









































23

Setting God’s pioneers free? The need 
to release lay pioneers from the Church 
of England’s narrative of resourcing 
and equipping

James Butler
Assistant Coordinator and lecturer of the MA Programme at Church Mission Society, 
Oxford and Post-doctoral Researcher at the University of Roehampton. 
Email: james.butler@churchmissionsociety.org

Abstract

This paper argues that the reason that the Church of England has strug-
gled to relate to lay pioneering is because its primary mode of engagement of 
resourcing and equipping is out of step with the realities of lay pioneering. It 
argues that despite numerous recommendations to release the laity in mis-
sion and ministry, when it happened through grassroots communities which 
became known as ‘fresh expressions’, the Church of England was unable to 
recognize it. By exploring both the “organizational story” and the “grassroots 
story”, this paper demonstrates that the problem is the Church of England’s 
reflex to view everything through a lens of resourcing and equipping. This lens 
means all problems are framed as deficit, in this case of the laity, which are 



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

24

remedied through the resources of the church. The paper reveals that this lens 
causes it to miss the gifts and challenges of lay pioneering, and makes it unable 
to engage in the mutual relationships called for in the report “Setting God’s 
People Free” (Archbishops Council, 2017). The paper calls for a deeper engage-
ment by the Church of England with grassroots stories of lay pioneers and to 
allow the narrative of resourcing and equipping to be interrupted. It suggests 
that attentive listening to lay pioneers and their stories can lead to more mutual 
and reciprocal engagement and as a result enrich the Church of England and 
other denominations.

Keywords: Lay pioneering; Setting God’s People Free; resourcing and equip-
ping; laity; mutuality

Introduction

At the heart of this paper is a question about lay pioneering. For all the evidence 
that pioneer ministry is a lay movement and a rich site of mission and ministry, 
why is it that lay pioneering is the poor relation to ordained pioneering? And 
why has it been so difficult for the Church of England (CofE) to embrace lay pio-
neering as it has emerged? The CofE website defines pioneers as those who are

able to see a new future, and have the skills and gifts needed to 
make it a reality now. Pioneers connect with people outside of 
Church, creating new ways of doing Church together in their 
community. Pioneers are leaders of innovation, with a gift for see-
ing what God is doing and responding creatively to it. (“Vocations 
to Pioneer Ministry”, 2021)

In this paper I argue that the lens through which the CofE has viewed lay pio-
neering is problematic. I will name this lens as the ‘equipping and resourcing 
lens’ and describe how the CofE has a tendency to name the problem as deficit 
and to see the solution as resourcing and training. I will argue that the CofE 
needs to return to its earlier instincts in Mission Shaped Church, to embrace this 
as a lay movement which it has hoped to initiate for many years and adopt a 
more reciprocal pattern of learning and ministry. To do this I will take a herme-
neutical approach comparing and reflecting on a number of CofE documents 
and reports on the laity and pioneering.



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

25

Two Stories of Fresh Expressions

A discussion of lay pioneering in the CofE must include the Mission Shaped 
Church report and fresh expressions. When I teach about fresh expressions I 
tell two stories. The first is one about the Mission Shaped Church report (Cray, 
2004), about how it encouraged a growth in these fresh expressions of church, 
of dioceses encouraging and resourcing these fresh expressions, of the designa-
tion of Ordained Pioneers, and the Strategic Development Fund (SDF). The 
second story is my story, arriving at university in the year 2000 and meeting a 
whole group of people who were connecting with the 24-7 Prayer Movement 
(Greig, 2003) asking what faith meant to our fellow students with little inter-
est in church, and dreaming about small communities who gathered to pray 
and engaged the wider community through mission and social action. It was a 
time of seeing similar Christian communities appearing in different places. We 
were excited when we discovered that the CofE had taken notice and wanted 
to provide a space for such communities where it could learn from them and 
be renewed by them. One story is told from the perspective of the ecclesial 
organization, the other from the grassroots. These stories are completely inter-
related, but they are two distinctive views on the same story. Steve Taylor (2019) 
and Sabrina Müller (2019a; 2019b) have both engaged in qualitative research 
around fresh expressions and pioneering and have noticed similar trends. 
Taylor distinguishes between “first expressions” which are “defined as initial 
experiments in ecclesial innovation”, whereas “Fresh Expressions” describes “an 
organisational initiative” (Taylor, 2019: 4–5). Müller describes the way in which 
movements like fresh expressions have a relational and dialogical ecclesiology 
which can seem in contradiction with organizational definitions of church. 
They certainly offer a critique of institutional church and yet by valuing con-
text and tradition try to find a place within the church, the “mixed economy” 
(Müller, 2019a: 142). Müller and Taylor will be helpful conversation partners 
through this exploration of lay pioneering.

