Asbury & Wildfires
Many of you will have heard about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit which started at Asbury University in Kentucky in the United States, and now seems to be spreading around the world. We know how desperately our nation, us included, needs a powerful move of God, and I know that many of us are hoping and praying that this is the start of such a move.
As part of this I, and many others, sense that this year’s Wildfires Festival (which is on Monday 29th to Wednesday 31st May) is going to be a significant time for us to meet with God in a fresh way as he prepares us for what he is about to do. The tag line for Wildfires has always been ‘Coming together to contend for the next great awakening’ – I believe that this year may be the year that we begin to see that desire become a reality. I also sense that God wants to do a particular thing amongst our children and young people, and that it is vital that we make it possible for as many of them to be at Wildfires as possible.
If you want to get more of a flavour of what has been happening at Asbury, and how that might impact Wildfires, then I recommend listening to this conversation between Rachel Hughes, Pete Greig and Pete Hughes. The first five minutes are comedy gold, but if you persevere beyond that you’ll hear some inspiring reflections from the two Pete’s on their visits to Asbury, and the thoughts of all three on the impact they hope it will have on Wildfires.
Based on all of this I’ve got four requests:
Let’s be asking God to move in us, our church, the nation and the nations. We need a fresh move of God now more than at any time in most of our lifetimes – let’s be praying that this is it.
If you can, book in for the whole of Wildfires (and come to Big Church Day out on the weekend before too). I realise that it isn’t cheap, but I believe that the spiritual investment you will be making in both yourself and your loved ones will more than than justify the cost. You can find all the details, plus information on the bursary fund which we hope to have available, here.
If you can’t make it to the whole of Wildfires then come for one of the days. We are planning on running a coach on the Monday to help people get there, but you can also make your own way down if that works better for you. We will post details on the coach soon, as well as letting you know when day tickets go on sale.
Please consider giving to our Celebration Fund. This is a fund we have set up to try to make sure that finances aren’t a barrier to anyone coming to Wildfires by providing bursaries, as well as funding the community facilities we will have on site and the people running them. We currently have about £2,000 in the fund but think we need around £20,000 to cover everything we would like to do. We will also use this fund to give bursaries for the children and youth events we are planning in the summer. By giving you will be making an incredible investment in the lives of others, as well as hugely blessing a senior pastor who is desperate for as many people as possible to be able to be there :)
Blessings,
Simon