‘Following Jesus on the margins’ is the strapline of the Crucible course, now in its eighth year. Six weekends of training, based in Birmingham, offer church pioneers, church planters and urban missioners opportunities to learn together and share experiences.
‘Following Jesus on the margins’ is the strapline of the Crucible course, now in its eighth year. Six weekends of training, based in Birmingham, offer church pioneers, church planters and urban missioners opportunities to learn together and share experiences.
The course starts with the assumption that the emerging post-Christendom culture in Britain presents a new mission context with fresh opportunities and significant challenges.
Although the churches may be marginal in this culture, rather than centrally located, there are plenty of biblical and historical precedents for anticipating creative developments on the margins of church and culture. The Crucible course aims to encourage and resource creative and contextual pioneering.
The course is an initiative of Urban Expression (www.urbanexpression.org.uk), one of the partners of Ekklesia in the Anabaptist network of organisations, and is run in partnership with the Northumbria community, Workshop, BMS World Mission, the Incarnate Network and others.
Some bursaries are available in case of need, although the course is not expensive.
The next weekend is 2-3 February 2012, offering two main options – ‘The Urban Challenge’ and ‘Becoming Human’. In partnership with Rural Ministries we are also offering for the first time an alternative module, ‘The Rural Challenge’.
Further details can be found at www.cruciblecourse.org.uk or email the administrator, Doreen Westley ([email protected]).
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© Stuart Murray works as a trainer and consultant under the auspices of the Anabaptist Network. He is author and editor of many books, including The Naked Anabaptist (Paternoster, 2011). He is editor-in-chief of the highly regarded After Christendom series of books. More on Stuart’s work here.