By keeping these two stories, the grassroots story and the organizational 
story, in mind I will explore the development of lay pioneering in the CofE and 
use it to identify some of the possible reasons why the relationship between lay 
pioneering and the CofE has not been straightforward. The words “grassroots” 
and “organizational” have been carefully chosen to avoid the unhelpful connota-
tions associated with the language of institutional. Following the practical theo-
logian and ecclesiologist Clare Watkins I see the use of centre and edges within 
the fresh expressions literature as referring to ecclesial structures and would 



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

26

distinguish that from a more “edgeless” ecclesiology seen and experienced in 
practice (Watkins, 2020: 147–50).

In search of the laity

The Kingdom Calling report identifies “The idea that the renewal of the church 
for mission” as hinging on “enabling the fuller participation of the laity became 
widespread in the decades following the Second World War” (Faith and Order 
Commission, 2020: 4). The report Towards the Conversion of England (Com-
mission on Evangelism, 1945) names this clearly, calling for the laity to be 
recognized as the priesthood in the world, and trained appropriately. Similar 
questions about the recognition of the laity were raised by the report All Are 
Called (Board of Education, 1985) and the Formation for Ministry in a learn-
ing Church Report (Archbishops Council, 2003) called for the training of the 
laity. 60 years of reports recommending that the laity be recognized and release 
seemingly made little difference. The Mission Shaped Church report offered a 
different perspective; rather than the need to mobilize the laity, it identified 
a largely lay movement.

Mission Shaped Church

Mission Shaped Church (Cray, 2004) was an initiative of Rowan Williams, who 
had just become Archbishop of Canterbury. Taylor, drawing out themes from 
his interview with Rowan Williams, describes how fresh expressions came 
out of Rowan Williams’ attentiveness to what was going on. He saw how these 
emerging groups and communities were developing and wanted to see how 
they could help shape the church more widely. Flowing from a conviction that 
the church should pay attention to the edges and is renewed from the edges, 
fresh expressions was seen as a way that the life of the edges could be brought 
together with the “inherited” church. As Taylor states,

There is no evidence of [fresh expressions] being rooted in con-
cern about the decline of the church, a desire for managerialism 
and restructuring or a search for relevance. Rather, by deciding to 
be located ‘in the middle of things’, in the life of churches, and by 
a practice of discernment which ‘watches’ ecclesial life, an innova-
tion has taken shape. (Taylor 2019: 101)



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

27

“Fresh expressions” was the church paying attention to the grassroots story and 
seeking to discern God’s mission, not an organization responding to organiza-
tional pressures.

Mission Shaped Church recognized twelve different emerging expressions 
of church. As the report notes, many of these were lay led, and would continue 
to need to be lay led.

If the missionary challenge we face is to be met, many new ini-
tiatives will be lay led. They are also as likely to have emerged 
unplanned through local discernment of the mission of God, as 
to have been meticulously planned in advance. This raises new 
challenges for the discernment, training, recognition and autho-
rization of leaders. (Cray, 2004: 135)

The Church of England should develop procedures that provision-
ally acknowledge the work and gifting of existing and future lay 
leaders in church plants and other expressions of church. A pat-
tern should develop that provides training as part of a process of 
discernment for- authorization, rather than training subsequent 
to discernment, or the removal of existing leaders for training 
elsewhere. (Cray, 2004: 147)

The report identified the challenges this emerging pattern of lay leadership 
brought to the traditional patterns of training and asked how this emerg-
ing leadership could be recognised and trained without disrupting what was 
emerging. It clearly locates this in a theology of the missio Dei, of discerning 
and responding to God’s mission in the world.

The Church Army’s research into fresh expressions, The Day of Small 
Things (Lings, 2016), brought quantitative evidence of continuing lay leadership 
in fresh expressions and pioneering. It found that about half of fresh expres-
sions were led by lay leaders, 67% of those lay leaders were women and about 
40% were voluntary (Lings, 2016: 175). This demonstrated a very different pat-
tern of leadership, one which some found threatening and some celebrated. In 
a church which had previously lamented the lack of lay participation and over 
sixty years had set targets to increase it, this surge in lay participation and lead-
ership seemed a great opportunity. This grassroots lay movement was exactly 
the kind of thing that the CofE had been hoping to initiate.



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

28

Setting God’s People Free

It is therefore somewhat surprising that the next big report focused on lay 
mobilisation, Setting God’s People Free (2017), has no reference to Mission 
Shaped Church and only fleeting references to fresh expressions as some of the 
things lay people are involved in. It fails to recognise fresh expressions as a 
predominantly lay movement. Setting God’s People Free has a focus on liberat-
ing the laity for fruitful ministry in both church-based ministry and ‘in work 
and school, in gym and shop, in field and factory, Monday to Saturday’ (Arch-
bishops Council 2017, 1). Through the exploration of these themes, the report 
identifies critical shifts in culture and practice which are needed to enable this.

