Fire in our hearts - Jesus Army

FIRE IN OUR HEARTS
NEW GENERATION
gling out of her institutionalism, was given a helping hand
and a raw taste of the future.
Youth was in upsurge. ‘A rising star, that’s what I am!’ was a
hit when Crossrhythms reviewed our tape The Greatest Cause.
New bloods wanted to win their spurs and this could mean
releasing treasured sons to pioneer new scenes.
From Ian ‘Greatheart’s’ base in Sheffield, the north was
wide open. Ian was keen to give his ‘young turks’ their head.
We now had a bus, kitted out with bunks, that lan’s men took
over the Pennines in search of adventure. The mould-breaking
team, without established leaders or community members,
descended on Barnsley, Wakefield, Bradford, Halifax and
Huddersfield ending up in Leeds where a church plant was
now under way. Their success pointed the way ahead.
Ian was emerging as a pioneer with an apostolic spirit. Steve
‘Capable’ was another folk hero with church-building skills.
Charismatic personalities like these foreshadowed the future
which must lie in gifted people birthing church and community
at a distance.
Our Northampton community had come into being through
apostolic ministry but daughter churches in Warwickshire,
Birmingham or even London were transplanted from mother
stock. Locals swelled the numbers, but the core group always
came from ‘home’. This wasn’t on. We couldn’t be forever
dividing up the clump.
Ian’s base was 100 miles away. He felt their situation was
similar to Antioch’s in the early church. The Jerusalem community
had spread through Judea and Samaria and up to Antioch
by migration. But from Antioch onwards the thrust out-
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