a brief history of Firelighters

Firelighters is a ministry that began by accident really. For 20 years Nick and Grace Turner worked with students, having a group that often numbered between 120 & 150 students to whom they taught Radical Discipleship. As a result of wanting to live like Jesus, and live life “on the edge” for God, many of these students went out in short term mission. As a result of that, a number of them stayed on in longer term mission. They would be supported by succeeding students (from a shoebox fund!) and come home telling of the things they did, so a new generation went out.

To begin with all the students went out with different missions, in the early years a number worked with street children in Brazil, with the poor in India, some went into full time ministry in different denominations, or went into youth work. Nick and Grace discovered, however, that many who were on the mission field (or even here) often returned to them for pastoring, as they were not being individually cared for in what they were doing… and so Firelighters was born. The organisation was initially set up to care for and pastor those they had sent out, to either send new people out from Firelighters, or to partner other organisations by mentoring and caring for those who had gone.

At present there are 50 Firelighters and others considering joining us, while some with young families have returned from the mission field but want to continue in association with us and may return at a later stage. Ross Paterson in his book “The Antioch Factor” talks of ‘The Bath-tub syndrome’. Churches often have a great send-off for their missionary, and interest is high just after they leave, gradually sinking into inexistence, so they are scraping along the bottom of the bath-tub until near return when interest rises again. This is very discouraging, and our aim is to be part of keeping people on the mission field by caring for them, giving to them, keeping their profile before people, and sometimes going to minister to and for them.

Something became immediately apparent, as we spoke to people about Radical Discipleship and our missionaries, and this was that many considered Discipleship to be for young people rather than the calling of the church. Many are currently entering our churches, knowing that God loves them, but not about His words “take up your cross and follow Me”.

So, out of an existing but nameless ministry, Firelighters was born. Our mission statement is “To be like Jesus and to change the World”.

So there are two parts to the organisation:

1. TO BE LIKE JESUS

Realising that teaching radical Discipleship results immediately in mission, Nick and Grace produced “The TIDE Course” (TIDE stands for Training In Discipleship and Evangelism). This course has 12 sessions (with material for 4 sessions on each topic, so it can be done in 12 weeks or much longer) and it encapsulates the early teaching that resulted in Firelighters.

The TIDE Course seems at first glance to have familiar topics, but it is not similar to Alpha in that it is for those already Christians who are challenged to a far more radical approach to living.

One pastor in Wales said that the TIDE course had impacted their community as people put things right in their shops and work places. The course has been done in every type of group from a church of 700, to small individual home groups. It has been done in the army, by University groups and has been used, to date, in 25 countries. The TIDE Course is our “Widow's Mite”. God miraculously gave us the finances to have it put on video and we have done what we could with the little we have and god has been gracious enough to use it!

The course is now on DVD, so the videos are being sold off very reasonably. If there are parts of the world (or this country) that you feel could benefit from such teaching, do go to the website page and have a look. When we were filming, one member of the crew, who was not a believer, came up after the session on God's Heart for the World, and said “If Christians really were like this, I would want to be one!” Living like Jesus is the only way to reach people with reality. Teenagers have come to Christ, listening to the same session, because they see the love of God and the need for radical living. People have been working on a version of TIDE for teenagers and also for children, so that all age-groups could be discipled at the same time.

So that is the first half of the Firelighters' vision “To be like Jesus”. What about the second half?

2. TO CHANGE THE WORLD

As we have said our members either work exclusively with Firelighters or are partnered with us while working with other missions or denominations. Please look at our Website pages on Mission Partners to read about individuals.

As a result of our Mission Partners going into hard places, a number of Projects have been born. Please look on the Projects page of the website to read about our latest ventures.

As you will have seen during this talk, Firelighters is simply a product of the Grace of God. In each case, and with many of our Mission Partners, God has chosen those who would call themselves weak, and having nothing, and has multiplied what they have in their hand. The idea isn't for us to be well known; our aim is that people are so motivated by the love of Jesus that they use what they have and see God multiply it to change His world. A Firelighter burns up and leaves nothing of itself behind, except, hopefully, a blaze which brings others to Jesus Christ.