Greenwich Youth For Christ

Hinga Amara, our very young and active youth worker is running the Hastings Half Marathon to raise much needed funds for GYFC. Having never run so far before, Hinga is slightly nervous at the prospect of covering 13 miles on Sunday the 25th of March. Please go to Hinga’s Justgiving page to sponsor him.

This year looks like it will be full of opportunities and challenges. Greenwich YFC is really well placed to be able to impact many more children and young people, the Olympics offer the opportunity to reach out with local churches to children and young people and to create a lasting legacy of change. The possiblity of new premises provided through a joint partnership with St James Church and The Superkidz Trust will be one of the biggest but riskiest ventures GYFC has ever been involved with. The venue called “OneSpace”, will enable us to bring together our projects in one purpose built space, with fabulous facilities. We are greatly excited to be working in such creative partnerships, we do stand at a very exciting point.

Our work contiues to thrive. The work of the drop in and Boys to Men goes on from strength to strength. The Violence Intervention Project VIP has now rebranded as VIP Family Support and provides help and support in many very difficult situations. Our work in the secondary schools, counselling in Blackheath Bluecoates School and mentoring in Trinity has been very well received.

One major challenge we face is at the time of writing is funding, and we are in need. The work and projects are in many ways in the best shape ever. The current situation is very difficult: while we have applications for Grant Funding in, we are still looking for people to invest in and support our work, it does make a difference and every bit helps. Please support us.

For more than two years, GYFC have been meeting with church leaders from Greenwich to look at the Church’s response to the Olympics and Paralympics next year. It is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Speaking at a More than Gold training event held at the Forum, Rev Duncan Green from LOCOG commented that churches are often very good at being in the wrong place: numbers of churches at Vancouver and other Olympic events were caught unaware: ‘We didn’t realise that it would be like this, we’ve missed it!’
We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to be a part of one of the greatest events in the world—on our doorstep. There is a great deal that we can do. Ideas and plans so far include: Sanctuary space at St Alfrege’s; A Sports Quiz at Charlton Athletic; a Lent devotional programme based around the Olympics; 100 Days of Peace (www.peacelegacy.org.uk); hosting Mission Teams from Youth for Christ International; Combined service at the Cutty Sark; common banners etc. GYFC are helping pull together the Youth section and we would be delighted to hear from anyone wanting to know more.
http://www.churchgreenwich.org.uk/

We are hosting another Ministers’ Lunch next week on the 22nd of November from 12.30 to 2.30pm at Sunfields Methodist Church. If you are a church leader or know of a church representative who would like to come along to hear about GYFC’s mission to young people and how we can all work together, do contact Pam at our office.

If you are unable to attend but would liek to find out more, do look up the benefits of joining our GYFC Churches and Organisations Affilliation scheme.

Do you own a banger that’s merely gathering dust in the garage? Then you can do your bit for charity!
Giveacar is a UK based fundraising organisation that specialises in donating unwanted and scrap cars to charitable causes throughout the world, including GYFC.
They provide a FREE service which is available throughout the UK, and can work with you hand-in-hand in the following ways:
• They can arrange the collection of the vehicle;
• Depending on its age and condition, they can either send it for environmentally safe disposal and recycling at an Authorised Treatment Facility, or to a salvage auction;
This means that a large portion of the proceeds are donated to us!

We’ve got 2 more sessions to go in our series of special “Heart For Young People” seminars. Coming up are “The Faith of Generation Y” on the 2nd of November and “Through the screen darkly – new media” on the 30th of November. “The Faith of Generation Y” seminar will be led by Sylvia and Bob Mayo who will present both a theological and sociological perspective on young people today and their realationship to Christianity. “Through the screen darkly” will look into the role new media can play in our minstry to young people who are very engaged and active users of new media and technology. To find out more and book your place for either of these sessions, click on HEYP

This summer, we sent 6 young people to join a mission project in Tanzania. The mission was organised in conjunction with a charity called ” Go Mad in Tanzania” who are partners of Tear Fund. They’re back with many stories to tell!

GYFC has been working with children, young people and families in South East London for over 15 years. Every week our projects touch the lives of nearly 200 young people. We have effective drop in sessions on the Ferrier Estate in the day times and in the evenings. To help us to make an immediate difference in our community text 70070 with any of the following messages GYFC02 £2, GYFC05 £5 or GYFC10 £10. Thank you

Come and find out more about how the very first GYFC mission trip to Tanzania went. We are holding an evening of pictures, stories and refreshments on Saturday the 17th of September at St Michael’s Church, Pond Road, Blackheath, starting at 7.30pm. Everyone welcome. Come and find out which projects they worked on, which buildings they helped put up and the impact this trip has had on all who went.

A huge thank you to everyone who joined us for our 7th GYFC Golf Day which took place recently at the Birchwood Park Golf Centre in Dartford. We were able to put together 7 teams from our 27 participants. There were apparently quite a few showers in the day but eveyrone went home dry! There were bacon rolls on offer and of course prizes at the end. It was a great day of fun and fundraising for GYFC and our work with young people and families.