New Hope Leeds

Supplying the missing jigsaw piece to people's lives

We are a ministry set up to help people with addictive lifestyles who believe their lives are like a jigsaw puzzle – missing at least one piece to complete the picture. We seek to share Christ with them and show them how He can give them a new beginning and supply the missing jigsaw piece. We also want them to learn that their jigsaw may be what God had intended for them and not what the enemy has left them with.

In 1999 two heroin addicts attended a service at the Church of the Nazarene in South Leeds. They were desperate for help. Our Pastor David Montgomery contacted some of the local agencies and soon realized how frustrating this was, as there were waiting lists the length of your arm.

The couple both lost their desperate fight by committing suicide within the space of two weeks of each other; leaving behind an eleven year old daughter.

At the same time our church had visited the local area with a questionnaire, asking how the church could help, and the result came back - drugs!!
So New Hope began.

In the beginning the church opened its doors with a certain amount of fear but lots of faith. We offered a two or three course meal and a testimony to the saving Grace of God. Within a month the numbers coming had reached around forty and after a year there was a need for us to re-structure the work.

We looked at all kinds of models from residential to outreach, to helping with an existing project but all these were rejected as we found that the client group we were called to work with had other needs. So we borrowed from lots of organisations and grew our own way and ethos of doing things with the help of an organisation called Stauros (www.stauros.com).

I fundraised until I had enough to get started and spoke to our committee about the need for more fundraising. We followed a lead and approached someone and have had their help ever since. We use the church building for our work and the materials are those that we have done ourselves along with the Stauros foundation course. Our volunteers came from all the different Churches in Leeds.

Now we are organised with structures and boundaries in place and have seen God do amazing things for people.

The main challenge at the start, was lack of knowledge in the area of drugs etc. We had to educate the church people on how they needed to adapt; cope with the increase in numbers; get the day-to-day structures right and maintain the focus of the ministry.

My advice for others...

Written by Alistair Park, who leads the work and whose own background features freedom from alcoholism.

For more information and to read some of the testimonies of transformed lives visit http://www.newhopeleeds.co.uk/