CHURCH HOUSE FELLOWSHIP, BRADFORD, UK. 1979-1981. For three years I belonged to, what was then, a movement whose star was rising. Locally it was called "Church House Fellowship" after thinking better of initially calling itself "The Bradford Church" no less! In other circles it was often referred to as "Harvestime" [which was actually the name of it's associated publishing business] or sometimes called "Restoration" [which was the name of it's magazine]. They were probably most identified at the time with The Dales Bible Week which they organised annually at The Great Yorkshire Show Ground, near Harrogate, UK. The church itself had been formed in the mid 1970's under the leadership of Bryn Jones (a modern day self styled "Apostle") who brought together three like minded churches in the West Yorkshire area. Although it may seem rather incongruous Bradford was one of the pioneering centres of the new born Charismatic Movement. By the time I joined Church House Fellowship Bryn had re-located to the USA and the church was being led by his brother Keri (who would also be later `recognised' as an "Apostle". [They were both from South Wales incidentally]. In fairness I should say that I had little direct contact with the "Apostles" and so the following experiences relate to their immediate lieutenants. My understanding now of the Biblical qualifications for apostleship are that they must be an eyewitness to the resurrection of Jesus (Acts 1v22, 1 Cor15 v1-11 etc) so there is no such thing as a "modern day apostle". But I didn't realise this at the time. I was 21 years old when I was wowed by the seemingly inexorable rise of this particular church [or it may be that it created a big stir in a very small pond!] Whatever the reason I met up with one of the elders of Church House Fellowship (who I will denote as DaM) who gave me a "prophecy" that, inter alia, God had a job for me that no-one else could do. Of course it was all very exciting but, in retrospect, I can see that this message was full of "Barnum" statements that could equally apply to anyone. But at the time I gave enormous importance to this message - it turned my head and fed my vanity. Not surprisingly I joined Church House Fellowship shortly after leaving my previous church, which I am ashamed to say, I had come to describe as "spiritually dead"! I had accepted Church House Fellowship's teaching on "Baptism in the Holy Spirit" (I had actually become a Christian a little over three years earlier), but this "Baptism", they said, was a distinct event from conversion .....some people have got it.....and some haven't. I distinctly recall CmD saying how privileged we were to have it because some people of his acquaintance had begged God for it and had not been given it. (This implies a level of capriciousness on God's part which I now feel is a terrible slur on God's character - Luke 11 v13). I don't believe for one instant that that was CmD's intention but he had clearly not thought through the implications of what he was saying. Whatever the motive there was a degree of spiritual one-up-manship in our attitude towards others which belied the graciousness of Christ. Church House Fellowship was viewed with some suspicion by other churches in the city for "sheep stealing" and because it was thought to have certain 'cultish' features to it, not least it's emphasis on "shepherding" and "submission" in regard to the leadership. Of course Church House Fellowship poured scorn on the more fanciful rumours which circulated on the grapevine but there was an element of truth to them. I recall having a discussion with one of the elders (DiS) who suggested that "if I had the faith for it, the elders could choose a wife for me"! I didn't have sufficient confidence- even then in my most credulous phase - to take him up on the offer, maybe because I was too bashful but I was certainly left speechless by his proposal. This was not exceptional, the expectation was that church members would `submit' career decisions and marriage plans to the eldership. Conceived as the loving concern of intimate friends this might pass muster but the real problem was the sheer self belief of the leadership in its own prophetic role. One speaker (GwD) said that even if the leaders seemingly made a mistake it would still be `right' in God's plan. Any hint of dissent would be met by dark parallels with Korah's rebellion in Numbers 16. One episode in particular in those years bears examination: all the members were interviewed and some [no doubt in a kindly way] were asked to leave the church; not because they had done anything wrong but because it was felt that they weren't keen enough or because they made too many pastoral demands on the eldership. This seems outrageous to me now because I can see how this attitude reflects the "Colossian Heresy" (the notion of spiritual elitism) Col 2v18. Of course, at the time, I was intoxicated by this elitism - especially as I was an insider! The vision of Church House Fellowship (as preposterous as it now seems) was that we would be an elite that would restore the world wide church to its first century glory and power as a prelude to the