|TOP|A new workshop, “Living God’s Covenant”, which aims at inspiring Christians to lead a covenant lifestyle, will tour ten regional centres across England in early 2006.

The workshop, offered by the Joint Implementation Commission (JIC) of the Anglican-Methodist Covenant, will tour from the 24 January until the 19th June and take in 10 different cities, including London, Newcastle, Leeds and Southampton.

“Two years after the signing of the Covenant, it is clear that the quality and depth of our lived relationships are what matter most.

“Only when we have made time to cherish one another and learn to work at God’s mission together will we see what kind of structural changes God is calling us to make,” said Rev John Cole, National Advisor of the Church of England’s Unity in Mission, and Dr Chris Sissons, Development Officer for the Methodist Church’s Local Mission and Unity, in a press release on the conference.

|QUOTE|The workshop, which features contributions from Rev Cole and Dr Sissons, aims to combine inspiration and pragmatism to create a committed and realistic engagement with God.

“Inspiration involves exploring the vision of what can be achieved as Christian disciples are helped to learn to live in a covenant relationship within God’s purposes (and where the cost really lies!),” they said.

“Pragmatism involves seeing the possibilities in any particular situation and exploring what is actually involved in dealing with the obstacles.”

The one-day course also hopes to nurture a covenant lifestyle in participants that will “enable people who are outside our churches to experience the Gospel of healing and reconciliation in Jesus Christ”.