1. Until, together, ordained and lay, we form and equip lay people to follow 
Jesus confidently in every sphere of life in ways that demonstrate the Gos-
pel we will never set God’s people free to evangelise the nation.

2. Until laity and clergy are convinced, based on their baptismal mutuality, 
that they are equal in worth and status, complementary in gifting and 
vocation, mutually accountable in discipleship, and equal partners in mis-
sion, we will never form Christian communities that can evangelise the 
nation. (Archbishops Council 2017: 2)

In these two critical shifts there is an emphasis on mutuality, on equal worth, 
and complementary gifting and calling between laity and clergy.

In this brief overview of some of the key documents around the laity from 
the CofE over the previous 80 years, it is possible to hear the two stories speak-
ing but not necessarily recognizing each other. Many of these reports begin 
with the organizational story and a concern for the reversal of church decline. 
Mission Shaped Church is, at least in its origins, a recognition and articulation 
of what is happening in the grassroots. So how does this idea of two narratives 
help us to explore the understanding of laity in the CofE?

Setting God’s people free from whom?

Setting God’s People Free identifies two key cultural shifts: lay and ordained 
together equipping lay people, and mutuality and partnership of clergy and laity. 
While there are some recommendations toward mutuality, the dominant lan-
guage of the report is about resourcing, equipping, enabling and empowering. 
This is the organizational story; mobilizing in response to the threat of decline. 
Equipping and resourcing becomes the key lens through which everything is 
read. This may seem reasonable, and indeed there is an important role for the 



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

29

CofE in equipping, resourcing and training, but inherent in this language is the 
assumption that learning and resources flow from the organizational centre to 
the edges. Calls for mutuality and partnership become lost.1 To help to illustrate 
this I will turn to a few examples. The report offers a whole series of ‘stories that 
illustrate the shifts that are needed’ (Archbishops Council, 2017: 5). The first 
story shared, and one which seems to be regularly repeated, quotes a teacher 
who says, “I teach Sunday school 45 minutes a week and they haul me up to the 
front of the church to pray for me. I teach in a school 45 hours a week and the 
church has never prayed for me” (Archbishops Council, 2017: 5).

Because of the training and equipping lens, stories like this are interpreted 
as lay people lacking confidence to live out their faith in their daily jobs. The 
report responds that “the Church of England must urgently find ways to ‘lib-
erate’ the laity to become confident disciples in the whole of life”. But that is 
only one way to read this story, and perhaps not the most obvious. A better 
reading might well be that the teacher already knows the significance of their 
work, they are just highlighting that the church does not seem to. Rather than 
lacking self-confidence this teacher is highlighting that their teaching does not 
matter to the church. The turn to resourcing and equipping would therefore 
be misplaced and the challenge effectively ignored. The report itself notes that 
“lay leaders say they struggle with a perceived lack of understanding within the 
Church about their vocation and calling” (Archbishops Council, 2017: 15), but 
turns this into the need for the laity to understand their own calling. It laments 
how lay people lack confidence and “have never been given a vision for their 
role in wider society” (Archbishops Council, 2017: 12). “Lay people don’t just 
need theological resources to grasp the range of ways they can be fruitful for 
Christ in the world, they need the theological imagination to see the ways they 
already have been” (Archbishops Council, 2017: 14). Rather than value what is 
happening and recognizing the challenge from the laity, the report continually 
identifies deficit in the laity and the need for the CofE to provide the resources 
to overcome that.

This emphasis on training and equipping draws the focus away from 
mutuality and towards an understanding of the laity as passive and unaware 
of their calling. This may be true for some, but it is also clear from the stories 
that the report itself tells that there are a whole range of lay people who have a 

1.  I am grateful to Tricia Frith, an MA student with us at CMS, for drawing my attention 
to the lack of attention paid to baptismal mutuality in the resources which have come from 
the report.



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

30

good sense of their vocation but feel undervalued and unseen by the church. 
This subtle shift from mutuality to resourcing can be seen in the report where it 
lists the support lay people would like to have; one of the items is “connections 
to others to learn from and share with”. However, once this is explored in more 
detail a few pages later it becomes “Easy access to, and signposting of the best 
available tools, resources, approaches, case studies, stories and experts to inspire 
and support people in their whole life discipleship and vocational journey” 
(Archbishops Council, 2017: 21). What was requested was relational spaces of 
mutual learning, and yet this was translated into signposting of resources; the 
“experts” who have the wisdom to release these unconfident and oblivious lay 
people. Framing the problem this way means that the call to mutuality is lost. 
Laity continue to be seen as the ones who need training, and clergy as the ones 
who train. This leads to my biggest question about the report, what or whom do 
lay people need to be set free from? In this paper I am suggesting that there is a 
need to be set free from purely an organizational story and to bring the richness 
of the grassroots story fully into the dialogue.

