In 2005 three friends had a cup of coffee which led to a dream to mobilise a generation in mission, which quickly became the whole Church in the UK. That dream was Hope 08! The three friends, Mike Pilivachi, Andy Hawthorne and Roy Crowne were all leading youth organisations and movements.
My story collided with Hope 08. In 2007, at the age of 16, I heard a life-changing message from Gav Calver who was then the Director of Hope Revolution, the youth arm of Hope 08. During a session at a youth worker conference, he spoke about mission and what Hope Revolution intended to accomplish by supporting local youth ministries to be more missional in word and deed.
What he shared was exactly in line with what I felt I was called to do and how I wanted to be part of reaching the UK to see God’s Kingdom advance. Following the conference, I spoke with my youth pastor, and we agreed to do an outreach in our community as part of Hope 08. As a young person with a passion for mission, I found myself stepping out and leading a community fun day.
Back in 2006/07, the year I was 15/16, I found myself moving from a normal Christian young person to someone who was on fire for Jesus like never before in my life. God spoke to me that year specifically about His call on my life ‘to be a leader to a generation of young people...called to be a missionary to the UK...called to be an evangelist, not just do evangelism and [to] draw people together in unity’. As soon as I heard the Hope vision from Gav and later Roy, my heart burned with the same things - a passion for the local church and national mission and evangelism.
We want Hope 23-24 to equip the whole Church in the UK again, but we believe it has to start in the younger generations where the most energy, innovation, creativity and passion are.
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