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We discuss how churches are strengthening discipleship and helping people grow in confidence in the Bible in a changing culture.
The Quiet Revival Podcast: what's the story? explores the stories behind a renewed interest in Christianity in England and Wales.
Whether you’re a church leader, small group leader, Bible communicator or simply curious about the Church in the UK, this podcast will inform, encourage, and equip you to discover your place in this unfolding movement.
The Quiet Revival sparked a national conversation about faith, church and what God might be doing in England and Wales today. Since its publication and the recording of these podcast episodes, we've had to retract the report after the underlying data was found to be flawed – but the conversation it started hasn't ended.
The Quiet Revival was always more than a single survey. Across England and Wales we're seeing signs of renewed interest in Christianity, especially among younger people: rising Bible sales, more conversions and adult baptisms, growing attendance at evangelism courses. Many of you have shared stories that point to a changing spiritual landscape. The questions this moment raises are more important than ever.
How is your church responding to this missional moment? And how can you invite today’s spiritually open Gen Z to experience Scripture?
Andrew Ollerton (00:00)
we believe that the questions this moment raises are actually more important than ever.
Sian Rees (00:06)
If things are different, what do we need to do differently?
Pete Wynter (00:10)
We're the whole church to spend 50 minutes a day with the Lord and there's all these Bible readings which feels high bar. If we don't lay a sense of challenge in this pursuit and following of Jesus, in the discipleship Jesus, then I think we'll miss something in this moment. So this is a moment for confidence and boldness. Read, learn, be inspired by the stories of old, the good things, the bad things and the ugly things, all of it, so that we learn what it looks like to steward a rising tide of God's presence in our day.
Sian Rees (00:35)
Hi and welcome to Series 2 of the Quiet Revival podcast, What's the Story? I'm Sian and I'll be joined by Andrew Ollerton and many other exciting guests as we explore how churches are responding to the missional moment that we find ourselves in. I'm excited to be joined by Paul Williams as we kick off this new series. Paul, can you set the scene for us by talking about what has happened since Series 1 of the podcast?
Paul Williams (01:04)
Sure, well, thank you, Sian, and hello, friends. We are in the middle of a very significant shift in the spiritual climate, the missional landscape in Britain right now. ⁓ We've named one dimension of that, the Quiet Revival, and in the first season of this podcast, we've been exploring those changes, those trends, what's happening, exploring some of these shifts. But you will be aware
that Bible Society has withdrawn the original quiet revival report. And the reason for that is that YouGov told us that they had found a major error in the way that they had conducted the survey. Now I think it's important to understand that this doesn't mean that the findings are wrong. It means that we can't use the survey to reliably say anything in particular about the mission landscape anymore.
Now, we think that's important. We think research really matters and we are going to be doing an even more comprehensive study of the mission landscape in the coming months. And that will come out hopefully later this year. But in the meantime, we're to focus instead on what's actually being experienced on the ground. The survey, the statistics, the data is important. That's one thing. But what's actually happening in your local church, your community?
So, Sian, I know that you and others have gone out, you've spoken to church leaders, you've spoken to Bible communicators on the front lines for this podcast. I'm really looking forward to finding out exactly what those stories are because all over the country in a very wide range of churches, denominations, urban, rural settings, you've been looking to find out what's actually being experienced, what's going on, is there a change? And that's what's been gathered up in season two.
of this podcast. I think it's going to be a blast. I hope you really enjoy it. I'm certainly looking forward to it. Thank you so much for doing it, Sian
Sian Rees (03:07)
Andrew and I will be further unpacking stories of spiritual change, exploring ways to equip church leaders in raising Bible confidence, and mobilizing effective mission to meet this spiritual moment.
Andrew Ollerton (03:21)
Now while we can no longer rely on the data behind the Quite Revival report, the evidence for spiritual change seems to be growing stronger. We believe that the questions this moment raises are actually more important than ever. So in this second series we're saying, well we're saying this, if things are different now, how can we do things differently? If things have changed, how can we change what we're doing?
Sian Rees (03:48)
So journey with us again as we showcase local church stories and testimonies that capture different ways the church is responding to this moment and how they're raising Bible confidence in their setting.
