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About

We are a group of stirrers and shakers.

We believe the gospel is beautiful and leads to full life.

We want to help the Church stimulate curiosity in new ways.

Start To Stir Darin and Joy Stevens

Hi, we’re Darin and Joy.

We spent the last twenty years ministering to young people in schools and churches in Oxfordshire and training theology students with Reign Ministries. We are regular facilitators of Bible, Theology and Youth Ministry courses with ForMission College.

Over the years we’ve spent a long time learning how to have gospel conversations with young people, friends and neighbours who seem completely indifferent to matters of faith. What we’ve found out is that many people are not against God, rather they have absolutely no sense of how He is relevant to their life. Their questions are not so much theological or ‘apologetical’, but rather, incredibly practical. So we are working on how to overcome the relevancy barrier and have better conversations that open the door for the gospel. We can help you and your church prepare to launch a new mission initiative, plan pathways from social spaces to spiritual conversations, and learn how to overcome the relevancy barrier by stirring up spiritual curiosity and helping people discover the presence of their soul.

Meet other stirrers

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Emily Spicer

"I’ve used the Stir Course in our work at the secondary school. It has been the perfect resource to help un-churched students begin to explore Christianity. It creates a level playing field for young people to explore faith for themselves."

Emily Spicer
Youthworker
Start To Stir John Procktor

John Prockter

"Stir has made a massive impact on our local youth ministry. Both the resource and the ethos behind it have been transformative for us. Recently we asked older young people who have grown up and left school what made the biggest difference to them while they were with us. Each of them spoke about the freedom to express their thoughts, safely as they learnt about their connection with Jesus.”

John Prockter
Director of Catalyst Youth Trust
Author of Stuck in the Mud: Stories of Hope For When You Are Stuck
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Rebecca Gyateng

“What I find helpful about the Stir Course is that it is suitable for church context but also for outside the church - especially because the language of the Stir Course is not full of church language and church terms. Our groups are made up of young people who come from various backgrounds. The Stir Course provides a positive starting point for young people from other faith backgrounds as well as those who have no faith background.”

Rebecca Gyateng
Youthworker & Church Planter
Hamburg, Germany
Start To Stir Tom Rodgers

Tom Rogers

"We use the Stir Course in two different community-based youth groups because it starts out asking basic questions that everyone is asking rather than being too complicated.

It’s great for the youth leader who doesn’t have a lot of time, but still wants to run a youth group, because it does a lot of the planning for you."

Tom Rogers
Youth Pastor
The Gate, Reading