As I’ve only just begun my ministry here, I thought it would be helpful to say a few words about my background and experience to highlight some of the things I’ll be looking at and sharing with you in the course of my first year with you.
The first thing to say is that I haven’t always been a priest. I worked for 18 years in the Employment Service before sensing a call to ordination and retain a strong interest in the world of work as a result. Throughout my ministry I looked to make connections for others between faith and work, something that looks to me to be important here as so many who live in Wickford are commuters working in Central London.
Initially, that fact seems to be a deficit for the church, as that’s a large group of people who aren’t around to attend church during the week and who are looking to rest and relax at the weekend meaning that going to church isn’t top of their agenda. One of the lessons I’ve learnt in my time at St Martin-in-the-Fields is that beginning with deficits is never the place to start. If we begin with the problems or issues we are facing then we end up overwhelmed by those issues and can’t see a way forward. Instead, we need to begin with assets or opportunities, as those always exist, even in the most difficult of circumstances. In fact, the Bible teaches us that God seems closest to us and is encountered most deeply in time of adversity than is the case in times of comfort. The Israelites discovered that when they went into Exile. Initially, they thought they had lost everything but Exile became the place where they learnt that God was everywhere, not just in Israel, and where they drew together and returned to their scriptures.
So, we need to look at the different groups of people who make up the community in Wickford and Runwell – including children, young people, parent, elderly people and others - assume that they are, in various ways open to encountering God, and work out how, when and where such encounters might take place. Different groups of people will be able to be engaged in different ways and at different times – in other words they won’t necessarily connect with our existing services and service patterns, maybe not initially, maybe not ever. So, in order to grow, as well as maintaining and developing our existing services and congregations, we will also need to grow new congregations by drawing on the riches of our traditions, history and heritage in the Team while representing those riches in new ways and at different times.
As one example, Great Sacred Music at St Martin-in-the-Fields is a weekday lunchtime concert that engages with people who enjoy choral music but who don’t feel comfortable in a church service. As a result, it is a concert rather than a service but one in which the underlying spirituality of the music performed is explored and explained in ways that enable to encounter something of God despite not being in a service. This is an effective bridging event drawing on the riches of Church choral music while sharing those riches in ways that enable people who wouldn’t otherwise come to church to engage.
I’m not saying that we need to replicate Great Sacred Music here. Instead, I’m saying that we will need to find our equivalents for the community here that provide a bridge to God in the way that Great Sacred Music does in central London.
Understanding and engaging with culture is also key to enabling others to encounter God. This has been another significant interest for me, particularly with the visual arts and music, but also with the Arts as a whole. Engaging with creatives locally and further afield and encouraging the creativity inherent in each of us enables the church to engage with another segment of the local community which often feels disconnected from church and enables us to create a culture of creativity that is a reflection of God, who is the most creative being in existence.
I’ve talked already about three elements of the model of mission with which I have worked throughout by ministry. It’s called the 4Cs, with the Cs being Commerce, Culture, Compassion and Congregation. We began with work, which is based on commerce and where we need to make deep connections between faith and work in order that people see how faith is lived out in the working week, not just on Sundays. Commerce is also needed as an additional source of income for churches that can’t be fully funded by benefactors or stewardship alone. I’ve already said a lot about culture, so won’t say more about that now. Compassion is a part of the 4Cs with which the churches in Wickford and Runwell already engage through support for the Foodbank and Women’s Refuge. I wonder whether there might be compassionate projects that we could, in time, initiate; remembering that care for the environment and support for families, young people and elderly folk are all also compassionate initiatives.
Congregation is the fourth element of this mission model. Supporting, sustaining and growing existing congregations is fundamental but is not an end in and of itself. If inwardly focused, existing congregations dwindle. If outwardly focused, seeking to support and grow new congregations using the other 3Cs, that’s when congregations grow. When congregations do this, it puts church at the heart of the community whilst also being with those who are on the edge. The edge may be the edge of church or the edge of society or the creative cutting edge (which might be found in commerce or culture).
I’m not saying that we need to replicate Great Sacred Music here. Instead, I’m saying that we will need to find our equivalents for the community here that provide a bridge to God in the way that Great Sacred Music does in central London.
Understanding and engaging with culture is also key to enabling others to encounter God. This has been another significant interest for me, particularly with the visual arts and music, but also with the Arts as a whole. Engaging with creatives locally and further afield and encouraging the creativity inherent in each of us enables the church to engage with another segment of the local community which often feels disconnected from church and enables us to create a culture of creativity that is a reflection of God, who is the most creative being in existence.
I’ve talked already about three elements of the model of mission with which I have worked throughout by ministry. It’s called the 4Cs, with the Cs being Commerce, Culture, Compassion and Congregation. We began with work, which is based on commerce and where we need to make deep connections between faith and work in order that people see how faith is lived out in the working week, not just on Sundays. Commerce is also needed as an additional source of income for churches that can’t be fully funded by benefactors or stewardship alone. I’ve already said a lot about culture, so won’t say more about that now. Compassion is a part of the 4Cs with which the churches in Wickford and Runwell already engage through support for the Foodbank and Women’s Refuge. I wonder whether there might be compassionate projects that we could, in time, initiate; remembering that care for the environment and support for families, young people and elderly folk are all also compassionate initiatives.
Congregation is the fourth element of this mission model. Supporting, sustaining and growing existing congregations is fundamental but is not an end in and of itself. If inwardly focused, existing congregations dwindle. If outwardly focused, seeking to support and grow new congregations using the other 3Cs, that’s when congregations grow. When congregations do this, it puts church at the heart of the community whilst also being with those who are on the edge. The edge may be the edge of church or the edge of society or the creative cutting edge (which might be found in commerce or culture).
Renewal comes from the edge. Those who are currently outside our congregations are those who have the greatest potential to renew us. That is because the Holy Spirit is always at work in the world and our wider community. We often don’t recognize what God is already doing in and through others because we think God is with us and we are those who have to share God with others. It’s freeing to turn that thinking on its head and realise that our calling is often to recognize and name what God is already doing in and through others, while getting involved to support those initiatives and help others see that what they are doing is of God.
This is a brief summary of some of what I have learnt about mission and ministry from nineteen years of ordained ministry. I hope it gives some ideas and frameworks that we can explore more fully over the months ahead. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and ideas as we seek to learn from each other and share together in being God’s people engaged in God’s mission here in Wickford and Runwell.
This is a brief summary of some of what I have learnt about mission and ministry from nineteen years of ordained ministry. I hope it gives some ideas and frameworks that we can explore more fully over the months ahead. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and ideas as we seek to learn from each other and share together in being God’s people engaged in God’s mission here in Wickford and Runwell.
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