all these things

A minister in a Connexional post told me that he most missed being pastor of a church at Christmas time. I must admit there is a different feel about this Christmas: the headlong rush to come up with enough sermons of relevance and to weed out the jewels of Carol-dom from the glut of Victorian sentimentalism in the hymn book is this year not an issue but despite approaching the Advent with the feeling that for understandable reasons perhaps mission is not on the top of agendas during the festive season , there's been plenty to keep me occupied. Of these a few highlights:

Property scheme visits to Silverstone and East Leake showed small congregations enaging seriously and bravely with the need for change and experimentation in mission. Leading a Sunday service at Queensgrove church in Northampton was a priviledged opportunity to share with a congregation ministering to their community at a time of great need following a fatal stabbing just yards from the church steps, now covered in flowers. A visit to Melton Mowbray helped to lay plans for a circuit Fresh Expressions weekend, which Andrew Barker will lead in February, whilst a presentation to the preachers meeting in Banbury was a chance to explore what FX is beginning to mean in several promising iniatives in that circuit.

In the midst of all this was a days retreat with a good friend during which Luke 2.19 was the focus of my meditations:
Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart

During strange, exciting and scary times, the only certainty is that God is at work.

shape not size matters

One of the surprise packages of this role has been involvement in property. Not my favourite part of being a circuit minister at all, so I can't pretend to have been filled with unalloyed joy when I found out that my role of District Director of Mission involved sitting on the District Property Panel. However it has proved so far to be just as enjoyable as the rest of my ministry here. There is a real determination in the District to be mission-shaped in terms of giving grants towards property schemes and so a visit from me is an essential prerequisite to making a grant application to the DPP. This week I visited Thornborough in the Buckingham, Bicester and Brackley Circuit. The church has begun an extension at rear of the chapel and having found sources for nearly all the money for it themselves, are looking to the District for some of the rest. The extra meeting room, toilets and kitchen will be used for their growing childrens work, much of which is in co-operation with the Anglicans. The church has run an ALPHA course with help from Well Street church in Buckingham and have got themselves twinned with a church in West Bromwich for exchanges and mutual support. All this with a membership of 11 and a weekly congregation of around 15. It all serves to remind me that being mission shaped has more to do with where the collective focus of a church is than with how many are available to do the focussing.