‘This is what family must feel like’
Food has always been central to our church. In fact in the six years that Unlimited Church has existed we have never held any form of church service or meeting without food of some kind being involved. And it is not particularly because we ourselves are that interested in food. We are just convinced it is a brilliant way of bringing people together, loving them and valuing them and encouraging community.

Every week we go out as a church and talk to young people in and around Exeter City Centre. We have done it right from when we started. We actively go out and talk to the young people of Exeter. We are not expecting young people who don’t do church to come and find us, so we are committed to going out to where they are.It is a small city and we find there are often large numbers of young people hanging around the shopping centres and cathedral green. The thousands of students at the sixth form college appear to have a lot of collective free time.

In the early days we would approach, often tentatively, and ask a group of young people if they were willing to talk to us. It still surprises me that the majority of young people are keen to talk to us, and are mostly incredibly polite and respectful even when our views differ hugely from theirs. Initially we would talk to them about the fact that we were starting a youth church. We asked them what they thought about church. What they would like to see in a church designed around young people. We moved the conversation onto God. What they thought about Him. What they thought He thought about them. And when it was appropriate we would offer to pray for them. We would listen with our hearts and Bibles open to hear what God might want to speak into their lives. The words were offered lightly but over the ten years or so since we have been doing this we know many loves have been deeply affected by these simple prayers.

But we quickly we realised that we could only get so far with this model. It was no good in cold weather. It was even worse on rainy days, and of course we live in Britain. We needed a building to invite the young people into. We needed a place that could be church. Miraculously we were offered the rental of a small room attached to a city centre church. It was centrally located, but tucked away. We decorated, added pictures and scatter cushions, we bought hot chocolate, cream and marshmallows. We had a vision of a youth café, despite the room only being big enough for eight seats and a coffee table. Even with new furnishings and decoration we remained aware that as the room was located down a dark and rather smelly alleyway, there was no way any young person was ever going to find our church. Either God or we as a team, or both, would have to bring them there.

To our great joy almost from the first week of having this café God brought young people along. Many had never been in a church before. They expected silence and solemnity, organ-music and candles. Universally we were not what they expected. We laughed a lot with them. We were generous with them with piles of cake and hot chocolate mountains. We just spent time with them. Week after week young people returned, trusting us enough to invite their friends. We became known as a safe space. We talked to them about our faith. We gave them a space in which it was good to ask questions. Everyone who came was offered prayer if they wanted it.

From the start we always tried to have home baked cakes. All the team were involved in baking. Students cooking in their halls of residence, the older members around other work commitments. None of us found it is easy. I became skilled at making large numbers of double chocolate chip muffins. I was perhaps even better at making Victoria Sponge cake but it was never as popular. We persisted in making the cakes ourselves, even when it would have been easier and perhaps cheaper to buy them from the local supermarket, because we wanted everything about that room, that space, to be the very best it could be. I wanted the people who came to learn something of their value through the quality of what they received from us. I wanted them to know they meant more to me, to God, than some powdered coffee and a packet of biscuits. That even before they arrived I had invested time, money and energy into them. In short, they mattered.

In time two girls, Jess and Kety, who came to café began to ask more and more questions about God. They started reading the Bible with one of the team members and there were great celebrations when they became Christians. And this was the moment that we as a team had been waiting for. All along we had resisted starting a Sunday service for this church for young people, even though team were asking for it, when we didn’t actually have any young people. We resisted because wanted to design the service around them. We wanted them to feel comfortable. We wanted them to have input and a say in what church should look like. Our very first service we decided to base around a meal. There was no kitchen at our church, and then we were only ten members, so we met late on a Sunday afternoon for toasted sandwiches, cake and drinks, and sat and ate as a family. A short service followed. It was all done in an hour. The was a meal, a talk, one song and a video to think about. As we sat around the table and ate Jess turned to a team member and said ‘I guess this must be what family feels like’, and in that instant I knew that we had got it right. We were called to be church, to be family to these young people. Many of the young people we were meeting had broken and dysfunctional families. We were staggered at how difficult many of their lives were. We were heart broken by their stories. And we were called to be family to them. To be a safe haven in their week.

And so from that first service that intention has never changed. We have had to be more creative in how we provide food with no kitchen as the church has grown. Our youth café still runs. Average attendance is now over fifty and so baking the cakes is more of a challenge. As is making the many, many toasted sandwiches that we offer. But every week young people return and bring their friends and over cake and sandwiches we can get to know them, talk to them, come alongside them. It is a real privilege.