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However, these things were nowhere near as challenging as planting a new church to reach people no other church is reaching.

The reason why is because our parish structures assume a population which is attracted to church already. The difficulty we find is that one of the fastest growing sections of the surrounding population (in my opinion) is the group that is not attracted to any Christian church. Changing the structures most Episcopalians, and probably most Americans, have in their mind as to what a local church is supposed to be like is far more difficult than building a new facility and moving to a new location.

In 2005 I moved to the Phoenix area and began work to plant a new church in the Diocese of Arizona. Most of the people who initially joined in with the new work had this picture of church:

priest + building + liturgy = church

I quickly began to see that something new was needed. Bob Hopkins and Mike Breen gave me a new model, or operating system, in their book clusters: creative mid-sized missional communities, 3DM Publishing, 2007. We have since been working to understand and implement:

faith + community + action = church

This is a profound change! A community of faith equipped and ready for action will make people with no church connection thirsty for what it has. For those who are used to a priest-centred way of operating this can be a very uncomfortable change, for both the priest and the people.

To pursue this new operating system I have a two-part strategy. The first part is to decentralise as much as possible. When we started out we had monthly dinners for the whole congregation to attend. We are now beginning to identify and train leaders who will host these kinds of dinners for their neighbourhoods instead of only church members. It takes a lot of encouragement for someone who is used to asking the priest about almost everything to begin thinking about what is the best kind of activity to serve their own neighbourhood. It is, however, the way to faith + community + action.

The second part of my strategy is to have our staff leaders spend more time in the community during the week. Our children's ministry team leader is gearing up for an adaptation of the 'Messy Church' approach. Our youth ministry team leader is preparing to volunteer in the local high school to meet students who know nothing about Jesus.

It takes a long time to change the operating system.

Revd John F Maher, Jr, Prince of Peace Episcopal Church, Peoria, Arizona, USA.

If you have something burning to say and want to contribute to the Share weekly guest blog, please contact Karen Carter. The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church, Church Army, Fresh Expressions or any of its partners.

At the heart of the matter is how we have sought to be community and how this journey has led us into a new romance with the God who is by nature community. We have had a new encounter with God as Trinity, not a hierarchical Trinity with God the Father as the CEO, Jesus as middle management and the Spirit on the factory floor, but with the Trinity as the root of radically mutual community ... of the meal table, not the boardroom table!

This is changing how we see and do leadership within communities, where we put the emphasis on the flow of gifting rather than the authority of a title or position. Each of us surrenders our gifts to the community and so each of our gifts, rather than being lost becomes animated from use and spreads through the community. When a prophet is willing to give their insight then all our eyes are opened in new ways; when the artist creates, we all find new ways to express ourselves.

So, how deep are we willing to let this change affect us? How much of our systems and structures are we able to challenge? Can we let a 'ground up' shift impact how we think about every part? Can it change the way we think about leadership, about ordination, about our structures? 

A colleague of mine from Lichfield Diocese, Revd Richard Moy, challenged Synod why it 'locked its trainee clergy away for three years in a place full of other Christians'. I agree. We need to reflect on how we train our leaders, but have we got to go deeper? In this changing world, which will force our church to change, is it time to release leadership, to give it back to communities, to create a new way for sustainability which does not rely on a professional body but on equipping and resourcing communities to lead themselves? 

After a recent visit from our new bishop, one member of safespace said how great it was to share with him as he was not at all 'bishopy'! Is it time to reflect the shift from hierarchy to community, not only on the ground but can we as a church become a community of communities, where we rely on each other, where we support each other and allow the quietest voices to be as significant as the most powerful ones?

Mark Berry, Pioneer Leader, safespace, Telford.

If you have something burning to say and want to contribute to the Share weekly guest blog, please contact Karen Carter. The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church, Church Army, Fresh Expressions or any of its partners.

Twilight @ Costa is the name given to a fresh expression of church that has been running for 13 months. It is a monthly gathering with music, DVDs, quizzes, conversation, speakers and copious amount of coffee.

The aim of Twilight, which meets from 7pm, is to try and be a church community outside of the traditional thoughts of church, ie, day, time and building. Over the year we have attracted people from various churches, de-churched people and people who just wander in because they fancy a coffee at Costa. Interestingly, many people with little or no inherited church connection return regularly. That is where the 'problem' is now beginning for us.

Of course, that is what we wanted when we set out on the good ship Twilight. We realised that you can have the best services, welcome, refreshments, buildings, and flower rotas in traditional church but there will still be great swathes of the community who will not darken our doors.

Our desire was not to invite them in to our current set ups but to go out and meet people where they are. We haven`t always got it right and have made changes along the way but at least we are seeing the development of a new kind of church community.

Now that we have made those connections, the challenge really begins. What do we do with them? The temptation to go down the inherited church route is great but one that we are resisting, in favour of a genuine desire to be a new church community. It is at this point that we have to exercise our faith as, if we are honest; we have no idea where this new church will be in 12, 18 or 24 months' time.

I am really excited by that approach as I believe that, in our desire to understand and operate our beloved mixed economy of church, we are discovering the need to exercise our faith in a real 'Help, we don't know where this is going' sort of way. Surely that is a good thing.

As we sit and strategise over our mission opportunities, there has to be room for the element of: 'That's a good idea, but I`ve got no concept of how it will work or end up.' To me, that feels the right thing (and also the brave thing) to do with any new expressions of church we feel led to pioneer. Sometimes we have to just get on with it, and it is within the journey that we find God at work, not necessarily in the arrival.

Revd Jeff Reynolds, Superintendent Methodist Minister (Stafford).

If you have something burning to say and want to contribute to the Share weekly guest blog, please contact Karen Carter. The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church, Church Army, Fresh Expressions or any of its partners.

However, I continue to reflect on my experience of Sanctus1 and one area that I've been thinking about is provisionality. I was recently told that the city centre residential community of Manchester has an annual people turnover of 30% - almost the entire community changes in a three year period. This was something that I observed during my time with Sanctus1 - approximately every two years 50% of the community would change. People who had been part of the community for more than four years were a rarity.

This transience created a fragility as people moved in and moved out. New people bring new energy and new life, but losing more established people all the time is draining on established people within the community. It is hard when you build community with one group and then that community disappears around you and a new one forms. Comparisons are always made with what the previous community was like and memory can be rather utopian.

A further reflection is how draining it can be for people who have been part of the community for a number of years, when they are dealing with the same questions that they have dealt with a few years earlier. Questions of identity, faith, purpose, belonging, etc, that they wrestled with before are revisited. This is an important process for the current community, but slightly frustrating for those who have been part of the community for a number of years.

It is also often the case that those who have been established for a number of years carry a lot of the responsibility of the community. When they do not see this level of commitment being shared by others, who are relatively new to the community, frustration can occur.

These are some of the challenges of church in a transient culture. I think that one answer is to develop a corporate patterning of spiritual life - patterns that allow for the instability of a transient context and church. I don't think that we got this right in Sanctus1. It's the tension of catering to the new people, the mission field, whilst nurturing patterns of spirituality that sustain those who are more established.

Ben Edson is the Diocese of Manchester's Fresh Expressions Missioner. He blogs here.

If you have something burning to say and want to contribute to the Share weekly guest blog, please contact Karen Carter. The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church, Church Army, Fresh Expressions or any of its partners.