Andrew Ollerton (04:01)
And
to kick off this episode, we're going to hear a conversation that Sian had with Pete Winter and some others from St Paul's Hammersmith. You might remember Pete from series one and we wanted to check in with him and see how things have changed and how they are changing what they're doing, increasing Bible confidence in the heart of London.
Sian Rees (04:23)
So Pete, you were kind enough to join us for series one and now you're back for series two. I guess my opening question would be, what's changed?
Pete Wynter (04:36)
What's changed since then? Well, I think within that series one, there's a lot of excitement, wasn't there? A lot of kind of, gosh, something seems to be happening. Something seems to be, there's definitely a stirring. And ⁓ in that respect, nothing's changed. I think that has continued to be the reality. And there's a great sense of expectation and momentum. I guess one of the challenges then, as well, has been like, well, with all these people being added, and in our particular context, where we are in St. Paul's.
there's been real growth. And so one of the challenges, what do we do now with these people who are landing in and lots of whom are not from a Christian home, not got a big grid for understanding what they do next, but many of them have had a significant encounter with God or have begun to engage in spiritual thinking practices and they're just working out now now what. And so for us, that's probably, that's been causing one of the changes and the challenges for how do we hold this now.
Sian Rees (05:29)
And how have these existing believers, if I can call them, how has the church responded to this new influx?
Pete Wynter (05:35)
Yeah, I think there's I think there is excitement I think I think it's the same as when any when if any church experiences growth you kind of get those kind of growth pains as well it's not all easy and no absolutely part of the danger would be I was you know there's quite revival stuff therefore everything must be great now and actually there's challenges on there you know how do I you know how do I relate to suddenly this influx of people who feel that they're acting like they're in the church right because there's a high sense of confidence like yeah I'm here and God's doing something and I'm now part of it and I'm at the front
And there's others who have been here quietly for 20 years just kind of faithfully hoping this would happen and now it's happening, definitely happening. And that provokes some challenge in terms of adjusting our expectations of what Sunday looks like. You we have challenges over connection, community, people feeling at home because it's like I'm not seeing the same people every week because it's now grown. But I mean, by and large, people are responding beautifully. And I think there's a general sense of expectation, hope.
Definitely a new buzz in life. It feels very alive and full of momentum.
Sian Rees (06:34)
So we're saying as a Bible Society at the moment that if things are different, what do we need to do differently? Has your method of mission, of Bible engagement, have you seen a change in the things that you're doing?
Pete Wynter (06:48)
Yeah, I think it connected to that boldness and confidence I've talked about. I think there is generally a one-to-one boldness that is emerging. ⁓ So that's a change, but I think more a change provoked by what we're seeing rather than what we're strategically trying to do. you know, people are... But again, I think that is also being born out of... ⁓
I would genuinely say people having more ready encounters with God's Spirit. So there's definitely something going on in that space here. An example would be, just a very recent example would be, we run worship rooms here, which are just a context of worship that often lead into intercession. And people...
seem to really meet with God in that space. You the reports walking out of that space are like, wow, I really sensed God's presence. Now, that's all you could say, that's all experiential. Is that the fluffy stuff? Whatever. I don't think it is. think God wants to meet with his people and he wants to reveal his presence. He wants people to encounter his presence and then be transformed. the
confidence that's coming as people are saying, well come Holy Spirit, fill me afresh, which is a deeply biblical practice. I think there's this confidence that's growing. So as a result, the little anecdotal story is that there's a young man who's been here a couple of years, Gen Z, he did a discipleship year here and then he got a job in a big global corporate in the city. Wonderful, there he is.
The week before he got his job he had a dream, which again I think is a God thing and it feels like we are definitely hearing more interruptions through dreams, prophetic things happening and they feel quite undeniable. for him, he had a dream before he got offered this job, he had a dream that he got offered this job and that he established a worship room in his corporate workspace in the city. Having experienced that for years here, for 18 months as long as he'd been here, a week later he's offered the job, he takes the job and he
feels convicted in his heart, I'm taking this job but I know that I need to be a Christian witness in my workplace and I need to live it out. And so he kind of worked things out, eventually came back to us and said we're going to do this thing, it's happening, don't have a keyboard, so you know from our discretionary funds that we have here which is kind of like help support different things, we said great we'll buy a keyboard and we'll, you know, let's start a worship room in the city. Off he went and he began and that was amazing. So those kind of things I think there's like a...
