Joel Virgo talks about the event ...
What is newday?
newday is a major youth event that takes place in the heart of the nation, with thousands of young people over about 6 days.
Who is it for?
newday is primarily aimed at young people between the ages of 12 and 19 but many people from different age groups come to serve and help out in practical ways. We have a children’s work to support families who come to serve so the event is kind of for everyone, but primarily it’s for the teenagers.
Why should people go?
There are all sorts of reasons why people should go. Firstly you’re going to have a lot of fun, it’s a total riot! Everyone who comes enjoys it. You get to know new people and build really strong friendships, genuine friendships that are going to last for years and really make a difference in your life. But I suppose if I’m honest, at the end of the day, I want people to come to newday because I want people to meet with God, the real God, the one who’s revealed himself to us in Jesus Christ. That’s the story for thousands of people who have come to newday so far. They come, some of them not Christians, some of them don’t even believe in God, but by the end of the week they know he’s real and usually they want to get to know him more. That’s why people should come to newday.
What is a typical day at newday?
Well people get up in the morning… usually and hang out with their friends in their tent or, if they are very wealthy, their caravan. Then they put on some clothes… normally and brush their teeth after they’ve had some breakfast. Then they go off to meetings. We have morning meetings which are times of worship and celebration and teaching from the Bible. They are always amazing! We have friends of ours who preach and come from all over the world. After lunch people are free just to hang out. There’s sport and all kinds of activities taking place on the campsite or people can just hang out with their friends, it’s totally up to them. In the afternoon hundreds of young people get on coaches and go off into the city to do social action projects. Evangelism is always a highlight of newday! In the afternoons people come back to have tea and then in the evenings we have meetings similar to the morning but we have all the age groups together and it’s just a time of celebration. We worship God, we hear from the Bible, we pray and we ask the Holy Spirit to come and people really meet with God. It’s always a superb occasion. After the meeting there are cafes, people hanging out with friends and eating food, all kinds of stuff taking place before eventually people go to bed… usually.
How does newday fit within Newfrontiers?
newday is an important part of Newfrontiers. It’s been launched by Newfrontiers as a family of churches together on a mission and we’ve seen thousands of young people coming from the Newfrontiers churches to make this happen. However, we still want to serve Christians from different groups, so we are welcoming Christians from any churches, not just Newfrontiers. We want to work closely with other believers from different churches, but newday is very much something that fits in with our vision as a movement. We are committed to people planting churches and we are committed to sending people out into the nations to plant churches all over the world. newday is supposed to serve that vision. We want to keep filling young people with a vision to plant churches that stays with them and encourage them to be a part of that vision that we own together, as a family of churches all over the world.
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Meet the team
Hundreds of servers work tirelessly to pull off the Newday event. Most of this small administrative army receive no payment but are committed to glorifying God by serving at Newday. If you'd like to help us out at this year's event visit our 'serving' page for more details.
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Joel Virgo
As well as heading up the newday team Joel is also the Lead Elder at Church Of Christ the King in Brighton.
He can often be found sticking random album covers to walls in an attempt to create what he calls 'art'. This might not seem that unusual, but when you consider the only albums Joel uses are hardcore acid jazz vinyls from the 90s, you have to start asking questions... -
Ben Rowe
Ben leads the youth and student work at King's Community Church, Southampton. He is passionate about Vikki, his wife, Danny and Caleb their boys, and (the mighty and glorious) Tottenham Hotspur. -
Steve Morris
Steve head's up the children's & youth work at Chafford Hundred Community Church in Essex. -
Stu Gibbs
Stu leads Emmanuel Church, Greenwich in London. Married to Livy for 13 years they have 3 sons, Lewie, Reuben and Jude. Between them they enjoy most sports, most food, most people and being a mummy and daddy. -
Stef Liston
Stef Liston is the leader of Revelation Church in Camden. He is married to Davina and has three children Daisy, Levi, and Melody. -
Stephen Dawson
Stephen is an elder at CCK in Brighton where he overseas the Racecourse Site. Stephen is married to Emma and have 4 energetic boys and one very loved daughter. At newday Stephen hosts the 12-14s meetings. -
Simon Brading
Simon Brading is married to Anna and they have a baby daughter called Ruby. Simon loves living in Brighton and leads the CCK Worship Team. Along with his debut album Going Your Way, Simon’s songs have been featured on the annual Newday albums as well as recent worship recordings from the Newfrontiers Leaders Conferences. Simon’s songs include Our God He Reigns, All That You Are, You Reign and Let The Rain Come. -
Adrian Holloway
Adrian is based at ChristChurch, London, which meets at the Mermaid Theatre. He is married to Julia and they have four children. He is the author of best-selling novels The Shock Of Your Life and Aftershock.
