Reaching Emerging California

Alpha is more relevant than ever before!

A Vision for Reaching Emerging California
The Alpha course has emphasis on the experiential and the relational sides of the Christian faith, all of which is exactly what the "next generation" and the large immigrant populations of California are looking for.   People are looking for what Alpha has to offer; more than ever.

Most of the established Evangelical congregations in California are made up of aging Anglo-white people.  They are becoming less and less able to reach "emerging California" which is young, hip, and multicultural. 

Alpha USA is teaming up with the Reformed Church in America to start a joint venture called Reaching Emerging California (REC).  Local Alpha veterans have teamed up with Gerard Long of Alpha USA and Rick Mysse of the Reformed Church to create a ministry that helps local established Anglo white congregations to have the tools and the confidence to reach a younger and more diverse crowd.

Key Developments
Mysse helped launch REC with a big kickoff event in early March at Rose Drive Friends Church in Yorba Linda.  Rick has planted a number of "next generation" churches including Revolution in Long Beach.  We had ten tables full of participants from every major local denomination.

 

One of the centerpieces of this effort is ESOL Alpha (Alpha in English for English learners) which meets a felt need among immigrants (learning English) with a course which carries the Gospel to them directly.  Christian Zebley of Hollywood Presbyterian is leading this part of the effort for REC; including a big training conference in early June.

Influential Leaders Are Involved
During a breakfast discussion with legendary California pastor Jack Hayford about REC, he called ESOL Alpha a "stroke of missiological genius."

Also involved is Ralph Moore, the most effective church planter in the English-speaking world.  Ralph is doing Alpha in a big way at his church in Hawaii (www.HopeChapel.com).  We are looking for ways to use what Ralph has learned in getting course participants into lasting cell groups within churches.

Steve McEveety (producer of Braveheart, etc.) has agreed to join the REC board. 

We agree with Mysse and others who see Southern California as the fountain of global pop culture.  To affect this culture is to affect the world.  Mysse believes that if we mobilize and army of 600,000 believers for Kingdom work in Southern California, then the culture of the whole world would be changed.