The problem of training and the need for mutuality

The biggest problem with the kind of training being suggested is that it does 
not seem to work. Setting God’s People Free identifies this itself. Talking about 
resources it states, “Available resources are thin. Take-up is also low, reflecting 
the fact most have never been given a vision for their role in wider society” 
(Archbishops Council, 2017: 12). It repeats a similar claim later, noting a “low 
awareness of the resources and networks that exist” and that take-up of these 
resources is low because “few have been given a vision for whole-life disciple-
ship” (Archbishops Council, 2017: 12). The report identifies that the current 
resourcing approach is not working. But it blames this on lay people claiming 
that they have no vision for their Christian life, which is asserted with zero 
evidence.

David Heywood’s Kingdom Learning (2017) was released the same year 
as the report and, as Heywood notes in the introduction, has a very similar 
diagnosis. He wants to see “missionary disciples” equipped and released. He 
emphasises how most learning takes place informally in the midst of life, builds 
on past experience, happens in relational ways, and often in social spaces (2017: 
49–57). He advocates for reflective and relational learning, and yet when it 
comes to expressing how this is done he turns to programmes of learning with 



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

31

learning outcomes, and sees the clergy or church leader as the one who shapes 
the learning and knows best what people need (Heywood, 2017: 129–44). This 
is the organizational story, where resourcing comes from the centre and sees a 
deficit which needs to be resourced.

Mission Shaped Church seemed to take a different approach, recognizing 
a movement of lay leadership within fresh expressions. However, once recog-
nized, the CofE begins to shape it through this organizational lens. The Mission 
Shaped Ministry course was seen as the flagship training designed by the fresh 
expressions team, and yet The Day of Small Things report found that only 6.6% 
of leaders of fresh expressions had done the course (Lings, 2016: 165) and that 
training had not had a big impact on what had occurred. 

Another piece of research carried out by the Church Army, this time focus-
ing particularly on pioneering in the Portsmouth Diocese, looked at a different 
training programme. The diocese ran “How to Pioneer” workshops. What they 
found was that the training did not attract the people it was aimed at. Though 
they were originally aimed at lay people exploring pioneer vocations, many 
attenders were either clergy or lay representatives of congregations looking to 
do pioneer ministry themselves (Church Army’s Research Unit, 2021: 30).

This programmatic approach to releasing lay pioneers did not connect 
with those lay pioneers it was aimed at. The report notes comments from clergy 
saying it had been helpful for their congregations moving them from a more 
passive to active engagement in the church. While this is helpful, the clergy’s 
perspective perpetuates the organizational story. There is no clear lay voice 
included in the evaluation.

This issue of training not connecting with those who have a particular 
calling to pioneering or fresh expression has been recognized by the CofE team 
supporting pioneers. They have developed a new programme called Green-
house which has a much more relational and community approach. It has based 
the training around teams coming together to reflect and learn from each other. 
It uses the “loving-first” journey of fresh expressions, which I discuss below as 
an example of the two stories coming together. It is described as a just-in-time 
model of learning which uses “the Godsend [phone] app, so that teams prayer-
fully discover what they need to know, when they need it, to move to the next 
stage of the journey” (Donaldson, 2021: 2). It is in the early stages but is clearly 
recognizing some of the problems of resourcing from the centre and trying to 
take a more responsive approach.



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

32

Lay pioneering

While lay pioneering has been a significant movement since before the Mis-
sion Shaped Church report in 2004, it is surprising how little research has been 
done into lay pioneering, and how little theological work has been done articu-
lating lay pioneering. Much that has been written and explored continues to 
reinforce the organizational narrative. The Guidelines for the development of lay 
ministry in fresh expressions of church pick up the recommendations from Mis-
sion Shaped Church around authorization, training and support (Archbishops 
Council, 2007). Of the eight recommendations, seven relate to training and 
one relates to authorization. The focus is on the potential and the initiation of 
pioneering and fresh expressions, rather than on the fact that there is already a 
large number of lay people involved in pioneering and fresh expressions.

The biggest piece of research done by the CofE with a particular focus 
on lay ministry is in The Mixed Ecologist report. It is particularly interested in 
lay ministry as something which is released by Mixed Ecology Ministers. The 
research therefore focusses on the experience of ministers as they look to release 
lay people into lay pioneering. It retains an emphasis on empowerment of lay 
people by clergy and it notes that “These findings identified the importance 
of clergy as advocates and enablers, pointing lay leaders towards appropriate 
training and networks” (Perrin and Olsworth-Peter, 2021: 32). Once again, the 
interest is in the organizational story – how these lay people were resourced and 
equipped.2

