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From London to Istanbul
Andy and Jess McCullough relocated from Hillingdon, West London, to Istanbul, Turkey, earlier this year. They have a fascinating story of how the move came about, so we asked Andy to explain.
 ‘Where East meets West’ might sound cliché, but in Istanbul it is literally the case. Located across both Europe and Asia, Istanbul is a city of 15 million people. It hosts a vast mix of cultures and influences, juxtaposing MTV and IKEA with bazaars, spices, mosques and sprawling suburbs.
When I was 19 I sensed God calling me to church planting in Muslim cities. I felt Him say ‘11 years’. I have always been wary of limiting God to timescales, but it did help me in terms of preparation for what was to come. Soon after this I met Jess, who had just moved to London from South Africa. She had come to the UK with her own sense of calling from God, ‘you are here to be trained to go’.
Some thought we were hasty to get married and have four kids in six years, but we wanted to be available for when God called us to go! We got stuck into The Crown Church, West London. I had the privilege of joining the staff there as an elder in 2006.
Isaiah 49.2 says ‘He made my mouth like a sharpened sword, in the shadow of His hand he hid me; He made me into a polished arrow and concealed me in His quiver.’ This verse speaks of polishing and sharpening ready for the time when God reaches into His quiver to fire you into the nations. A church plant is a great place for this preparation.
Whilst continuing to serve wholeheartedly at The Crown, we also pushed some  doors. We went to a Mission Awareness Day, met with Andy Martin who had led the day, and came out excited about the idea of Istanbul. We visited the city for a weekend and I was very positive, but Jess was unsure.
One of the biggest prospective challenges for Jess would be living in an apartment. She had moved from a house in Durban, which had monkeys in the garden, to a terraced house in London. The idea of raising four young children in a gardenless flat seemed pretty tough. So we decided to pray and wait. I secretly prayed that God would speak to Jess by Christmas, while she was secretly praying for a visible sign. Two weeks before Christmas, Jess had read a line in a book, ‘submission is at the heart of faith’ and said yes to God in faith. The next day she was stuck in traffic behind a taxi that said ‘Go to Turkey’. Both our secret prayers were answered!
The next year was full of answered prayers as we worked to recruit a team, raise money, and prepare our family to move to Istanbul, which we did in July. God has blessed us so much; we have a ground floor apartment with space for the kids to play and to welcome neighbours.
Our ambition is to plant a growing Turkish-speaking international church. We are spending our first two years studying Turkish, and after that we will launch the church. We will put up a website, open on a Sunday and plant as openly as possible. So far two great families have moved to join us, and others are preparing to come.
 Twenty years ago, mission leaders were asking if we would see any Muslims saved. Now the question is whether we can see effective churches planted in Muslim cities! According to Rick Love, ‘More Muslims have come to Christ in the past 25 years than in the previous 1400 years of missions history combined’. God is saving people, but there is a desperate need to plant churches to serve these converts, make disciples, and catch them up with passion to reach this great city and other Muslim cities for Christ! What a privilege to be part of God’s great plan!
To get in touch or subscribe to our newsletter email istanbul@crown-church.org.uk |
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