Cheryl and John's walk with Street Partners

My name is Cheryl and my husband John and I have been part of the Prayer/Street Partnering team in Great Yarmouth for about 18 months now. The reason I am writing today is that we are in desperate need for Prayer Partners for the Great Yarmouth team. At present we meet in the Church Hall at Park Baptist Church in Great Yarmouth. We meet there on Saturday evenings at about 9.30pm-10.00pm until about 3.30am-4.00am about twice a month. We are happy, however, to meet in different church venues throughout the borough or northern villages – this is not just a Park Baptist initiative

 

Our walk with the Street Partnering team came about 2 years ago where, after our fellowship housegroup over coffee some of our group were talking about the Prayer/Street Partnering team they were involved with. John and I listened and, while walking home, decided that we would like to help in some way and got quite excited at the prospect. We duly enlisted and became Prayer Partners where we enjoyed long evenings in our church hall. It is a lovely team and we spent the time praying following requests from the Street Pastors for prayer for certain people on the streets. We also spent time worshipping and enjoying the midnight feasts brought in by a member of the team who worked in a bakery – wonderful!!

 

So many times, after being requested to pray for certain people, we heard back from the Partners that the situation/problem had eased – how amazing was that! One evening a colleague brought his guitar along and we all sang loudly and joyfully and the Street Pastors said that the streets were very peaceful that night! I don’t think our voices were angelic but prayer and worship that night certainly had results!

 

John and I did start getting ‘itchy’ feel though and decided we would like to go out on the streets ourselves as Street Partners and duly did the necessary training with a lovely group of people and teachers

 

We have now been on the streets of Great Yarmouth quite often and have met all sorts of people, some angry with the hand life has dealt them, some sad and crying because of broken relationships or losses in their lives. Others are happy and out to have fun.  Many know us well and we are called “the lollypop people” or even the flip-flop people!” Many ask why we do this over the weekend and listen with interest when we explain our faith and love for them. The police and door staff are happy to meet up with us and say they believe we are a calming influence on the streets. On New Year’s Eve we were actually invited in for champagne or coffee at some of the nightclub venues – obviously we declined their offers but how lovely for them to ask

 

 

Please, please think about joining our team and, as above, it is not  a Park Baptist Church initiative (although the church does support us) and we would be happy to move around to churches in the Borough if this would make more people willing to help us

Many thanks for reading and God’s blessings to you all