Why we changed the name of our church to CROWD Church

What Happens When Crowds Gather Around Jesus

There is a question buried in the Gospels that does not get asked often enough. Wherever Jesus went, crowds gathered. In towns and villages, on hillsides and by lakesides, people came. Sometimes a handful. Sometimes thousands. But they came. Why?

That question is what led to the naming of Crowd Church, and it opens up something worth exploring about what Jesus actually did when people showed up.

The Eureka Moment

For years, the assumption was that church needed walls. A building. A physical space where people gathered on a Sunday. That was the default thinking, even for someone who ran multiple digital businesses and understood the power of online connection.

"I do business. I am a businessman. I have a digital business. I run a number of digital companies. And whilst I thought church can and should do digital really well, if I am honest, I had never thought about doing a purely digital church before. For me, churches needed walls."

Then the pandemic hit. And like so many things in 2020, what had seemed fixed and permanent turned out to be far more flexible than anyone imagined. The church plant that had been meeting in a Liverpool city centre coffee shop went online. And something unexpected happened. It worked. Not as a temporary measure, but as something with real potential.

The question became: what do we call this thing? The old name, Frontline City, made sense for a physical location. It did not make sense for a digital church that was reaching people far beyond Liverpool.

The answer came from reading Matthew's Gospel.

Confused and Aimless, Like Sheep Without a Shepherd

Matthew chapter 9, verse 35: "Jesus made a circuit of all the towns and villages. He taught in their meeting places, reported kingdom news, and healed their diseased bodies, healed their bruised and hurt lives. When he looked out over the crowds, his heart broke. So confused and aimless they were, like sheep without a shepherd."

That image of Jesus looking at the gathered crowds with a breaking heart is striking. He was not irritated by them. He was not performing for them. He saw people who were lost and hurting, and he responded with compassion.

"It was actually reading this scripture that I saw the crowd and thought to myself, this is it. Because whenever we live stream or whenever we put out content, crowds gather. Sure, it is in a digital context. But crowds gather."

Sometimes the crowds were small, ones and twos. Sometimes they numbered in the hundreds or thousands. The size was not the point. The point was that people were drawn to something. They were intrigued.

The Most Significant Figure in History

Why did people gather around Jesus? The answer proposed in this talk is simple: intrigue.

"They had heard about this charismatic healer that claimed to be the Son of God, and they were intrigued. They wanted to see someone get miraculously healed. They wanted to hear what he had to say. They wanted to see if everything they had been hearing about Jesus could actually be true."

Time magazine once called Jesus the most significant figure in world history. A carpenter from the small town of Nazareth who affected history like no other character, and he did it in just three short years of public ministry.

"You might not believe that he is the Son of God. But you have to admit he has changed the world. Including, if we are totally honest, our world."

The invitation extended from this observation is not heavy-handed. Not everyone in the original crowds followed Jesus. Some stood at the back. Some were just curious. Some left unconvinced. But they gathered. And the gathering itself was the starting point.

What Jesus Did When People Showed Up

Matthew's Gospel summarises Jesus's approach to crowds in three parts: he taught, he reported kingdom news, and he healed. Each of those has implications for what a church does today.

He taught. Jesus used parables, stories, and illustrations to take complex ideas and make them accessible. "He talked about the value of people, how to overcome obstacles, how to forgive, and why money is not the answer to your problems. He told the people that God was not mad at them."

The teaching was revolutionary and practical. It addressed the things people were actually dealing with. It was not abstract theology disconnected from daily life. It was about how to live a meaningful life, and the claim that Jesus himself was the key to that.

He engaged in conversation. The crowds around Jesus were not passive audiences. People asked questions. They pushed back. They shared their stories. When the woman who had been bleeding for years touched his garment and was healed, Jesus stopped and made her tell her story to the whole crowd.

"This is why we encourage you to comment on the live streams. It is kind of like the digital equivalent of putting questions and ideas out there, of sharing your story."

There is an honesty in this that resonates. Anyone who has sat through a sermon with burning questions and no way to ask them knows the frustration. The digital format actually improves on the traditional one in this respect. You can ask. You can debate. You can contribute.

He healed. Jesus did not just talk about the kingdom of God. He demonstrated it. He healed diseased bodies and bruised lives. He showed that what he was teaching was not theoretical.

"He inspired people. He engaged in conversation about the kingdom of God. And then he demonstrated the kingdom of God by healing bodies and transforming lives."

The Woman in the Crowd

The story from Mark chapter 5 that inspired so much of this thinking deserves attention. A woman who had suffered from significant bleeding for years, who had spent everything on doctors with no result, forced her way through a packed, restless crowd to touch the edge of Jesus's garment.

She did not announce herself. She did not ask permission. She just pressed through the crowd, touched his clothes, and was healed instantly. She wanted to slip away unnoticed.

But Jesus stopped. In a crowd of hundreds, he felt something happen and asked, "Who touched me?" His disciples thought the question was absurd. Everyone was touching him. But Jesus knew the difference between the press of a crowd and the touch of faith.

He found her. He heard her story. And he made sure everyone else heard it too.

That story captures something essential about what happens when crowds gather around Jesus. In the middle of the noise and the movement and the crush of people, he notices the individual. He stops for the one.

An Invitation, Not a Requirement

The talk was clear that Crowd Church is not for everyone, in the same way that not everyone in the original crowds stuck around. Some people are deeply committed. Some are curious. Some are just standing at the back, watching.

"We appreciate that it is not for everybody. When Jesus went to the towns and the villages, not everyone came out to see him. Not everyone came to be part of the crowd. But those that did, even if they just had the smallest amount of intrigue and they just stood at the back of the crowd, well, they gathered. They came to find out about Jesus."

The only requirement is a bit of intrigue. A willingness to show up, even digitally, and see what happens.

More Than a Thought Exercise

The closing point was perhaps the most important. Christianity, as presented here, is not merely intellectual. It is experiential.

"Christianity for me is more than just a thought exercise. It is a living, breathing, incredible relationship with Christ himself. And you can know him mentally, but you can also know him experientially too."

Crowds gathered around Jesus because something real was happening. People were being taught, engaged, and healed. The claim of Crowd Church is that the same Jesus is still at work, still drawing people, still stopping for the individual in the middle of the crowd.

What would it look like to step into that crowd, even from the back, and see for yourself?