New Year ~ New Hope ~ New Challenge
This well known extract of poem
‘The Gate of the Year’ quoted by King George VI in his Christmas Day broadcast
in 1939 feels so apposite at the moment.
“I feel that we may all find a
message of encouragement in the lines which, in my closing words, I would like
to say to you:”
I said to the man who stood at the Gate of the Year,
"Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown."
And he replied, "Go out into the darkness, and put your hand into
the hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light, and safer than a known
way."
May that Almighty Hand guide and uphold us all.
On January 6th I
returned to Church House Hove after being on leave since the 19th
December. It was good to put to one side all the unhappiness and uncertainty
and disquiet at Church House for awhile.
However on Christmass eve I was struck down by sickness and diarrhoea.
Jane and I went off to Tenerife on the 26th
and the ‘problem’ continued on and off for about another four days during which
time I seemed to have spent more time asleep than awake! I eventually pulled around to something like
‘normal’ to enable us to celebrate the New Year in style. We returned home on the 2nd
January and I had to have a quick turn around as I had accepted an invitation to
lead and preach at the Church of the Ascension Westdene (Brighton)
on the 5th January.
Having been told on the 29th
November about the restructuring at Church House and that once a consultation
period is over the post of Diocesan Evangelist will cease to exist life has become
‘interesting.’ The proposals are
extremely radical and include the deletion of the whole of the current Youth
& Children’s Team and replacing three full time Officers with just one linked
in with Education/Schools amongst other changes to the current Admin team.
Therefore alongside the busyness
of ministry I am trying to assimilate this unexpected news and all of the allied
documentation.
Two runs in early December. The first one was a very short 5k Santa
Dash alongside
Hove seafront that was just so
much fun and we got a free Santa outfit to run in as well!
This set me up for the next day and the Mince
Pie Ten. This is a tough multi-terrain ten mile that includes one very steep
climb for just over a mile at the 6 mile marker. The conditions were near
perfect and I was delighted to shave off a couple of minutes from previous
years.
Rural Ministry - a trip to Church House Westminster to meet with
Jill Hopkinson (National Rural Officer) and a small group of Rural Officers.
This ecumenical group have been meeting for a few years now putting together a
set of ‘papers’ which seek to offer some initial theological reflections on
certain aspects of rural ministry. I was delighted to hear that following the
General Synod motion calling for ‘Intentional Evangelism’ to be placed on the
agenda of every parish a Task Force has been set up and there has been a request
for someone to speak for the rural church. So often there is a strong
centrifugal pull towards the sub-urban, urban and city and rural churches can
easily get overlooked. Rural evangelism and rural ministry needs a different
approach and rural proofed resources.
I
am meeting with Simon Martin of the Arthur Rank Centre on the 28
th
January to review the Rural Evangelism Course ‘Journey to Faith.’ We would welcome
any comments to add into our review – you will find the Course as download on
the ARC website.
www.arthurankcentre.org.uk
City Ministry – ‘Soul by the Sea’ (www.soulbythesea.org) continues to grow
and develop as it seeks to serve all the Churches across Brighton & Hove. New
into the mix is the Soul by the Sea Friends, a regular monthly meeting of the
Soul by the Sea Community in a local pub and we are just about to launch our
very first Emagazine. Plus rehearsals for Brighton Passion Play 2014 are just
about to get underway alongside numerous Roadshows to various churches across
the city. It is very exciting to be part of this emerging Community and so much
of what we are seeking to do chimes in with the latest Grove Booklet…
Ev 103 Mission-shaped
Unity: Missio Dei and a New Way
of Being Churches Together
While the drive for ecumenism that characterized
the Council of Churches for much of the twentieth century saw mixed results,
the recent impact on evangelism of Missio Dei theology has had unexpected
consequences for Christian unity. This
booklet explores Missio Dei and how it is currently shaping changes in Churches
Together at national, regional and local levels. It aims to raise questions
that will inspire readers to bring about new ways of being churches together.
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