Beacon Church scores big with fruitful outreach

It’s a season of growth and change for Blackburn’s Beacon Church, through which God is encouraging unity and the use of everyone’s gifts. Pastor Emmanuel Ofosu explains

“I’d describe 2024 as a year of grace, growth, settling and strengthening,” says Emmanuel Ofosu. Emmanuel is senior pastor at Beacon Church in Blackburn and is reflecting on his first year leading the congregation since taking up the role in November 2023.

In terms of grace and growth, he begins, one of the most noticeable changes recently has been an influx of families and different nationalities.

“Since I joined the church six years ago there’s been quite a bit of generational change,” he says. “We’ve transitioned to become a younger church, from my son – who’s one – as the youngest to a lady who’s the oldest, at 93. Families are joining us regularly.”

A father who discovered the church just over a year ago is a typical example.

“His family had been in Blackburn for a few months and he was looking for a church. He used to walk past our building regularly – we’re close to a retail centre – and one day he noticed us.

“He said it felt like he was being led here and started coming with his children. They’ve been part of the church ever since.

“We’ve had different nationalities join us too – people from Britain, El Salvador, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Kenya and France.”

One age group that is blossoming in particular is the youth.

“We’ve seen great growth among our young people,” says Emmanuel.

“They went to a youth camp in Yorkshire, for example, and four decided to get baptised. They’ve formed true relationships among themselves too.”

Another fruitful area for Beacon Church is its outreach on a tough local estate. “One of the things you notice about Blackburn is that the churches here all focus on different areas of the town because we can’t all cover everywhere ourselves,” he says. “For us, one of our main outreaches is on an estate called Shadsworth. We had a Friday night youth club there until a couple of years ago, then a new youth leader joined us and we launched a weekly football academy for nine- to twelve-year olds on the estate instead.

“That’s in its second year now and it’s been great for helping us to get to know the kids and reaching out to their families.”

The church has also forged strong links with schools on the estate. “We’ve been running Messy Church at the infant school for a year or so to reach families there with the gospel. “We’ve got a great relationship with the headteacher so we also get invited in to do assemblies. At one we did recently we shared with the children about worship and prayer. That was fantastic!”

Transition

Twenty twenty-three was a year of huge transition for Emmanuel, with the church’s previous pastor of 14 years moving on.

He is grateful, therefore, that 2024 provided an opportunity to settle into his new role and invite the church to come together to pray about what God would like them to do in future. “I feel it was a year of strengthening the core group of people in our church,” he explains.

“Some people think of church as having a pastor, an assistant pastor, a youth leader and so on, and they are the ‘ministry people’ who do everything.

“But when I took over I really sensed God saying that whatever the church had ahead of us we needed to rally round and work together, with each of us doing different things.

“He led us to strengthen our fellowship with him first, then with each other, and then come together to serve.”

What Emmanuel and the church have come to realise is that God was preparing them for another big change.

“Our assistant pastor Simon Gimeno and his wife Kirsty are leaving to lead another church in Blackburn,” says Emmanuel. “They’ve been here for around three years doing youth and children’s work and it’ll be a big hit for us.

“I found myself asking God, ‘What’s happening? Who will you send and what should we do?’

“I felt the Lord reminding me of what I’ve just said – that we are going into this new season as a church together. Instead of rushing in to find someone new, then, I want to focus on identifying gifts and encouraging people in church to step up and serve together in different areas because we can all do our bit.

“I feel really passionate about getting each and every member to contribute to our ministry in some way.

“I’m a strong believer in ‘there is something in you’ in the sense that God created all of us with specific skills that he can use for his glory.

“If we get closer to God and to one another as the body of Christ, we can fulfil our God-given purpose together.

This article first appeared in Direction Magazine. For further details, please click here.