Missionally, there's a confidence, and that's coming from individuals.
Sian Rees (09:09)
And an assurance that actually this is us, this is who we are and this is what we do,
Pete Wynter (09:14)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And people aren't, as I said, they're not being met with so much resistance. So there's kind of more confidence to speak out. And that's been the key driver of the change of mission. mean, just, guess, to speak at a strategic level for church leaders or people who are thinking about leading their churches, I'd say that as a church, then, we're not trying to be lazy in mission, but I think we have, we are putting on less kind of events that are kind of bring your friends to this. ⁓
know, the kind of thing that if we do this then people might be comfortable to come to church.
We just don't do that anymore because they're coming to church anyway. So we're saying no to that kind of thing because it's like we don't need that at the moment. In this missional moment, we don't have to create that. It is just happening. They're coming anyway. The one thing we say bring your friends to are the baptism services, which are happening more. We're doing more baptism services than we have done before because people in those share their stories and those are kind of often epic moments that usually end up in real celebration and you get a whole bunch of people who have never been to
before because their friends getting baptized and they hear the story and they think this is amazing. So every baptism service people are giving their life to Christ and it's pretty sort of in a way we don't dial it down it's like it's deep end stuff it's like this is what we do this is how we worship it's our particular style and every church will have different styles but it's amazing that we don't we don't have to dial up the invitational gathering at the moment because we're just having to cope with what's coming through the door or what's already on the street and already God is doing.
Sian Rees (10:43)
It's incredible, I love hearing this. This is so beautiful. So at Bible Society we have a sort of theory of change, or at least that's what we call it, which means that we believe that Bible confidence can be described as impacting the head, the heart and the hands. In other words, you know, the academic side of understanding a Bible passage, perhaps some of its context, and then affecting our emotions and our heart and moving us, I guess. And then
to the hands, which is the outworking of the Bible. And it sounds like you're seeing very much all three of those aspects come to life.
Pete Wynter (11:20)
Bye.
Yeah, totally. And I totally agree with that. I love that theory of change because it's an absolute reality ⁓ as people are grasping that and going for it. We talk about a theory of change as well in terms of as a church life, which is as people encounter God and within that, when we talk about that, we would teach around that and all those things. We're not just talking about moments in a worship room where it's kind of a sense God's presence. Encounter is in serving somebody who is in
deep need and then you meet Jesus in the context of that social transformation. It's in the words of Scripture, you know, and we are encouraging more and more so. ⁓ We're always encouraging, you know, a lot of young people here, carry smaller Bibles in their back pockets, things like that, and that is almost like a culture thing that's going on. Often when we preach, we're saying, bring your Bible, you know, bring something physical, interact with it as we're preaching, because this, you're going to encounter God in the words of Scripture and you need to recognise that and you will meet with Him. So this kind of theory changes.
as you encounter God, you come alive.
and then you go out and awaken cities. it's that kind of, again, it moves to the, I guess you're talking about the hands and the feet, you? But this sort of thing actually, the encounters we've got, they're not about just us feeling like, wow, we know Jesus. They're actually, there's something that goes on there. There's something that then, know, life in all its fullness, we come alive and that can't help but spill over into awakening others. And so that's often what we're talking about and provoking and recognize that I recognize that the people who delve deeper into scripture, ⁓
are more likely to walk with confidence in awakening cities. we're working at strategies and ways in which we're mobilizing the church to recognize that and then to walk in that. So calling people to read scripture. We're about to go on a 50-day journey where we're calling the whole church to spend 50 minutes a day with the Lord. And there's all these Bible readings and scripture stuff. And they'll delve deep into the Bible. They'll get a whole overview of what it looks like for biblical awakening. What does that look like from a scriptural point of view? the whole church, we're
And again, I guess I'd say of that, you know, there's a whole load of spiritual disciplines connected to that particular journey that we're going to go on, which feels high bar. ⁓ But I think, again, I would say that I'm seeing these sort of younger emerging Christians absolutely wanting high bar. They're like, OK, so what do I do now? OK, do X, Y, Z. And I think if we don't lay a sense of challenge in this pursuit and following of Jesus, in the disruption of Jesus, then... ⁓
then I think we'll miss something in this moment because this emerging generation are very much looking for like, challenge me, I want to grow. Absolutely, They're wanting something, so beware of just going softly, softly and going, well, isn't it great you're here and just great that you turned up. That won't sustain, that's great. Passion goes for a moment, but you have to then add the structures and stuff. Absolutely. I think that's really important and that's what we're seeking to do.
