Newcomers from across 10 nations were recently hosted by Highfields Church, Cardiff with a membership dinner for people to get to know each other.
The church runs a quarterly membership evening at Highfields where, explained lead minister Dave Gobbett, they ‘share the vision and values of Highfields, and why we encourage those who see us as their spiritual home, to formally join as church members’.
At the start of 2024, people from China, Egypt, Sierra Leone, India, Latvia, Malaysia, Nigeria, England, Wales, Hong Kong and South Africa were represented at one evening.
Gobbett added: ‘The evening is always a great time, over pizza and desert, and gives newcomers to the church a chance to meet each other, as well as some of the staff and elders.’
The church has 380 members and has had a world mission focus. Gobbett said: 'As a church we are privileged to have mission partners & associate mission partners serving the Lord all over the world. Being in a capital city, many of the nations of the world come to us: either for study, work, or to seek asylum.
‘In recent years our international student ministry, headed up by my colleague Rowland Hughes, has seen a mini revival, with often up to forty international students gathering each Sunday lunch for food and Bible study.’
In February, a Japanese student was also baptised after coming to Christ over Christmas. Gobbett said she has returned home, where they have connected her with a local evangelical church.
He added: ‘We rejoice in the privilege of getting just a small glimpse of seeing ‘the nations be glad’ through God’s work here. Not to us.'
Churches, do you really know your communities?
Who is missing from your church?Who feels at home in your church? And who doesn’t?