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Major Motivator boosts Norwich church viewers

A Norwich Salvation Army officer is helping draw thousands of people to online church services with his popular keep-fit videos as Major Motivator.

Norwich Salvation Army Citadel Commanding Officer, Major Mark Sawyer, started producing the videos when his wife Andrea suggested the idea after they began hosting a breakfast-show type church service online once lockdown started.
 
Major Mark has said that more than 2,000 people have been tuning in to the online Sunday services, compared with around 300 who would attend pre-lockdown.
 
Major Mark told Radio Norfolk: “When there was a lively song we said ‘why not stand up in your front room and do some exercises because you need to keep fit’. Out of that, Andrea started to wind me up and say  ‘why don’t you bring a fitness video out, and to cut a long story short I ended up doing Major Motivator and it has caught on.
 
“I had a heart attack ten years ago in my early 40s – that was quite surreal and St Thomas’ Hospital gave me some cardio-rehab exercises, which I now use in the fun videos.”
 
And there has been a great response with thousands viewing the videos on YouTube.
 
“There is a bigger story going on,” said Major Mark, “because people tell their friends and their family members and so people join in. We have now had people from New Zealand and Australia and Kenya and through that they have been tapping into our online services which is brilliant.
 
“We have not closed our churches, we are just reimagining church and doing something different because church is not about the buildings but is about us as Christians.
 
“We have also still been doing a foodbank, supporting a women’s refuge and helping an asylum seekers place near us as well as keeping the rough sleepers work going on.”
 
You can view the videos on Facebook and YouTube or above

Pictured above is Major Mark Sawyer in one of his Major Motivator videos from YouTube.


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