Sian Rees (14:13)
So Pete,
just take us deeper into this 50 day challenge that you're doing. Have you found anything that's helped you to frame that or have you created it sort of organically?
Pete Wynter (14:24)
That 50-day thing, we're at the front end of sort of piloting a new thing, which we're calling Awaken 50. And really that has come through trying to work out how do we help particularly these new people who come into faith discovering this stuff, how do we help them engage with scripture and then build spiritual disciplines, habits that will give them the kind of structure that's needed around the initial passion. And I think that's really important. when you're again looking at revival history,
look back at the emergence of the Methodist movement. The Wesley's and others who were provoking and leading in a time when God was moving powerfully in our nation recognised some structure was needed. They set up things like holiness sets, like early small groups, with accountability questions of what was going on. So we learned from that and decided we're going to do something that's time-bound.
So it's only a commitment for 50 days, although it's high bar and we believe that people want that. Where they will be in much smaller groups of two to six, where they'll learn patterns of accountability, asking real life on life questions and being sort of guided and coached through doing that.
through this tool, Awaken 50. So they get really into the kind of depths of their character, what the questions are, what's really going on. It's much more specific than you can do in a congregation or even in a small group of kind of 15, 20 people. This is like more like, I guess, the prayer triplet thing. It's like three, four, five.
accountability around scripture. So every day there's a reading and guided prayers and then there's this kind of daily accountability, daily connection and that's all supported by introducing them through the process of the 50 days to some of these spiritual habits. So they'll be introduced to things like fasting, they'll be introduced to generosity and giving, they'll be introduced, yeah, was going say to the sort of accountability. Other little practices, another little practice will be phoning a friend in need each week.
So just again, partly trying to help, particularly in mind, you everybody needs to do that, particularly in mind of these 18 to 25s, like how do you begin to actually, you know, speak life to others, just get out of like tending your own world and how do I change, but how do I help others? And so just beginning to exercise the stuff I'm learning to bless other people, so leading them into pastoral ministry. So these little practices, they'll experience over the course of 50 days. And, you know, we've trialed that and it's been amazing to watch the few groups that have already gone through it.
and the sense of depth, commitment.
both to each other and to the Lord as a result. One or two churches have trialled it and there's one church in Crawley that has basically signed up to, they're on their fourth time through this Awakened 50 stuff and they've got literally hundreds of people who've gone through it and the vicar there would say there's been amazing transformation at a character level and the depth of discipleship has been much deeper as a result. And there are loads of advantages to it, I won't carry on about it, we are beginning exploring that and working out how to do that and have written it with this
congregation particularly in mind, how do we help these people really man into it. So it's quite a high bar thing but we're going for it.
Sian Rees (17:26)
Wonderful. So my final question, Pete, if that's okay. What would your words of encouragement, perhaps advice if you want, but how would you encourage the church leaders, the Bible engagement people, the communicators that are listening in this season? What would your words of hope be for them?
Pete Wynter (17:43)
I'm trying to, in a sense, provoke courage and boldness in myself because I think we're in a missional moment which is ready for those that are bold and courageous, they're going to step out. And not to sort of think, well, that's fine, it's happening over there, but not here. That may well be the case across the nation. I doubt every church is able to report stories of the quiet revival as you described it. every church, no, absolutely. There will be more. A lot of my friends are. And I was with a network of leaders just...
couple of weeks ago, a couple of hundred church leaders and almost all of them are reporting this upturn.
