Egham Boiler Room

As a few of us sat round having eaten the last Boiler Room meal of the academic year, cups of tea and coffee in hands, we began reflecting on the highlights of the year reminding each other of all sorts of things.  Perhaps unsurprisingly the first thing we remembered was the great food, including fondues, pizzas, bbqs, curries…..  We remembered amazing answers to prayer, particularly when we prayed for Lauren’s friend back in Australia.  There were great times of worship together, particularly a couple of times when when we met together in the prayer room during prayer weeks. 

The transit students, Colin, Louise, Mick and Lauren and their kid’s Lily and Jake were a big highlight of the year.  Their hospitality, their heart for prayer and there desire to serve have been an amazing blessing to us and many others.  They came to the Boiler Room and were a key part of forming the core group.  I will particularly remember the time, when having been told we were meeting to pray, Lily began praying while people were still gathering.  She finished saying amen and no one responded at which point she shouted out “I didn’t hear you say AMEN!”

The prayer weeks were obviously big highlights as we gathered, with many others, for weeks of 24-7 Prayer, some focused around a particular theme, others more general.  The Tearfund prayer is one which particularly stands out for me, with each day dedicated to a different area of the work of Tearfund.  Prayer weeks always ended with comments like, “I really engaged with God in a new way”, “it was a really special week”, “I love the creativity”.  The prayer week hosted at St John’s Church Egham was a particular highlight for the Boiler Room as a whole as we had the opportunity to engage in prayer with St John’s church in a fuller way.  New people experienced the prayer room and we ate together every evening and were blessed by the culinary skills of the members of St John’s.  Apparently the St John’s staff team were sharing the answers to prayer at their weekly meeting and had to cut it short and move on otherwise they wouldn’t have finished their meeting!  God is answering our prayers.

Creativity has been a mark of this year, being really blessed by so many creative people getting involved in the Boiler Room.  We’ve seen creativity used in prayer and communication, through the art work in prayer rooms andbeyond, in the work of east to west and in the churches.

We’ve had a great number of people come to visit from all over the world, both just down the road and as far away as New Zealand.  As Jamie commented “although they come from so far away, they feel like close friends.”  And it has been that way; all the different visitors have just come and joined in and shared their stories and inspired us to continue in what we’re doing.  I particularly want to mention a few specific people.  The blessing of having Phil Togwell with us for a boiler room meal, sharing profoundly about the simplicity of following Jesus and being a community of prayer.  The friendship with the Gillums and having Tom come and share at our boiler room meal, sharing his deep wisdom and insight.  Nate and Marissa sharing their encouraging stories and talking about their experiences of birthing a community of prayer in Kansas City.  There were many others too, who blessed us as they shared with us.

Prayer has been at the core of who we are, and our rhythms of prayer have continued to develop over the year.  Praying the Lord’s at 12 midday everyday.  Meeting on Thursday mornings to pray together and obviously praying together at our boiler room meals on a Monday night.

Mission and pilgrimage has seen people travel to different places and get involved in different activities.  We were involved in The Noise Project in Egham.  The transit students headed off to London to be part of the Pentecost 08 festival.  We went and joined in with the life of the community of St Jude in Earls court.  The transit students headed off to Southampton, Wales, London, the West Country.  A number of people from our community headed off on a team with their chuch to Africa.  One of our community prayer walked in Israel.  We’ve heard stories of people praying for others on the street, in cafes and petrol stations and been prayer walking in various different places locally.

We describe ourselves as a community, a refuge, a voice and a catalyst.  I believe that we have learned more about how we can be those things for people locally.  We’ve seen all sorts of initiatives in prayer beginning in the area, some directly related to the Boiler Room, others more indirectly.  We’ve seen the prayer weeks as a refuge for people to come and find time with God.  We’ve seen the life of the community grow and develop and we’ve had opportunities to speak up for justice and mercy and to love the forgotten.

This is not the end of the road for the Boiler Room, in fact I believe it’s only the beginning.  While praying I’ve had a picture of laying everything down, all that has gone on this year, all the dreams, desires and hope for what the boiler room could be and just see where the life springs from.  Then when that life springs to water it and encourage it to grow.  And life has been springing.  There have been exciting developments with a number of different churches locally as well as an on-going and growing friendship with Besom.

For me the biggest revelation was that the overriding story of the last year is that it’s been a journey taken with good friends.  When Nate came to visit from Kansas City he asked “if all the activity and prayer was removed what would you have left?”  The answer is good friendships, based around a shared desire to love God, to love one another and to love the world.