In my own research into small missional communities many lay pioneers 
did not experience this encouragement and equipping; instead, they faced 
many barriers and challenges from their churches and leaders who dismissed 
the need and failed to recognise the lay pioneer’s calling (Butler, 2017). Jonny 
Baker, a leading voice in supporting pioneering, set up the pioneer leadership 
training at the Church Mission Society; he describes this different perspective 
– pioneers have the “gift of not fitting in” and are “dreamers who do” (Baker, 
2014: 1). He describes pioneering as a difficult gift, one that can feel more like 
a curse at times. He identifies how the church struggles to understand pioneers 
and prefers to recognize pioneering when it looks and feels most like church as 

2.  Since this paper was peer reviewed a report has been released by the Centre for 
Church Multiplication (Bruce & Brooks, 2022), interviewing twenty “lay planters” about their 
experience of church planting. It is good to see further examples of the close attention to lay 
people advocated in this paper and I will engage with it further in future work.



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

33

it is already experienced. He describes how “there is an invisible gravitational 
pull that is always seeking to pull pioneers back into business as usual” (Baker, 
2014: 8). In this view the organizational story is problematic and undermines 
the gift brought by pioneers, trying to shape them into the organization’s mould. 
Baker highlights the need for leadership as dissent, critiquing the structures 
and proposing alternatives. In the organizational story, business as usual is 
preferable to dealing with people who are going to critique and challenge, but 
Baker identifies the grassroots challenge as vital to helping the church fulfil its 
mission. He concludes:

Newness that has depth is found by driving to the heart of the tra-
dition and reclaiming it over and against itself, by refounding, and 
not by rubbishing it and leaving it. In the light of these anthropo-
logical insights perhaps it is not surprising that the Church has 
found that this gift is as difficult as it is essential (Baker, 2014: 11).

The relationship between pioneers and organizational structures of the church 
is unlikely to be an easy one, and yet it is vital. The problem with the way the 
church focuses on this organizational story and reads pioneering through the 
lens of resourcing and equipping is that it closes itself off from receiving the 
gift and wisdom of pioneers and their communities. There is almost nothing 
in the CofE’s reflections on lay pioneers, nor on lay ministry more generally, of 
what might be received from lay people, what lay pioneers might bring as part 
of their gifting and how the space can continue to be made for that within the 
organizational story.

Space within the organization, according to Taylor’s reading of fresh 
expressions, is exactly what Rowan Williams had in mind when he talked about 
the church being renewed from the edges. Taylor describes how Williams saw a 
need for mutuality in relationships. The edge needs the church and the church 
needs the edge. The organizational story allows the grassroots to participate 
in something bigger than their own programme, and the grassroots help the 
church to be attentive to what God is doing (Taylor, 2019: 103). Taylor describes 
fresh expressions as “organisational innovation’ which is designed to draw the 
whole church into this vision” (Taylor, 2019: 117). This describes an organization 
where there is mutual and reciprocal learning between the organizational story 
and the grassroots story. The church learns from the grassroots practice, and is 
able to make space for, support and encourage such practice in a way in which 
both become mutually enriched. Paying attention to pioneering, as Williams 
highlights, could contribute to the CofE discerning God’s mission and seeking 



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

34

to participate. But as I have demonstrated, in the subsequent reflection on lay 
pioneering and on lay ministry in general this organizational story has domi-
nated, the flow is one way, opportunities to be attentive to what God is doing are 
missed and this pioneer gift of dissent, as Baker puts it, has become lost and no 
longer valued. Even more problematically the lens of resourcing and equipping 
which accompanies the organizational story means that it becomes increasingly 
difficult to value lay pioneering. The gifts that are present get lost, and a narra-
tive of lay deficit and organizational empowerment become the norm. The rich 
interplay between organization and grassroots is missing, and pioneers either 
need to be drawn into the organizational story or leave entirely to thrive.

Control and making space

In his excellent critical survey of church planting, Stefan Paas notes two types 
of control which denominations exert on church plants. Control through the 
horizontal planning of the organization and control through the vertical plan-
ning of clear ecclesiological or confessional outcomes (Paas, 2016: 201–2). He 
describes how both of these kinds of control stifle church planting. Horizontal 
planning turns to models and patterns, it wants universal principles and risks 
closing people off from what God is teaching them in the midst of practice. Ver-
tical planning asserts that the new community must fit within the confessional 
tradition, limiting what can emerge. As Paas states, ‘Horizonal planning makes 
the mistake of thinking that renewal can be imported from the outside, vertical 
planning errs seriously in thinking that renewal means to copy the past’ (Paas, 
2016: 212). We can see elements of these two types of planning appearing in the 
organizational story, planning based on the managerial and confessional wis-
dom at the organizational centre, and missing the learning from the grassroots 
and the opportunities to discern the missio Dei.

