All Are Welcome: Nathan's Story

In 2006, my mum, a Methodist minister, was appointed to be the minister for a couple of churches in and around Hexham – a small market town in rural Northumberland. With this being my mum’s first appointment, it was a big change for all of the family. For me, it was a scary but exciting time. Being only eight years old, I’m not sure I was particularly aware of the extent of this change; looking back it was a big shift in my life. This change was made so much easier by the churches my mum became minister of. West End Methodist Church, Hexham, was the church we regularly attended, and they not only made the new minister (my mum) feel welcome, but the rest of us too.

Moving house. Moving away from friends and family. Moving to a completely new area. All of these processes are big changes. Yet the members of West End Methodist Church, the Sunday Club teachers, and the people involved in the Boys’ Brigade all made these changes easier to confront and accept. I didn’t always love going to church or Boys’ Brigade, but these communities helped me to get through moments of doubt in my faith – whether they knew it or not.

Knowing that people had been there for me was a very important thing, so once I had settled in this new place I gradually came to be involved in welcoming other people. This involvement came about through helping younger people in the Boys’ Brigade and in Hexham Holiday Club. As well as this, I picked up the role of ‘door steward’ at church – welcoming people into the church and greeting them with a smile and a ‘good morning!’. Initially, I took on this role as a contribution towards an award within the Boys’ Brigade. However, the joy of welcoming people into church, seeing how they were doing, and the company I shared with the other door steward – a lovely man by the name of Jim Clark – all made me want to stick with the role.

Churches, faith groups and youth organisations would be nothing without a welcoming attitude. This attitude attracts people into places they would not normally be comfortable. In an increasingly secular society, many people don’t see the point of going to church. To show them the point of it all, we must first welcome them into our church, our faith group or our youth organisation, and then show them the love of God through our actions and through Scripture itself. It is so fundamentally important to be welcoming, as a Christian but also as a decent human being.

My faith rests heavily on the phrase ‘All Are Welcome’. Why? The ‘All’ part. As a Methodist, I place great importance on the idea of the ‘Four Alls of Methodism’ (also known as the Catechism for the Use of the People Called Methodists), which are as follows:

‘All need to be saved.

All may be saved.

All may know themselves saved.

All may be saved to the uttermost’.

Personally, these four phrases are very significant. It is very important to me that everyone has the chance to know the love of God. I believe that a welcoming attitude is a crucial starting point, as it allows others – Christian, of another faith, or of none – to feel the warmth of God’s love.

God, through Jesus, welcomes all. As we read in Galatians 3:28 – ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus’.


Written by Nathan Olsen, member of SCM Leeds and currently studying for a BA in Politics.

Tags: