The hall is buzzing with conversation. Around a table adults and children burst into laughter as they wrestle with metallic tubing and googly eyes and their teenage helpers despair of ever creating the promised artefact. A toddler slaps green paint on a huge sheet of card under the watchful eye of a Granny (not sure if they’re related or not – it doesn’t really matter). A five-year-old watches wide eyed as an enthusiastic leader shows her how to bang in a nail. There’s a delicious smell wafting out of the kitchen. The ten year olds, intent on their glass-painting, agree it must be jacket potatoes. The vicar takes a photo of the surreal result of the junk modelling and two mums catch up on the gossip as they drink welcome cups of tea and slowly decorate gift bags while their children make something unidentifiable but very chocolatey upstairs.

The cooks should be getting the plates stacked, but one of the mums needs to talk about her problems with her foster children. I would be panicking about the story for the celebration later, but there’s a huge collage of The Great Banquet to assemble before five o’clock, the powder paint has proved a formidable weapon of mess creation in the hands of Jack, and we’ve barely got started on the lettering and whoops, someone’s kicked over the gluepot… Just another Messy Church.

Messy Church is one church’s attempt to be church for families who might want to meet Jesus, belong to their local church and bring up their children as Christians but can’t cope with traditional Sunday morning church services. It’s a once-a-month time of creativity, worship and eating together. You may have seen it featured on the Fresh Expressions DVD expressions or read about it in the Barnabas book Messy Church. You may even have visited a Messy Church or started one up as part of your church’s ministry to families.

What’s in the Messy Church book?

Two things: half the book consists of the thinking behind Messy Church, which I included because it’s useful for anyone thinking about starting their own fresh expression of church for families, whether that’s eventually a version of Messy Church or something completely different. You’ll find a reflection of a real life ongoing situation with all the confusion, pain, fun and – well – messiness of unfinished business as we try to grow in Christ together. You can see all the mistakes we made (and are still making), why we felt the need to do something different from Sunday church, how we set about finding the way to go, why we focused on families rather than just on children, what biblical principles we’re working from and a few thoughts on if not Messy Church, then what? More than anything, I think it’s a way of saying ‘No, we’ve not got all the answers; this isn’t the perfect way of being church; we don’t have enough time, money, space, wisdom or people to do everything we’d like to, but it’s a start. And if we can do something, with all our limitations, you can too!’ If you’re a minister and your church is wondering what ‘real church’ or ‘proper church’ is, you might like to pass round the book – it’s a very easy read and will definitely provoke a reaction.

The other half of the book is the shortcut bit for anyone wanting to kick-start a Messy Church of their own: it’s got many of our sessions all laid out, with ten craft suggestions for each session, a themed worship celebration plan for each one and recipes for hot meals suitable for vast numbers. It covers over a year of once-a-month Messy Churches, so you’ll find all the major festivals featured as well as other Bible stories.

While we don’t recommend mindlessly copying a model of church that works for one setting but may not be right for you, there is enough tried and tested material here to give a church the confidence to give something new a go.

• View other titles by Lucy Moore
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ISBN: 9781841015033
Catalogue code: N/A
Publisher: BRF - published 17/11/2006
Format: Paperback