Paas turns to innovation as a way the two stories can be brought together 
and identifies three biotypes of renewal: free havens, which provide a coun-
tercultural space far from the centre living out radical solutions; laboratories, 
which create spaces for a diverse group of people to come together to solve 
shared problems; and incubators, where an organization makes a space for 
innovation within its own structures (Paas, 2016: 224–39). Paas identifies fresh 
expressions as an incubator, where the CofE has intentionally made space for 
innovation which can enable renewal within the organization as a whole. Again, 
the richness comes in the space to see what is emerging, to learn from it and 
respond to it. This is definitely not an abandonment of tradition but faithful 



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

35

improvisation; confessions are seen as authority examples of faithful witness 
to Jesus Christ, providing a pattern rather than a “once and for all definition” 
(Paas, 2016: 212).

Müller in her reflections on church development highlights the impor-
tance of mission, relationality and dialogue. She notes that while these emerg-
ing church groups such as fresh expressions are a contra-motion and critique 
of organizational church, the organization also offers stability and continuity to 
the emerging community (Müller, 2019a: 142). But importantly this connec-
tion is through relational dialogue rather than more formal structures.

Within the framework of fresh expressions of church, sustain-
able church development has to be grounded in tradition and 
challenged by context. The potential of this approach for church 
development theories is exactly this fruitful interplay of sound 
theological anchorage and the actual situation of people, net-
works, and neighbourhoods. (Müller, 2019b: 255)

This interplay between the tradition and context called for by Müller is closely 
related to the interplay between the organizational and grassroots stories. The 
church holds the organizational and confessional tradition, and the grassroots 
is attentive and responsive to life at the edges. Hopefully it has become clear 
that what I am arguing for in relation to lay pioneering is to move away from a 
purely organizational story to reengage with what is at the heart of the vision for 
Mission Shaped Church, a mutually enriching relationship, an interplay between 
the grassroots story and the organizational story, and a shift away from the 
singular lens of training and resourcing.

Reversing the flow

What we have been observing in these reports around pioneering is a tendency 
for the organizational story to view lay people through a lens of deficit and 
needing to be equipped and trained by the organization. Al Barrett, in his reflec-
tions on the churches relationship to outer urban estates, identifies an ecclesial 
turn in political theology which positions the “church’s own ‘performance’ as 
the ‘true’ site of meaning-making, and a participatory politics which overcomes 
wider society’s divisions of race and class, among others” (Barrett, 2018: 85). 
What he identifies in his case studies is an “outward flow” of resources from the 
church which reinforces power and privilege leaving them unchallenged. There 



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

36

is a “flow which while it originates in God, is directed quite clearly through 
the church and out into the world” (Barrett, 2018: 87). This assumption that 
resources flow from the centre to the those lacking resources on the edges is a 
powerful one which prohibits the organization from seeing the gifts, wisdom 
and resources present at the grassroots, and perhaps more importantly, the 
challenge to its vision which comes from the grassroots. Barrett reveals how 
this flow privileges the white middle class. As Willie James Jennings argues, 
western theological education, and indeed western education as a whole, is 
about producing self-sufficient white men. Education is used as a means to 
maintain homogeneity and hegemony; the self-sufficient, white man making 
the world in his image (Jennings, 2020: 7).

What Barrett and Jennings both call for is relationality and mutuality. For 
Barrett it is a radical receptivity, engaging relationally and dialogically with 
those on the edges, being prepared to receive the unexpected and perhaps 
unwelcome gifts which bring interruptions and an awakening to the work of 
the God in their midst. For Jennings the model is Jesus and the crowd, a diverse 
group of people who would never otherwise be together, listening to Jesus. 
The crowd is not a means to an end, but “the beginning of a joining that was 
intended to do deep pedagogical work” (Jennings, 2020: 13). The logic of flow 
from the centre to the edges, the domination of the organization story over 
the grassroots story needs to be interrupted and re-formed. In light of these 
analyses, it is not surprising that the recommendations in Setting God’s People 
Free were reinterpreted through the lens of resourcing and equipping, rather 
than embracing an invitation to mutuality and reciprocity – a more “edgeless” 
ecclesiology which seeks to discern the missio Dei across the church.

Examples of mutuality and reciprocity

The question is, can these mutual models really develop? There are indica-
tions of mutual learning within fresh expressions. In all of the accounts of 
fresh expressions listening has been absolutely at the heart. When the fresh 
expressions team was first developed, Steven Croft the team leader spent a 
year travelling around the country listening to practitioners (Taylor, 2019: 
112). Listening was a common theme across different emerging communi-
ties (Müller, 2019a: 140). And listening was picked up by fresh expressions as 
the first step in the “loving first journey”. This model came straight out of the 
observations of the fresh expressions team. It begins with listening, moves to 
loving and serving, then building community, exploring discipleship and then 



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

37

church taking shape, before the process can begin again in the next community 
(Moynagh, 2012: 208). I know from my own engagement with lay pioneers and 
leaders of fresh expressions that this model resonates with their experience. 
Some only found this model after they were well on the way to developing a 
fresh expression and found that it matched what they did. For others it was a 
helpful starting point and fruitful guide through setting up a fresh expression. 
It is a great example of where attentiveness to lived practice has been brought 
into the service of the wider movement and the organization. Of course, all 
models come with risks and can be unhelpful when imposed from above, but 
for many, this model has been affirming and resourcing. The Greenhouse pro-
gramme discussed above draws heavily on the listening first journey and is a 
good example of how training can be more mutual and reciprocal, focusing on 
teams who lead fresh expressions rather than individuals, and responding to 
their needs and context.

