What are Communities?
Faith has a corporate expression as well as being a personal journey. St Thomas’ Philadelphia is a big church and it could be easy to feel lost in the crowd on a Sunday. We believe real community is an essential building block of the church and is a vehicle for mission into our city. It’s a place where we can be known, supported and challenged to go deeper in our relationship with each other and to grow as disciples of Jesus. To help us in this, we have more than 40 smaller communities of different shapes and sizes across the church: A place to find friends to grow in your faith with and to live it out!
 |
Missional communities are generally made up of between 6-30 people (plus any number of accompanying children) and are communities of people who find they have a similar heart, focus or calling in life. Whether this similarity is for a particular people group, geographical area of the city or ministry, it forms the basis of their life together and of their outreach. |
“The objective is not to get people into ‘church’ but to get ‘church’ which is us, mixing with people in whatever they enjoy doing” - Activate Community
Most missional communities have smaller groups within them. These are like our immediate family - people we see week-in, week-out and share our lives with at a deeper level.
How do Missional Communities fit into St Thomas’ church as a whole?
St Thomas’ Philadelphia is a large church with over 2000 people who connect in some way every week. We have many different groups, communities and ministries which take place all across the city. They are as varied as the people of Sheffield themselves—including communities for students, young adults, creative types, the marginalised, business communities, families, the elderly and more. These are based across the city on urban estates, in the suburbs and in the city centre.
"We want to encourage and support people wherever they live across the city to build relationships and encourage other people." - This, that and the other
So how do Missional Communities fit in?
They are the backbone of all the missional and discipleship activity which goes on. We have missional communities connecting with all of the people groups and places listed above and many more. The Sunday services are places for resourcing and equipping and are not places of belonging in themselves. The most important thing is belonging to a community, not which Sunday service you attend. Most communities would attend the Sunday services between one and three times a month and meet as a community in their context for the rest of the time.