in attendance and engagement and people coming through the door. So, you know, that is more than anecdotal. This is like multiplied church upon church upon church. So this is a moment for confidence and boldness. And ⁓ as part of becoming bold and confident, I would encourage everyone to be reading both biblical and church history revival stories. know, revival isn't just a kind of, you know, isn't just reserved for, you know, people who are kind of energetic and excited. You know, God has moved by the power of his spirit in ways
in Scotland, in England, in other parts of the world, throughout church history and don't ignore those moments. Read, learn, be inspired by the stories of old, the good things, the bad things and the ugly things, all of it, so that we learn what it looks like to steward a rising tide of God's presence in our day. And of course, it's deeply biblical, know, it's not just church history, you know, a few stories from John Wesley or a few stories from John Labour's, whatever it might be. This is biblical history. can, you know, if you want to start somewhere deep
Sian Rees (18:50)
Awesome.
Pete Wynter (19:18)
in the Bible then do a review of biblical literature across the ages that point to revival moments where God's people were awakened to his presence, renewed their covenant with him and there was like this new kind of wave of God's kind of presence and like closeness to his people it happens again and again through scripture. Absolutely. So notice it, go after it, study it and that will help cultivate a courage to step into this moment so that we don't miss what's going on. don't think we
to be fearful that we're going to miss it. I think we're in something. Lots of people are recognizing it and we need to say, yes, God, now give me courage and help me move into it.
Sian Rees (19:57)
⁓ man. Pete, thank you so, much. feel really inspired, but just genuinely thank you so much for your time.
Pete Wynter (20:06)
You're very welcome.
Sian Rees (20:07)
I was also joined by Arthur, Luke, Mayaka and Emmanuel, who are all on the team at St Paul's and all of whom are passionate about helping people know Jesus, whether that's for the first time out on the street as they hand out Bibles or through one-to-one or group discipleship. What's clear from these interviews is their heart for reaching the City of London and we think their stories will inspire you.
So just coming to you Luke first if that's okay. Just paint us a picture of Hammersmith, people that you serve here at St Paul.
Arthur (20:42)
Yes
Luke (20:43)
Yeah,
sure. So predominantly Sian, I serve in relation to like the evangelism team. And I could go on all day about this, but yeah, in terms of what we're trying to do, we're basically trying to offer Christ to people on the street and then go from there.
Sian Rees (20:58)
incredible. Is there one particular story maybe Luke that's particularly impacted you, something that's really stood out?
Luke (21:05)
Well that comes to mind. So I went on like an evangelism course a few months ago with Speak Life and it like an intensive essentially. We talk about storytelling and how we meet with people. anyway, I was like had like a picture or like an idea come to mind. A sense of I've been like the spirit essentially. And it was more about like storytelling. And there's a guy that I encountered and a really sweet man and also kind of prompted to read him a story. And we read the parable of lost son essentially.
And I went through that, it was like a couple minutes to tell that to him. I might tell like the headlines of that story, but we actually opened up the book and then he was with me for a few minutes doing that and we did parade with him.
Sian Rees (21:46)
I mean that sounds amazing. It sounds like the Bible is coming alive on the streets of Hammersmith. mean, guys, I don't know who wants to answer this question, but how do you help people to engage with the Bible once they've received a copy?
Miacah (21:58)
So normally we invite people to Alpha, just meeting people where they're at. So we have Alpha every week. And from Alpha we ⁓ have a discipleship program which is called Foundations. And Foundations is a 10-week course. And that's where we go deeper with them. In our Foundations we will talk about our values at St. Paul's. So we speak about what is awakened.
about the Holy Spirit and then that goes into our life groups on a smaller scale so that's where you get to do life with those people and they're in their small groups and from that that's where they will have cheerleaders that's when we really go into the Bible now and we are ⁓ saying you're learning those skills about actually how to hear from God how do we read the Bible our identity in Christ
and how do we apply what the Bible says to our lives? And they do it in closed community and it's such a safe space for them. ⁓ And also we train up life group leaders as well. ⁓
Sian Rees (23:07)
So in effect, everybody's being discipled because you're either new to it or you're learning how to disciple others. I've heard a number of you talking about this word, awakening. You're talking about awakening the city. But you actually have an Awaken 50 program, right? Tell us about the program, what its aim is, and perhaps something of the impact that that's had on the people who've been through it.