Return of Christ. There was to be a restoration of the "Ephesian 4" ministries - hence the justification, nay neccesity, for modern day apostles. Indeed on more than one occasion it was stated that ultimately there would only be one church - and ours was to be at the heart of it! (Which makes it all the more baffling that anyone could be asked to leave!) It was indeed intoxicating to believe that one belonged to God's elite and that the future belonged to us. It was often said that whereas other generations had failed to "bring in the kingdom" this one would succeed. If this made me boorish towards outsiders.....it is something I deeply regret now. Was God at work there in Church House Fellowship? Yes; of course, but the key thing to remember is that God is a God of grace - he even blesses arrogant, vain, boorish people but we wrongly assumed that somehow we had earned God's approval by our inherent brilliance......and that is not an uncommon mistake. Since then it has seemed to me to be absolutely critical not to confuse the Biblical concept of the "Elect" (chosen by grace) with the dubious idea of an elite! That makes me a Calvinist (and if you are in sympathy with my comments I have to say that makes you one too!) A cursory glance at the example of the Corinthian Church should alert us to the fallacy of such elitism 2 Cor 4. A Christian is `a work in progress' and not yet the glorified end product, unless we realise this we will be consumed by self-righteousness and triumphalism....or we will be destroyed by the man-made standard of perfectionism we set and fail to live upto. I will not say all of Church House Fellowship was bad, there were some wonderful people there. There were also some wonderful leaders such as Arthur Wallis (who was based in Bradford shortly before his untimely death). Whatever its faults there was a sense of excitement and expectation and a closeness that was genuine. If I had to choose a moment when I started to grow disillusioned with Church House Fellowship I would have to highlight the time when JcW was sent from St Louis by Bryn in the USA to give a series of talks. The church had always emphasised the importance of `tithing' (giving one tenth) one's gross income, but JcW took this to a new level. During one of his talks he said that it was morally wrong to give away what God had blessed you with and to give it to someone he had not so blessed. I took issue with him on this teaching after the talk. I had hoped that the leadership might distance itself from such an ungenerous and ungracious message but Keri actually took the opportunity to emphasise that this particular line had full eldership approval. The focus on 'tithing' then became 'the more you give [to the church] the more you'll get' [from God], on the basis that "God is no man's debtor" etc. I grew increasingly uneasy at the whole 'power', 'success', 'health' and 'prosperity' gospel they moved into. It seemed to me to be a materialistic, one dimensional notion of the Gospel and one that was actually, thoroughly unchristian! Alarm bells started to ring in my head, I felt very uneasy about it all, but I didn't know then how to articulate what I know now and the eldership were not minded to assist me. My personal expectations of the leadership were - of course - wildly unrealistic and immature. I expected them to be as insightful, discerning, caring and "prophetic" as they claimed to be. Maybe I was particularly vulnerable in that my father had died three years before I joined CHF but it would be unfair to present myself as a victim in this situation - I wanted to believe in them. In retrospect I probably warmed to the paternalistic style of leadership and I certainly craved their affirmation and approval. There was an element of complicity in my victimhood if you like. But the leadership did foster a cult of personality so I'm not minded to be too self critical. My disillusionment with them was directly proportional to my initial credulity, perhaps if I had taken Church House Fellowship with a pince of salt and not at face value I wouldn't have tied myself in knots! But I was very serious minded and I did take things at face value. Things came to a head in a none too articulate way in September of 1981. I met with some of the elders to discuss my misgivings which I lacked the words to express, so we parted in mutual incomprehension. Perhaps this was the inevitable clash of the "visionary" with someone like me with a valet mind. Their vision was that Church House Fellowship and its circle would so impress the watching world by it's material prosperity and miraculous healing that they would be compelled to join. Among their final words were these; "one day (if you are still walking with the Lord) you'll be faced with having to rejoin our church because it will be the only one"! I would be lying if I said that that thought didn't haunt me for the following decade. Of course it was nonsense, but they had obviously gotten underneath my skin - and the fear of being confronted again by these people [as irrational as it seems now] made me very reserved with my other Christian friends. Maybe they too would one day