Four years ago, in the centre of the student community in Leeds, a student worker and a group of students planted into a Church, to reach a generation of unchurched students. Seeking to serve the 30,000 students on their doorstep, the Church became known as Church @ Hyde Park Corner. The vision was to create a student Church for unchurched students, right where the students would walk past them every morning on their way to university. After months of praying and planning, the team had a launch date in September 2020.
Fast forward four years, and the team has been blessing a whole generation of students, with outreach in all seasons. From sharing free hot drinks in the park, and hosting events throughout the year; they're now a well known part of the local community.
In Leeds, there are over 80,000 students, and less than 1% go to Church - yet 76% of students would go to Church if they were invited by a friend! The team at HPC are actively seeking to engage students and offer those invitations; this bonfire night just gone , they gave away 300 sparklers, and with each connection, an invitation to come along to their community on a Sunday, and see what Church @ Hyde Park Corner looks like.
Each week, Helen, the student worker, treks out into the park opposite where hundreds of those students will walk past her every week, as she and the team hand out hot drinks, and tell students that they are loved and valued- and the impact is tangible!
Helen and the team meet with students in ‘Explore one-to-ones’, listening and sharing with students who want to take that leap to reading the bible, as they search for God, wanting something different from what the world offers.
“Watching these students as they discover who God really is, is such a privilege as they see the significance of what is on offer.”
Chatting over a morning coffee creates such a natural opportunity to invite students along to ‘Eat’, the Sunday space where their community of students gathers to share food and life together, and get stuck into the Church family. The fruits of this were seen over the exam period, when the team offered their regular ‘Eat’ students the opportunity for the Church to pray for their exams, and they saw over 40 of the students respond to this.
“It was a really beautiful moment to show them the support of the wider Church community they had become a part of, and how God offers to help all who come to him”
From this Sunday community, the team has seen a number of students come along to the Sunday service, welcoming their first student into the wider Church family this summer through their baptism. Since then, Helen shared how encouraged she’s been seeing how his life has changed, and the way he is seeking to put God first.
“I can see the spirit working”
Church @ HPC, in rethinking how to share Jesus with unchurched and dechurched students, have adapted their outreach, to extend an invitation to the 76% of students who would come to Church if invited by a friend. This outreach creates opportunities for Churches students to extend those invitations.
Helen described how through all of the stories that she has heard at HPC, there is a real hunger for something more than what the student culture gives. This isn’t something unique to Leeds, but a trend all across the country; students are waking up.
How can you pioneer in your context, to extend invitations to those 76% of students?