Miacah (23:13)
Definitely, yeah.
Arthur (23:32)
Yeah, it's really exciting. Some of the transformation I've seen has been absolutely remarkable, not just in our relationship to God and how we've connected with the Holy Spirit throughout our walks, but with others. I've been lucky enough to do it twice, both in all guys' groups, and the sense of brotherhood that is achieved after 50 days is remarkable. can't even... It's night and day between the 50 days. And it is, yeah, an amazing journey where you really dive into...
ancient rhythms, things like fasting. It introduces a lot of people who never come across this stuff and they're confronted with, ⁓ the early church fasted, Jesus fasted. He said, when you fast? And it kind of begins this journey of deep end discipleship for a lot of people. So yeah, my experience has been extremely positive. For me, it's felt more than just a 50 day program. It kind of set me up on this journey where I feel like I am set up to win.
I feel really well-discipled. I ⁓ able to create deep connections with people who I'm walking with. I feel an ease with accountability with other friends. And one of the most transformational practices that I personally found was 50 minutes a day of quiet time and prayer. I'd never experienced anything like that. I came into it being like, this is going to be such a stretch for me. But actually being in a group,
and us all saying, we're committing to this. ⁓ I was forced with a choice and I decided to carve out 50 minutes a day into prayer and worship and ⁓ in quiet time with God. And it's something that I've stuck with ever since. And honestly, don't understand how I functioned as a human being without that now. ⁓ I would actually say like, I need more than 50 minutes a day with God. ⁓ And that's just a journey that the Lord has brought a lot of guys on and will bring a lot more
people through as Awaken50 kind of expands and grows. But yeah, that was kind of my experience with Awaken50.
Sian Rees (25:32)
And so this whole theme of encounter with God seems to be really prevalent at the moment, whether that's through dreams or encountering Him in worship and the presence of God. Anyone want to contribute anything to do with, yes, you know, this has been a full-on encounter with the Lord.
Emmanuel (25:50)
Yeah, for me, ⁓ with my last year of studying to be a curate here at St. Paul's Hammersmith, we had a module called the Arts and Culture, and it's just describing how we don't only encounter God by reading scripture or doing the liturgy, we can encounter God through ⁓ nature, we can encounter God through movies or music. And it's just one of my things of life for me, because I'm dyslexic, so reading is really tough.
but I really want to encounter God. So one of the elements that helped me to encounter God was through fitness. And one of the big things lately is movies. And I was watching Iron Man. I was watching Iron Man. And there was a moment where the guy saved Tony Stark, but then the guy decided, you know, I will sacrifice my life so you can live. Tony Stark wanted to save him. And then he said, no, no, I'm fine because my family is dead. I'm going to meet them.
Don't waste your life, just don't waste it. And I was like, it just reminded me of when I encountered Jesus, I was in my lowest point and Jesus came to me and said, don't waste your life. I've got so much more for you. And it's like now there's a whole space where, okay, you can encounter people, encounter God in the church, you can encounter God through conversation. But on your day to day life, whether you like movies, you like sports, you like nature, you can also encounter God and
but you have to have your spiritual eyes like open. You have to be, just be open.
Sian Rees (27:22)
It sounds like all four of you have real confidence in your faith, you're very assured. And has that come from discipleship itself in your own personal faith? How has that come about?
Arthur (27:38)
I mean, I can only speak for me personally, but I think the first point for me would be an encounter with God, a slight realization that God is worth going through hard things for. It's worth the meat and the grip. No one wants to be sat reading a book for 50 minutes a day when they want to be eating their porridge in the morning or getting out the door. But honestly, it is kind of the joy set before of, no, there is someone so good at the other end of this. There's something so worth investing this time.
fasting, no one wants to give up food for the day. if I'm going to get more of Jesus, okay, that's a different story. And so for me, was encountering the goodness of God, becoming aware of how much He loved me, how much He cared for me, and how much He actually wanted the best for me. And I didn't know what that looked like. I didn't know what was best for me. And so submitting myself to that and realizing, ⁓ if this God is good and if He loves me, I should probably check out what He says in His Bible.
