Easter things...

So this Hope08 thing's been happening for a few months now, and we've been getting a bit curious about how it's all going. So I put myself on a train and wandered around a few cities and villages this Easter, turning up at various Hope08-style initiatives and sticking a dictophone in people's faces.

Here's a few photos and quotes from real life people doing real life Hope08 stuff - all of whom blew me away with how inspiring, fun and enthusiastic they are. The same goes for all the things they're doing - from walks of witness to the world's biggest painting by numbers - it's all good.

Enjoy!

Fritha

Good Friday

What: Walk of Witness

Where: Letchworth Garden City

The walk of witness has been done in Letchworth for a few years now, and ususally with a very respectable turnout of about a hundred people. However, church leaders decided that more churches turning up together would be more fun - so they turned out in style this year. Everyone was told to wear something red (I forgot and didn't, but they were nice about it anyway), and they took a cross (and some dramas explaining why) through the town centre.

While I was there I saw quite a few people wandering over and asking what it was all about, so conversations were started by this statement of faith - a pretty good result! Mark leads LGC Church and he said that:

''we've drawn together in a way we've never done before, it's been really great''

Friday Night:

What: NotJustBreathing.com gig

Where: St. Andrew's Street Baptist Church

Dan Dowman is the youth worker at St. Andrews and Jim Overton works for YFC in Cambridge. Together with a Canadian drama group called Lifeforce they'd spent the previous two weeks in schools around Cambridge. The gig was a culmination of the work they'd done with the young people in schools, and a place where Jesus could be more obviously talked about. This is Dan:

Dan says that:

'Cambridge schools are very sensitive when it comes to the faith issue - we've been going around trying to build a few bridges. We've actually seen massive breakthrough these last two weeks in schools that haven't let Christians in for the last ten years...'

Saturday 

What: Passion Play

Where: Cambridge, again!

People in Cambridge are pretty dedicated to the cause - putting on the play in the ridiculously cold weather! Check out the photos - if you look carefully you can see the snow flying horizontally at the centurion's legs...

Monday

What: The biggest painting by numbers in THE WORLD!

Where: outside Emmanuel church, in Loughborough

Monday was when they fitted the final panels to the 460sqm painting. The mural depicts scenes from Holy week, and took about 2,000 people three months to complete. It's huge.

Thousands of people from the community showed up to see the painting being measured and verfied as a world record - and also to enjoy the free food, concerts, bouncy castles and music on offer. The photos don't really do this one justice, so for better info on this go here

David Newman is one of the church leaders behind the project, and he's really pleased with the finished painting -

'I think it's awesome - everyone who sees it just takes an intake of breath'

So, yes.....that's it for now. We'll carry on sticking this kind of thing up on the website, so let us know what you're doing at www.hopenews.co.uk