Sacred Spaces
Visitors often talk to us about the peace, calm and safety they experience within NightChurch. If you have visited, you may have been surprised by how you felt as you entered near the font, lit a candle or listened to the music. Some people are able to open up to our team about important, often difficult issues for the first time in years. Others don’t want to speak at all.
As Christians, we believe that God is always all around us, and find St Peters to be a sacred, 'thin' place, where the presence of God is close and we catch a glimpse of the heaven. We love spending time with visitors, walking with them through many emotions including confusion, disorientation and often peace and healing.
If you would like to think more about Thin Spaces, Eric Weiner has a lovely article in the New York Times, you can access here.
In the article, Eric describes the divine or transcendent as the 'Infinite Whatever'. As followers of Jesus, we understand the divine as a person with a name, Jesus, and the presence of God as His Holy Spirit.
The Bible tells the story of God working to bring heaven to earth, there's a great explanation of this by the BibleProject in this video.
Praying with you
Our team welcome visitors of all faiths and none. We trust God to meet with people in His way. We can help you to talk to God through speaking , through quiet, when lighting a candle or writing a prayer on our prayer board. God is present in all our conversations, and often gently meets us during quiet reflection.
Praying for you
One of our team may have prayed for you during your visit to NightChurch. We simply ask the God who knows you, and cares for you, to do good for you in the future. If you have left a prayer on our Prayer board, we will continue to ask Jesus to be with you and meet your need in the coming weeks.
What next?
If you have experienced some of this in NightChurch, or elsewhere, and would like to find out more, you are welcome to visit us again, or to drop into St Peter’s Café during the day and speak to a Café Chaplin.
You can find out more about St Peter’s Church community here
You could visit a church gathering. If you are local to Chester, have a think about:
St Marks Lache, Saltney here
City Church, Chester, here
St Michaels, Chester, here
Christ Church Chester, here
Festival Church, here
St Marys without the Walls, here
There are many other, lovely church communities in the city, or close to where you live. We hope you enjoy exploring.
Alpha is a great way to explore the Christian faith. You can find a course online or, we recommend join in person in Chester. Many Chester churches including those listed host Alpha courses, details are on their websites.
The BibleProject have other resources to help you understand the bible and the Christian story.