April 10, 2005 was the date of our church launch with a fantastic sending service. It was great! We walked through a tunnel formed by members of the congregation who worked in London. They blessed us as we passed them. Then some friends who had come from London to be a part of the commissioning received the fledgling church group into London. It was eventful and very encouraging.

There was only one problem. We had nowhere to go. We were released, no longer part of the ‘paid’ church staff, virtually homeless – our furniture in storage – and no place to lay our head in Kensington. Bonnie and I along with Ashley, our worship leader, camped at our friends’ home in Chelmsford. We called it the refugee camp. Then, one of the other couples that were coming with us also had to give up their home as the lease was finished. They moved into the camp as well. So we had 7 people living in a small, three-bedroom former council estate house. At the end of a month there was near mutiny as the camaraderie wore thin.

I spent the better part of a month scouring the Internet looking at websites that advertised rental accommodations in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. After a time a home with an £800 a week rental rate seemed reasonable in comparison to all the £1000 a week or greater rates. Talk about being between a rock and a hard place! Neither Bonnie nor I had an income and we were looking to rent a home in the most expensive borough in England.

I had talked to a friend, Phil Webb, about our plans in March when he had taught at our leadership college. I told him that Hammersmith and Fulham were right next to Kensington and more reasonable to rent. He advised me against renting there for two reasons. One, he said if we went to H & F and it worked, we would always wonder if we had truly been obedient. In the back of our minds would be the thought that I didn’t do what I heard Him say! His other thought was if we tried to get into K & C, whether we could or couldn’t do it; we would always know that we had been obedient. Then he told me a remarkable story of how the Lord had provided them with a house when they moved from London. I really believed this was the counsel of God.

If we are a people of faith, then what we do has to have enough risk in it that we couldn’t do it ourselves. Hammersmith and Fulham I may have been able to pull off with the help of my friends. But Kensington and Chelsea we couldn’t do on our own, even with combined incomes. I determined to hold on for the breakthrough rather than do something out of my own strength. It was not easy!

By the end of May we had rumbling among the natives. We decided we would have a worship service in the borough as a statement that we were serious about planting a church there. One of our group started phoning churches in the borough to see if they would rent us their building for that service.

Another one of the people in our group, Joanna Simms, had found a church hall for sale on Ichfield Road, down an alley and butted up against a cemetery wall. How she found it I will never know, unless of course, I thought to ask her the next time I see her! Bonnie and I went to look at it, took the details regarding estate agents, and decided to visit St. Luke’s C of E that owned it. We attended a service on a Sunday night at St. Luke’s and were warmly welcomed into the community by the church. Having received such a warm greeting, I decided to see if they would rent the hall to us. They agreed but at no cost.

The next day Patricia who was trying to book a hall called St. Luke’s. They said they were sorry but the day she wanted to book had just been booked the night before. For some reason Patricia asked if the person who booked it was Jim Inkster. Sarah, the church secretary, said it was. Sarah asked Patricia about the church and in the course of conversation it came up about our quest for a house. Sarah suggested we contact Synergy, the letting company that was just in the process of letting out St. Luke’s old rectory.

We arranged to see it on Tuesday and four of us checked it out. The house was rundown and dirty, although they said it had been extensively cleaned. The company’s plan was to rent it out room by room with everyone having a shared kitchen. I asked how much for the whole house. £3500! I made an offer of £3200. They countered with £3200 and I pay the utilities. I took it. I’m not sure if I would have been better off with utilities included and the higher rent. Nevertheless we had a deal.

On Thursday when I arrived to sign the lease, the agent asked if I would also sign a form that they would send to my bank to verify I could pay the rent. I signed it with the thought that God could do anything. In the natural there wasn’t a hope on earth that they would say we could. When we were on salary in Chelmsford we didn’t net enough to cover the rent. They gave us the keys and we began the process of moving in. A month later the bank sent me the form saying that they would not fill this information in as the letting agency had no right asking for it. I sent it onto the agency but no one ever asked for anything else.

We were in Kensington and Chelsea with a one-year lease.

Oh, by the way, we just happened to rent the house next to Hugh Grant.