More Together than Apart - Global 2024
For this week's blog, I have asked Joe Macnamara (who we recently announced will become Lead Pastor of King's from September 2025) to tell us about last week's Newfrontiers Global conference.
It was a genuine honour for me and Sylvia to attend the Newfrontiers Global Conference this year. The annual conference gathers about 200 leaders from around the world, and we had both been looking forward to going for some time.
In the first session, hosted by Steve and Deb Tibbert, we heard from Terry Virgo, the founding father of Newfrontiers, who shared some of the major prophetic words that have shaped and continue to shape our movement of churches. It stirred our faith to hear all that God has done, and it was an important reminder that we must continue to be a spirit-filled church, hungry for more of God!
There were many highlights from the conference I could share with you: superb teaching by Pastors from four different continents, incredible times of sung worship which were led fantastically by our King’s Church worship team, inspiring stories of multiplication from people pioneering into unreached people groups - including one man who, after spending multiple hours travelling by car and train, rode a snow mobile for two hours to reach a small village of people who hadn’t heard about the love of Jesus!
However, there is one highlight that stands out the most: the sense of unity amongst a diverse family. The conference is a healthy reminder that we are part of something far bigger than ourselves - we are a part of global family! There were over 80 nations represented and I have never been in a context with such staggering diversity. We worshiped in Shona with the Zimbabweans; rejoiced with Bulgarians regarding the opening of many Bible Schools in their nation; celebrated stories of Gospel breakthrough and miracles in nations and places that I wouldn’t want to mention publicly due to ongoing persecution; and in the final session, I witnessed brothers and sisters from around the world breaking bread and praying together – a wonderful picture of Gospel unity.
Hearing from men and women in hugely pressured and challenging situations was both humbling and inspiring, a healthy reminder of both the privilege we have in our nation to worship God so freely, but also the long-held conviction by our family of churches that we are more together than we are apart. The whole conference was a potent reminder of 'how good and pleasant it is when God’s people dwell together in unity!'
In days when it can seem like Christianity is on the decline, particularly with the media narrative in our context, it was refreshing to hear that the Kingdom is advancing, God is building his Church and 'the Gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the world.’ Or as Andrew Wilson once said to me, ‘the church is always bigger than you think!’
Joe Macnamara