⁓ And then from that place being transformed and kind of continuing a spiral of encountering God, encountering His goodness in the Bible and being like, okay, I want more. And just kind of this circle and circle of going deeper and deeper with God.
Sian Rees (28:46)
Beautiful. So my final question to you all is I'm going to ask you for one encouragement that you could give to our listeners who are perhaps pastors or leaders in their own sphere, perhaps they're working in different spheres of influence. What would you say to encourage them in their own journey of Bible confidence, of evangelism, in discipleship, et cetera? How would you sort of cheer them on in this cultural moment?
Emmanuel (29:14)
One of the things I can encourage that has helped me so much is not to be afraid to be different. we can come into church or we can come into discipleship and say, okay, this has been proven and done. I need to follow it. But God has given us a unique gift in. And one of the things that when I was coming to Christ, God showed me like an image of like, He told me that, look around you, everything was created by someone's imagination and faith.
now is the norm that, there's internet, so someone thought of it and I will encourage everyone to don't be afraid to be different and God has put something in your heart to create something new for the next generation, I'll say.
Sian Rees (29:54)
That's really inspiring. Thank you, Mayuka.
Miacah (29:58)
For us,
as we continue to disciple, something that I've recognized in a lot of people that have come to faith is ⁓ they're concerned a lot about how do we hear God? How do we pray? How do I read the Bible? And I always say to them,
God has made you differently. So how I read the Bible, which would be with me with a journal, my quiet time, a coffee, silent in the morning, for someone else, it will be going for a walk in the park with the audio book in. So I would say just know what it is, how God has created you and not to look to the left or the right, just have confidence in that.
Sian Rees (30:40)
So
wise, thank you.
Luke (30:42)
Yeah, I think in terms of what we've made in our own different ways and it's to prayerfully consider what it is that will help shape us to become more like Christ ultimately and not to be afraid of whatever that looks like as well. It could be more intellectual for some people. It could be more on an emotional heart level for other people as well. And then to also get a good
teaching as well. So I could recommend the Bible course by the Bible Society. That is a great course, which I have done. So particularly coming from a non-Christian household and yeah, being an atheist, I'd never real framework for what Christianity or faith or anything else like that would like to be honest. And then when I did that, it really helped to just paint the bigger picture and beautifully presented. It's all communicated. And then from there, they went into the Romans course and they basically deepened them all that.
knowledge from there. Because you can do it, you can pick lots of bits and pieces up at church or online and conversations and you know, go to do lots of Bible studies and things. But until you actually really put in the work to understand the bigger picture, then things start to really come into place.
Andrew Ollerton (31:47)
There is so much to be encouraged by in there.
Sian Rees (31:50)
There really is. What strikes me about these conversations is the evidence of spiritual hunger. From the conversations out on the street as they hand out Bibles, to the genuine desire to be discipled, it's quite extraordinary. Then of course, their hunger for reading the Bible. Spending 50 minutes every morning with the Lord is no small thing. And yet our guests were saying that even that isn't enough time to be spending with Jesus at the start of every day.
While we're on the subject of engaging with the Bible, Andrew, there's going to be a biblical reflection in each episode so that we can link what God is doing in the here and now to what happened in His word thousands of years ago. So over to you.
Andrew Ollerton (32:35)
Thanks, Sian. Well, let's turn to the Bible, shall we? And particularly the Gospel of Luke. In chapter five, there's something that feels surprisingly contemporary. Jesus is standing by the Lake of Gennesaret or Galilee and there's something unusual happening. The crowds aren't hostile. They're not skeptical. Instead, they're pressing in, eager and attentive, hungry to hear the Word of God. So it's kind of like Jesus is in a moment of spiritual openness.