This paper is part of a qualitative research project into lay pioneering.3 
Early findings from focus groups with lay pioneers suggest that where recipro-
cal and mutual work is present it is often at a local level and enabled by strong 
relationships. This is particularly clear in some of the Methodist lay pioneers 
participating in the project. While they highlight that their experience is not 
necessarily true for all lay pioneers in the Methodist Church, they shared about 
the freedom and trust which is given them in their local district and circuit. The 
Methodist Pioneering Pathways (2021) offers a national network of support 
which it describes as a ‘community of pioneers’ and includes lay and ordained 
together. It offers some formal training but what was particularly welcomed 
by participants was the regularly online gatherings to share their experience 
and learn from each other. Where it was working well they noted how their 
local circuit and district had made space for them. They were trusted to get on 
with their pioneering and not required to contribute to Sunday church services. 
They had “good gatekeepers”, line managers and clergy, who understood what 
they were doing, supported them, and were able to protect them from some of 
the institutional pressures. They identified other circuits and districts who were 
less supportive of their pioneers. Their suggestion was that the clergy in those 
areas be encouraged to attend pioneer gatherings, experience more of what is 
going on and build better relationships.

3.  This research will be carried out in the first half of 2022 with funding from the Susanna 
Wesley Foundation, part of Southlands Methodist Trust. https://susannawesleyfoundation.
org/.



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

38

The way forward for lay pioneering?

So, how can God’s pioneers be set free? Not just free to pursue their own voca-
tion, but to see that vocation in relation to the wider organizational story, and 
as a gift to it. What I believe is needed is a re-engagement with the grassroots 
stories of lay pioneering and to enter into these reciprocal and mutual relation-
ships. Yes, there is training that can be helpfully offered by the organization, but 
it needs to move away from this reflex of resourcing and equipping, and turn 
to a posture of open learning and the attentiveness propose by Williams at the 
beginning of fresh expressions.

This is not just a struggle for the CofE. Müller’s work (2019a) points to 
similar struggles in other traditional denominations across Europe. These 
churches need be attentive to what is already happening and to welcome the 
gifts, challenges and wisdom from the grassroots. They need to embrace a 
mutual and reciprocal pattern of work and relationship, not simply because this 
will be a better way of supporting lay pioneers, but because it enables the church 
as a whole to begin to discern God’s mission together. For me, my next step in 
this is to engage in a small qualitative research project of listening to the experi-
ence of lay pioneers to begin to articulate the gift they bring and the theology 
embedded in their practice. For church denominations I hope they can find 
ways of being attentive for the purpose of developing reciprocal relationships, 
learning and discerning together, rather than simply identifying what needs to 
be resourced and equipped.

References

Archbishops Council. 2003. Formation for Ministry within a Learning Church. GS 1496. 
London: Church House Publishing.

———. 2007. “Encouraging Lay Pioneer Ministry: Guidelines for the Development of Lay 
Ministry in Fresh Expressions of Church.” Church of England. https://acpi2017.files.
wordpress.com/2018/01/encouraging_lay_pioneer_ministry.pdf.

———. 2017. “Setting God’s People Free.” GS2056. Church of England.
Baker, Jonny. 2014. “The Pioneer Gift.” In The Pioneer Gift: Explorations in Mission, edited 

by Cathy Ross and Jonny Baker. Norwich: Canterbury Press, 1–19.
Barrett, Al. 2018. “Interrupting the Church’s Flow: Hearing ‘Other’ Voices on an Outer 

Urban Estate.” Practical Theology 11 (1): 79–92. https://doi.org/10.1080/175607
3X.2017.1416221.



James Butler—Setting God’s pioneers free?

39

Board of Education. 1985. All Are Called: Towards a Theology of the Laity. Essays from a 
Working Party of the General Synod Board of Education. London: CIO.

Bruce, Alice, and Wendy Brooks. 2022. Listening to the Voice of the Lay Planters. London: 
Myriad/Centre for Church Multiplication. https://ccx.org.uk/content/listening-lay/  
 accessed 23 April 2022.

Butler, James. 2017. Exploring the Lived Theology of Small Missional Communities: 
Uncovering Charismatic Practices and Beliefs to Enable Sustained Engagement in Social 
Action. Doctoral thesis, Durham University. http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/12849/.

