“Adopt London”  seeks to reach a new generation of lostness

London is a city with over 300 different spoken languages representing 190 nations. Some have said that if we can reach London with the Gospel, we can reach the world. The IMB London team needs your help to make this a reality. As a way to reach every nook and cranny of this international city, Tim Pelley, team leader for the London city team is inviting Southern Baptists to get involved.

“We want to cast a vision of how to reach London from across the sea,” Pelly said, “because every avenue to the world comes through this city.”

‘Adopt London’ is an initiative created by London missionaries to saturate the city in prayer, sow the seed of the Gospel and help American partners become catalysts for new work. London is divided into 33 boroughs, something akin to an American county, and each of these city segments is available for adoption. The adopting church becomes an intern, working with missionaries in London to create a strategy for tearing down strongholds in the community and affecting change for Christ.

“We want people from the adopting church to be in the borough, understanding the lostness there, multiplying the missionaries’ presence in the city and giving them a catalytic contact,” said Matt Fontenot, a London city team member who is in charge of Borough Strategy Partners.

He points out that they are not looking for church-to-church partnerships, but church-to-community partnerships. The local churches are not reaching most Londoners. The idea is to start, not where the present church is, but where the people are—to find opportunities for natural life-changing conversations to take place.

“We are dreaming of volunteers making in-roads that enable the lost to hear the gospel and form into new churches relevant to the communities from which they came,” Fontenot said. “Partners can use their talents, hobbies and passions to share concentrated time with people, using a missional approach to witnessing through life-on-life situations.”

Small groups with similar interests can use their hobbies and interests to engage population segments in the boroughs—photography clubs, hiking excursions, cycling teams are just a few ideas of how to connect with a group of locals. The goal is to see grass roots groups formed and leaders trained.

The question most often asked is “Why one more church in a country famous for its churches?

“Just because there are three churches within a four block radius does not mean these churches are reaching the lost in their community,” Fontenot said, “proximity doesn’t mean connect-ability.” In fact, churches in London are actually being turned into high-priced flats or day care centers. “The days of ‘this is the church this is the steeple open the doors and see all the people’ are gone,” he said.

If London is going to hear the gospel it won’t be from the pulpit or mass invitations hung from sign posts, but from the lips of believers in relationship with those who have never heard.  “This is what the London team is asking borough strategy churches to do.  Come to London and join in relationship with those who have never heard,” Fontenot said.

There are eight borough strategist churches (BSC) already involved in ministry. One BSC has been coming for eight years and has prayer walked every one of the 2000 streets in their borough, which has a population of 300,000. The BSC churches rely on each other and recently had a conference in to pool ideas and conduct learning peer groups. There is also partnership and training from missionaries living on location, as well as material available for incoming volunteers.

“We take the churches through the whole process, like an internship,” Fontenot says.

He and Pelley have created material to help people do missions through life—for example, prayer walking guides for men and women traveling for business, contact information and opportunities for students doing a semester abroad and mission trip “kits” for a group that wants to come over and engage the lost.

The London team will walk volunteers through the process, beginning with training in London where the vision is presented and the adoption process is explained. A second training will prepare leaders—typically a strategist, a prayer advocate and a logistics coordinator. Conference dates in 2012 are May 9-12 2012, and September 12-15 2012.