And what's striking is not just the openness of the crowd, but what I find really challenging is the response of Jesus. He doesn't just simply carry on as before. He doesn't default to the familiar model of a rabbi teaching a small group sitting at his feet. That just wouldn't have worked. Instead, he pauses, sees what's happening, observes and adapts. And then he steps into Simon's boat.
they push it out from the shore and he begins to teach over the water. Now it's a small detail but it reveals something I think significant. When the moment changes, Jesus changes his method. The message, of course, remains the same, what he communicates, but the mode flexes to meet the opportunity. And for those of us leading churches and communicating the Bible, shaping discipleship today, that should give us pause for thought because
We too are living in a moment where there's spiritual changes in the landscape across our cities and certainly in places like London as we've just seen. There are signs of fresh openness. People are searching. They're pressing in. They're exploring Scripture. Many are encountering the Bible before they've actually encountered the church. They're arriving not as blank slates but already part-formed.
already curious, questioning, sometimes surprisingly well read. In other words, the crowd is gathering again to hear the words of God. But that raises a question. Are our methods ready to meet them? You see, in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 5, Jesus recognizes that the conventional approach would be a bottleneck.
it would limit God's work. Too many people are coming. There's not enough access to do it that way. So he creates space. He amplifies his voice across the water. He repurposes what's already to hand, a fisherman's boat, and it becomes a floating pulpit. The lake becomes the natural amplifier. I love it, don't you? It's innovative. But more than that, it's intentional. It's Jesus saying, in effect, how can I reach more people
with the Word of God right now, in this moment. How could I repurpose what I've got and reach more? That's the question for us. If people are exploring faith, digitally searching, long before they walk into a building, how do we meet them there? Not just with invitations to events, but with real substance online. If there's a growing appetite for depth, for scripture, for prayer, for practices that shape the whole of life.
Are we ready to offer more than low bar occasional engagement? Because increasingly that's not what people are looking for. What we're seeing in many places is that those who are coming are not asking for less, they're asking for more. More depth, more clarity, more challenge, more formation. They don't want nominal attendance, they want to be transformed. And that begins to reshape
how we think about discipleship. If things are different, we need to do things differently. Not as something optional, but as central, structured and intentional, engaging the head, the heart and the hands, creating pathways where people can encounter God daily through scripture, prayer and building the rhythms that anchor their lives. In a sense, it's about recognising that we need to be fishing in deeper waters.
rather than paddling in the shallows. Which brings us to the second half of this passage in Luke 5. You see, after teaching from the boat, Jesus turns to Simon, Peter, and says, out into deeper water and let down the nets for a catch. Simon's response, as always, is honest. He says, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. It's the voice of experience, of expertise, of having done things the usual way for a long time and seen limited fruit.
But then comes this remarkable line, but because you say so, I will let down the nets. This is where vision meets obedience. It's one thing to recognize that the moment has changed. It's another to trust Jesus enough to do something different, to move into deeper water, to risk new approaches, to let go of methods that once worked, but may not serve the mission now in the same way.
And what follows is abundance, nets overflowing, boats filled to the point of sinking more than enough and more than they could manage alone. It's a picture not just of fruitfulness, but of shared mission, partners called in, capacity stretched, community required to hold what God is doing. And perhaps that too speaks to our moment. If God is stirring new openness,
If people are gathering again around His Word, then the invitation is not simply to do more of the same. It's not work harder, but work smarter. It's join Jesus in reimagining how we can make that Word more accessible, compelling and transformative. I dare you to ask with fresh honesty, where are the bottlenecks? What needs to be repurposed? What might it look like to reach into deeper waters? Because the challenge
And the opportunity is this. If things are different, we need to do things differently. If things have changed, we need to change what we're doing. And as we do, we may just find that the same Jesus who taught from the water, from a boat, from a floating pulpit, that Jesus is still leading his people into deeper and more fruitful waters today.
Sian Rees (39:07)
Thanks, Andrew. That was really, really rich. Isn't it extraordinary how Jesus just captured the moment and read it so well and saw that things were so different? And I think the question for us, as Andrew said, is are we willing to trust Him and to go ahead and do something different in this moment? We want to invite you to send us your questions as we'll be having a Q &A episode at the end of the series. You can email us.
at podcasts at biblesociety.org.uk or you can visit biblesociety.org.uk slash questions to submit a question which we will have a go at answering on the final episode of this series.
Andrew Ollerton (39:51)
Well, thanks for tuning in to this first episode of Series 2. We're excited for you to hear our next conversation, which was recorded in rural North Wales, where a church community is seeing people both come to faith and engaging with the Bible.
Sian Rees (40:07)
So until then, don't forget to subscribe, share this with a friend and send us your questions for the Q &A. See you next time.