Church Army’s Research Unit. 2021. Pioneering in Portsmouth: Evaluating the Diocese of 
Portsmouth’s Pioneer Project (2016-2020). Sheffield: Church Army’s Research Unit.

Commission on Evangelism. 1945. Towards the Conversion of England: Being the Report 
of a Commission on Evangelism Appointed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York 
Pursuant to a Resolution of the Church Assembly Passed at the Summer Session 1943. 
London: The Press and Publications Board of the Church Assembly.

Cray, Graham. 2004. Mission Shaped Church. London: Church House Publishing.
Donaldson, Will. 2021. “Report on New Congregations.” Oxford: Oxford Diocese. https://

d3hgrlq6yacptf.cloudfront.net/61f2fd86f0ee5/content/pages/documents/20211012-
doc-news-new-congregations-report-v01.pdf accessed 23 April 2022.

Faith and Order Commission. 2020. Kingdom Calling: The Vocation, Ministry and 
Discipleship of the Whole People of God. London: Church House Publishing.

Greig, Pete. 2003. Red Moon Rising. Lake Mary, Fla: Survivor.
Heywood, David. 2017. Kingdom Learning. London: SCM Press.
Jennings, Willie James. 2020. After Whiteness: An Education in Belonging. Grand Rapids, 

MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
Lings, George. 2016. The Day of Small Things: An Analysis of Fresh Expressions of Church in 

21 Dioceses of the Church of England. Sheffield: Church Army’s Research Unit.
“Methodist Pioneering Pathways.” 2021. https://www.methodist.org.uk/our-work/our-

work-in-britain/evangelism-growth/new-places-for-new-people/called-to-pioneer/
methodist-pioneering-pathways/ accessed 23 April 2022.

Moynagh, Michael. 2012. Church for Every Context: An Introduction to Theology and 
Practice. London: SCM Press.

Müller, Sabrina. 2019a. “Church Development from a Missional Perspective.” Mission 
Studies 36 (1): 127–44.

———. 2019b. “Fresh Expressions of Church and the Mixed Economy: Potential and 
Challenges for Church Development.” International Review of Mission 108 (2): 241–56.

Paas, Stefan. 2016. Church Planting in the Secular West. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. 
Eerdmans Publishing.



E c c l e s i a l  F u t u r e s :  Vo l u m e  3 ,  I s s u e  1

40

Perrin, Ruth, and Ed Olsworth-Peter. 2021. “The Mixed Ecologists: Experiences of Mixed 
Ecology Ministry in the Church of England.” The Living Ministry Research Project. 
Church of England.

Taylor, Steve. 2019. First Expressions: Innovation and the Mission of God. London: SCM 
Press.

“Vocations to Pioneer Ministry.” 2021. Church of England. https://www.churchofengland.
org/life-events/vocations/vocations-pioneer-ministry accessed 23 April 2022.

Watkins, Clare. 2020. Disclosing Church: Generating Ecclesiology Through Conversations in 
Practice. London: Routledge.


	_Hlk95485040
	_Hlk96334497
	_Hlk91151276
	_Hlk99228587
	_Hlk92923612
	_Hlk92923636
	_Hlk72870314
	Sample
	_Hlk102057148
	_Hlk102058336
	_Hlk102058373
	Editorial
	Nigel Rooms

	Problems with “pioneering” mission: Reflections on the term “pioneer” from Germany, South Africa and the UK
	Setting God’s pioneers free? The need to release lay pioneers from the Church of England’s narrative of resourcing and equipping
	James Butler

	Discipleship, mentorship and training which empowers African women for ministry in the diaspora
	Naar M’fundisi-Holloway

	Communal maturation and missional discipleship: A congregational study
	Nick Ladd

	Joyful disciples: A study of a missing link in considering spiritual disciplines and corporate missional habits
	Mike Harrison

	We want the good life now: Insights from lived religion for a whole person and communal approach to salvation in the twenty-first century
	Dejan Aždajić
	BOOK REVIEWS
	Kwiyani, Harvey. 2020.
	Multicultural Kingdom: Ethnic Diversity, Mission and the Church.
	London: SCM Press.


	Reviewed by Sabrina Müller
	Roxburgh, Alan J. 2021.
	Joining God in the Great Unraveling: Where We Are & What I’ve Learned.
	Eugene, Oregon: Cascade Books.


	Reviewed by Steen Olson
	Susan Lucas (ed.). 2020.
	God’s Church in The World: The Gift of Catholic Mission.
	Norwich: Canterbury Press.

	Reviewed by Luke Larner
	Olsen, Steen, 2020.
	Jacob’s Ladder: Missional Church in the 1970s.
	St. Marys, Australia: SA & RL Olsen.

	Reviewed by Patrick R. Keifert





