Abundant Life Church

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The Abundant Life Church is a large church based in Bradford, England. It is led by Senior Pastor Paul Scanlon, who has written a number of books on the Christian lifestyle. Services each Sunday regularly draw 2,500 attendees. The church has a second location in Belfast, under the title of "one church, two locations". Abundant Life Church Belfast is led by Pastors Christian and Jelena Allsworth, and has been operating since September 2005.

History

Abundant Life Church has its roots in the Charismatic Restoration movement of Arthur Wallis. It was founded in 1976 by Bryn Jones, one of the early Restoration/British New Church leaders, by an amalgamation of three small Bradford churches - a Brethren Assembly, an independent Pentecostal church called Dean House Christian Fellowship, begun by ex-Apostolic leader Cecil Cousen and the New Covenant Church, a fellowship originally under the apostolic leadership of G W North, which Bryn Jones had been asked to lead temporarily.^[1] In its early days it met in the Anglican Church House and so has often been known locally as "Church House." In 1988, the church spent almost £1 million to reonvate a former textile mill on Wapping Road. The church was formerly a part of Covenant Ministries, but it withdrew from the organisation in 1997. Although the church greatly grew in numbers following the move, the period in which the change happened was a struggle for those in leadership, as many former core members withdrew their support. In January 2000, the church opened a new 2,500-seater auditorium, now used every Sunday.

Ministries

The church has an active social outreach programme. Its Community Action Teams (known for short as C.A.T.), headed up by Pastor Matt Stockdale, work with under-privileged families in Bradford. Another outreach division of the church, Mercy Ministries UK, is a residential support programme that works with women aged 16-28 who are struggling with various life-controlling issues including depression, eating disorders and self-harm. The church also runs a leadership academy. The academy is led by Associate Pastor Steve Matthew, and students choose from one of two electives - worship, music and creative arts or pastoral leadership. Students take either the one year certificate programme or the two year diploma programme. There are currently around 70 students in the academy. Many of these want to train as pastors, although other Christians take the course for leadership skills. Rocknations is the youth ministry of the church. It was founded in 1999 by youth pastor Steve Gambill under the name Rock the Nations, later shortened to Rocknations. The ministry has a band named RPM, who play at all youth events as well as some special church events. In early 2005 they released their first album, RPM: Live, which made it to number one in the UK Christian Music Charts in October of that year. A second album, I Surrender All, was recorded in late 2005 and was released in the church shop and on the church website in March 2006, although the general release was not until July 2006.

External coverage

The Abundant Life Church received much attention in late 2001, when former chorister Gareth Gates was a contestant on Pop Idol. The Church featured in the BBC1 documentary Jesus Who..?, which aired in April 2004.

Sources

• The Times, 28 March 1988, "Spectrum: The feeding of the five thousand"
• The Times, 9 February 2002, "Christians urged to worship pop idol"
• Jesus Who..?, BBC1, 6 April 2004. BBC catalogue

External links

• Abundant Life Church official website
• Abundant Life Church Belfast website