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Today we face a new challenge: to connect with people, and make new disciples, in a rapidly changing world.

In the past, many students came to St George's, stayed to work in Leeds, and joined the church family. After a quiet period, we are now reaching to students again, and have refocused our evening service so that it is more appealing to students and those in their 20s and 30s.  The service has seen huge growth, students are back in large numbers, but we have more to do to adapt to the new culture. To strengthen our student work, we have recently appointed three full time Interns.

In addition, Leeds is developing rapidly as a centre of business for Yorkshire and the North. Thousands of jobs are being created, and residences built in the City Centre.

St George’s is well placed to reach these groups: students, city centre workers and residents. Our parish contains the central sites of the two universities and 30% of our resident population are students. We also have half of the commercial centre and many of the new residential developments (including one our doorstep, one floor of which will be our New Church Centre).

Now we need to work with them to create an environment into which it is easy to invite friends and colleagues so that they can discover the life and love of Christ for themselves.

We also need to find ways to equip ourselves to go out, as salt and light, to make Jesus known in the networks of relationships where he has placed us. Leeds Bible Talks (see website) is one such initiative to make Christ known to the world of work.

We want our worship and preaching, and all our communications to be accessible to contemporary people and culture, while remaining faithful to Christ and the Bible, to our senior members and to the good foundations on which we build.

We want to make new disciples, who become mature disciples, who are sent out into every area of life in our City, and beyond. This is how the Kingdom of God grows. Leeds is a city in the process of renewal. Our calling is to make new people for this city, servants of Jesus Christ. We cannot achieve this vision on our own, but only in partnership with all the churches and networks that share the vision.

In January 2005 we re-launched a central Alpha Course, which has had an encouraging response. Our vision is to develop a series of courses (like the SHAPE course and the Marriage course), and a group infrastructure, which will form a complete discipleship process through which we can grow to maturity as disciples, and be sent out in the name of Christ. To do this we need:

  A clear way IN to St George's and the Christian faith
  A clear way ON to Christian maturity
  A clear way OUT into Christian service and mission in daily life

With God’s help, we intend to develop just such a process in St George’s.

Families have been a strength of St George’s and will remain a priority. We want a partnership between home and church so that our young people become disciples and grow to maturity: confident, knowing their gifts and purpose in life, ready to make their mark on the world. To strengthen our Young People’s team, we have recently appointed a full-time Youth Worker.

St George’s already has many gifted leaders and mature Christians. The challenge here is to make the most of our gifts, resources and experience. So, a vital part of the discipleship process is to help people know God’s call, and the gifts and opportunities he has given them, in later life.

The vision is for the whole church to become a missionary congregation, doing God’s work in the city, and making new disciples for Jesus Christ.