Stories: The North Bristol Noise

The North Bristol Noise is a fantastic example of what The Noise can achieve. A few churches got involved in The Noise and were so inspired by the experience and the results that they took it further. With a pretty impressive website, newsletters, 3 G videos and all, the guys from North Bristol have taken the Noise to another level.

In terms of actual work on the ground the North Bristol Noise have a “Detached youth team”, reaching out to the young people on the fringes of their community. In addition to this they also organise more traditonal Noise style projects including: free car washes, clearing up gardens and public spaces, scrubbing off graffiti, re-painting walls and re-planting gardens and flower beds. They even have a creative team that paints murals on walls of local school playgrounds, and two free kids clubs.

Not being content with all this they hold a free banquet for senior citizens, and perform maintenance tasks in local schools, helping them to be safe and attractive environments for the pupils.  

Apart from the fact that the projects communicate the love of Jesus in a real and pratical waythe North Bristol Noise is a great example of unity within the church. Several congregations, of different denominations, are working together to bring the message of Jesus into the local community. In various areas of their city, the churches are becoming more and more well known, and the local people are aware of their presence throughout the year, not just over The Noise weekend.  We caught up with Stewart North, one of the orgainsers behind the North Bristol Noise and asked him a few questions!

How did you get started and what did you do?
Our first Noise project was in May 2001. We initially started connecting with all local community leaders and people of influence in the community. We got them together and shared the vision, fed them a nice meal and started to network and build partnerships. A number of us got involved in local community committees. We also provided a lot of volunteers to help run two local community festivals. We aimed to serve them and build trust.

What problems did you encounter?
We have had some difficulties with working with the local council but over time, the results have proved themselves, as over 170 volunteers have been involved and served with no strings attached. We have also learnt from mistakes in not planning some events too well: eg. a Fun afternoon - although sucessful to everyone who came, behind the scenes it was a bit of a last minute stress. We have learnt from mistakes.

What would you have done differently?
We would probably have done a few events on the Noise weekend, but kept them slightly smaller on the first couple of occasions. Also, we needed to have more people taking leadership responsibility of different aspects of the weekend rather than the events resting on a small core team. We have now put in to place a whole structure of leadership and those at the core are mainly overseeing and looking at long term strategy of developing the project.

How do you publicise your events?
We publicise by flyer dropping the whole area (10000 houses), putting up posters and banners. We also have two websites: one for volunteers to sign up (www.northbristolnoise.org.uk) and one website for the local community (www.thenoise.org.uk).

How many people were involved in organising and conducting your Noise projects?
Initially we had a core team of 3 people. Now there is a core team of 4 plus others are involved in taking the lead and responsibility for each area of North Bristol Noise. That means we have specific people who are involved in organising the publicity, administration, detached team, youth/sports teams, kids clubs, community development projects, working with the elderly, the fun afternoon, a prayer room and loads more...

What advice would you have for somebody wanting to start up a Noise project?
Visit other projects. Make sure it's not a hit and run kind of project, but instead work on ties into the local community and connect the Noise with what you are doing all year round; make it a high profile event that all the community know about and are invited too or are involved in. Plug really hard all the time for volunteers - it takes people ages to sign up!!! Keep prayer as the engine room! Have fun and show God's love in practical ways!

We want to thank Stewart and the team over in North Bristol for their time. Check out their site and if you live close get involved, they're doing some amazing stuff!
www.northbristolnoise.org.uk or www.thenoise.org.uk