Love Leiden

Hi, I am Simon Dixon. I live in Leiden, The Netherlands with my wonderful wife Ruth and two lively boys Samuel (10) and Luke (8).   We are a family of cross-cultural church-planting missionaries, sent by our home church Ivy Manchester in Manchester, UK.

In Short

• The Dixon family are long-term church planters, based in the city of Leiden, Netherlands. They are still quite new in Holland and are continuing to learn the language and culture.

• Simon is currently integrating himself into the local community in a deprived area of the city through teaching computer lessons, helping with a homework club, and running a discipleship group for new Christians.

• Simon works part-time for a multinational chemicals company.

• Ruth is studying the Dutch language part-time, as well as managing the home, kids and husband!

• Samuel and Luke are well settled and enjoying living in Holland.

Aim

Our eventual goal is to help plant a very simple and highly relational Dutch language church, most likely based in someone’s home, to meet some of the needs of local Dutch people who don’t fit into traditional churches. This church will be rooted in the local culture (thus unlikely to look like an established church) whilst discipling people in the Kingdom’s counter-culture.

Situation

Simon & Ruth have been in Holland with their children Samuel and Luke since 2007 and are in the early stages of Church Planting activities. Leiden is a multicultural city situated between Amsterdam Airport and The Hague with a population of around 125,000. Whilst we live in an area of Leiden called the Merenwijk, we are working in an area called the Mors, which is where God seems to be opening up opportunities for us. We currently belong to a Dutch reformed church in the Leiden area. However, most people in 21^st century Holland have lost any sense of connection with the established church and their spiritual needs are rarely addressed by established churches. This is especially true in Leiden where many of the Christians that do go to church travel to other cities to worship because of a lack of evangelical churches in the city. There are very few churches in Leiden that are actively seeking to take the gospel to ordinary Dutch people outside of the professional classes, such as poor people or immigrants. Leiden has a large immigrant population made up of mainly Moroccans, Turks and Afghans, as well as having several deprived areas. It is those people we especially want to pray for and target with the gospel in a way that they can understand.

Ministry

We are working in an inter-church team of seven people, largely drawn from the church we are involved in, all of whom are working at least once per week in the Mors area. Whilst we are not currently affiliated with a mission agency, we both have experienced personal coaches to guide in our vision and strategy, Simon’s coach having planted two inner-city churches. We have spent lots of time and energy to quickly learn the Dutch language and culture. Some of our English friends that lead an international church here in Leiden have recognised the strategic importance of detailed integration (‘becoming Dutch’) and although it is at times very stretching and draining for Ruth and I to do this, we are convinced that this is the only way to effectively connect with local people and we plan to be here for the long term to see this happen.

Integrating

At present Simon is much further on with the Dutch language than Ruth is. This has meant that he has been able to lead a Dutch speaking discipleship group in the Mors and also to find ways to integrate into the community through the local community centre. At the moment he is involved in running computer lessons for local people, helping with an after-school homework club, and he plans to start using English conversation classes soon as a tool to build relationships of trust. Meanwhile, Ruth is at a local college learning and immersing herself in all things Dutch.

Future

Eventually Ruth and Simon will be able to work together in their ministry. We believe our gift of hospitality is something we can use together to open our home and welcome in people of all backgrounds and help them find Jesus and grow in their faith. Dutch hospitality is rather different to that in the North of England. It is fair to say that we are still trying to figure out how we can use this gift most effectively. However we have discovered that despite their reluctance to offer hospitality, Dutch people are thrilled to be on the receiving end!

Children

Our children are very happy and settled here in Holland. They have adapted very well to the life and language. Samuel’s educational needs are being well met in a special school close by to us. Luke is in another school, also nearby, where he has made many friends. Both boys are enjoying different sports – Samuel trains in athletics and Luke plays ‘korfbal’, a kind of Dutch version of netball.

Background

Simon & Ruth have been members at Ivy Manchester since 1990. During our years at Ivy we were small group leaders together and Simon was involved in leading worship. Ruth was the Church Administrator for 5 years. In 2004 we moved to Christchurch, Dorset to follow a three year course in theology at Moorlands College. There Simon felt called to become involved in church planting in Holland. After having a long-standing relationship with Holland, we moved to Leiden in September 2007.