This is the year of hope!

Against a bleak cultural backdrop, we have an alternative message of hope and the ground is fertile for sharing it. That’s why we should have great hopes for 2025 says Evangelical Alliance’s CEO Gavin Calver

I am more hopeful about 2025 than any other year I’ve been in ministry. Does that sound strange considering there’s such a bleak cultural narrative at present? Perhaps. But alongside that there is a greater openness to our alternative message of hope, and the ground has never been more fertile for us to share that.

Bleak reality

On the face of it, our culture has rarely felt so hopeless. Last year, for example, we had a Labour government come in with a word for its slogan that doesn’t normally exist on its own: change. With previous political landslides like Blair or Obama, “change” and “hope” went together as the rhetoric for them getting in. This time, change was promised alongside managing our expectations with warnings that things are going to get worse.

Life is challenging outside politics, too. I’m a parent of teenagers and I don’t know anyone who is saying it’s easy to raise kids in this environment. They’re not saying their kids have great aspirations for their futures, that they’re planning to buy their own homes, that things are going to be brilliant. People are acknowledging life is hard. The secular stories we’re being told have never felt so weak.

We sing a different tune, however, and our Jesus story has lost none of its depth, truth or wonder. This is where my hope lies for 2025: I’m really optimistic about the message the church can sound into our culture.

Hope from the margins

For years we’ve tried so hard to be relevant, but actually it’s our difference that is appealing to people right now. I’m not finding anyone who doesn’t want to talk about hope at the moment.

As Christians, we’re more marginalised than we’ve ever been before, but this actually creates an incredible opportunity for the gospel. Major moves of God don’t tend to happen when the church is socially acceptable – they happen from the margins. How can we take advantage of this and speak Jesus into our challenging culture and situations?

Diverse and united

From my perspective leading the Evangelical Alliance there are several reasons why I’m confident that’s already happening. One is our growing membership. People from across the evangelical spectrum are joining us and it’s not just Pentecostals, Anglicans, Baptists or new church models, it’s across the church. Up to last April we’d targeted a 3,000 rise in individual members, for example, but we gained 5,000 instead.

We now have more than 80 networks, denominations or streams within our membership and they are so diverse that on any given Sunday when I’m invited to preach somewhere I can’t predict what the church will be like until the first worship song. Is this an arms-in-the air church? Am I an ethnic majority or minority here? Will I be translated this week? Am I young or am I old? It’s a wonderful situation to find yourself in. We’re here to serve the whole evangelical church and to provide a port in the storm for every Christian who wants their voice to be heard in our culture.

And with this incredible diversity we’re able to stand together in saying that being an evangelical means we won’t compromise on God’s Word, that the death and resurrection of Jesus is central, and personal conversion is a necessity not a choice.

Surprising moves from God

Another thing I see as a visiting speaker to churches around the UK gives me hope: God is moving, often unexpectedly.

In the past nine months I’ve seen spontaneous baptisms twice after my talks. I’ve heard about this happening in other parts of the world but had never seen it here before now.

I’ve also seen God move when I’ve least expected it. At one church I was asked to speak and give a gospel appeal at the end. Being honest, it was a dreadful sermon. I was expecting no one to respond – if anything I thought some people would unfollow Jesus – yet lots of people became Christians.

Over lunch the pastor told me, “We keep having below-average sermons and we keep seeing people come to faith because God is moving.” Things are happening and it can only be God.

What about us?

The question is, how can we see more of this? I recently wrote a ten-year directive for the EA in which I said we need to hold our nerve theologically without compromise, and to wholeheartedly share the gospel.

We’re helping individual Christians and churches with that. This year, for example, we’re releasing some research showing the different ways and reasons over-18s have come to faith in the past five years to help people understand and adapt to what’s happening.

With the opportunities we’re seeing, we also need to see a gear change on our outreach; where rather than being frontled or evangelist-led, every Christian is doing their best to take part in the Great Commission. That’s where this season of consecration for Elim has been so fruitful and helpful. We must not mistake activity for intimacy and our real fruitfulness starts with us on our knees before our King. This year, though, I’d love to see that lived out loud so more people can see the distinctiveness of our faith. If we can have greater intimacy with the Lord, then move into activity, we could see God do amazing things.

I really believe that as we go into this new year we need to be confident that if we stand uncompromisingly firm theologically, not overestimating our activities and underestimating our prayers, and wholeheartedly share the gospel, we’ll seize this moment for the church.

I’ve been in ministry for 25 years and I’ve never been as convinced that this is the church’s moment as I am right now. I’m very excited for 2025.

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