be absorbed into this juggernaut and I would be left behind.......at least that was my fear. The classic put down in my final meeting was "So you think that you are right and everyone else is wrong!?" I found them overbearing and left - but there was always that nagging thought in the following years - "what if I am wrong?" The continuing expansion of this church certainly seemed to confirm all the seemingly pretentious talk of the eldership. It was only after I left Yorkshire and moved to London in early 1991 that I could start to see all these things in their proper perspective. Their church loomed larger in my head than it ultimately proved to be in reality. I joined an evangelical church with an excellent Bible teaching ministry. No longer moving in those circles I don't know what became of the Jones brothers or their circle of churches. But it seems that, for whatever reason, they lost momentum, possibly because other Charismatic churches came on the scene and they no longer cornered the market. I am given to understand that the Bradford branch of their outfit has long since renewed itself along a different model....the jury is still out as to whether that is for the better. If you are sufficiently interested there was a sympathetic account written about the rise of Church House Fellowship by Andrew Walker in "Restoring the Kingdom". The latest edition was published by Eagle in 1998. Why am I writing this? And why now? First up, all these events are over half-a-lifetime ago from my perspective so I sincerely hope that any sting in what I have said here will have been drawn by now. In any event one's perspective on these things is always better when seen in a larger context and as it turned out I needed this time to judge those heady days aright. In the meantime it may well be that the protagonists I've indicated have all since come to a better mind on these issues anyway, so I have not used their names but an annotation; unfortunately it isn't really possible not to identify the Joneses but I hope that they will forgive me. It was never my intention to cause unneccesary hurt to those people who acted in good faith. More importantly, even if I had had the means to lash out at Church House Fellowship, I was reluctant at the time to bring the church (the wider church that is) into disrepute because that may have reflected badly, by association, with the Gopsel of Jesus Christ. The onlooking world often jumps to the illogical conclusion that because Christians often fail to be Christ-like the example of The Christ is somehow discredited. (If nothing else I hope that this article can help correct such perverse logic). Having started on this account of what was, after all, only a brief couple of years out of my life I found my initial draft grew out of all proportion and became therapeutic in the writing. Perhaps, on reflection, this indicates actually how significant those years were to me both on a psychological level and in terms of my subsequent spiritual development. Why should anyone care? Good question! In many respects I do not look upon my experiences at Church House Fellowship as particularly unique and so I'm writing this in the hope that others will find these thoughts helpful. Maybe there are other groups and individuals out there that are making similar claims for themselves and are gathering a following among young, impressionable, misinformed Christians who are left wide open to abuse for want of good Bible teaching. "There is nothing new under the Sun" said the Preacher! post script 14/02/2010. At www.davidmatthew.org.uk/restorationhist.html there is an article about the Restoration movement written by David Matthew who I met in 1979. He was part of the leadership team in Bradford and this article is written from a sympathetic insider's point of view. It gives a good overview of the movement but doesn't address some of the main concerns voiced at the time about the Church's direction; eg its authoritarian tendencies. The article also plays down the significance of prosperity teaching within the Church, I recall it having far greater prominence than the author is prepared to admit. With those provisos I hope that this link is helpful. ------------------------------------------------------------------ tag-line: CHF. Church House Fellowship, North Parade, Bradford. Harvestime. Harvestime Publishing, Hall Lane, Bradford. The Dales Bible Week, Great Yorkshire Showground. Bryn Jones. Keri Jones. Bryn & Keri Jones. Modern Day Apostles. Restoration Magazine. Early Charismatic Movement UK. Arthur Wallis. Latter Rains. God's Chosen Fast. Dominion. Reconstructionism. Reconstructionist. Triumphalism. Christian Counter Culture. Versus. North. England. Wales. Great Britain. Europe. New. Covenant. Ephesian 4 ministries. City of God, Thomas Danby College, Leeds. Bradford Church. 1979. 1980. 1981. 1982. 1983. The Bradford Church. Restoration. Elect or Elite? Restorationism. Restorationist. Life Abundant. Premillennialism. Premillennialist. Morality. Grace. Postmillennialism. Postmillennialist. Amillennialism. Amillennialist. Centre. Center. Peter Swift. swiftypete. The church; elect or elite?