Dear Church Family,
This Sunday will mark the fifteenth anniversary of my licensing as vicar of St Chads! I’m sorry we won’t be with you to mark the occasion, as it is our son Luke’s wedding in Oxford this weekend, a far more significant event for future anniversaries.
I guess after fifteen years as your vicar, I am finally not feeling like this is my new job – it takes me a long time to adjust to things! When we arrived Micah had just started walking and he’s now nearly as tall as me. There are so many things we are grateful for in God bringing us to Romiley, each member of family has grown and flourished here and we have seen God do beautiful things. Looking back at these anniversary moments we see how the things of real value often grow steadily and slowly, so it is good to pause at these staging points and give thanks. What anniversaries are you celebrating this year?
Many things come to mind as I reflect on the years gone by and what is to come, I just want to highlight three: your generosity, our life of prayer and giving space for God to move.
When we came to St Chads, part of the vision God gave us for the culture of the church was some core values, which included generosity. We found that St Chads was already a generous church and we wanted to see that continue. Over the past week we have seen beautiful expressions of generosity in our church family, £1088 given for harvest, £884 given for KBF at the cake sale and £482 given for the men’s curry night. Generosity is an expression of both love and justice, two things which we see clearly in God’s heart throughout the Bible. Let’s continue to be a generous church, our generosity enables God’s love to reach people in very practical ways.
The second is our life of prayer. I remain absolutely committed to intercessory prayer being at the very heart of the life of St Chads. Early this morning I was reading about church planting movements in Muslim countries and what had been learned in times of extraordinary growth. The first lesson those leading the movement emphasised was the centrality of prayer. We long to see God move in our community, to see the Holy Spirit bring people into an eternity with God, through the forgiveness of sins. We long to see the poor provided for, lives restored, joy released, loving community built. When prayer is central to a church’s life, then these things happen.
Next week we have our next 24hrs of prayer and prayer event. Giving this intentional time to pray shifts us and brings new life. Sanctuary is a beautiful place of encountering God and hearing him speak. At the last 24hrs prayer I did the midnight to 1am slot and the sense of closeness to God and the power of his presence still makes my heart beat faster to write about it now. The things God said to me there, I am still unpacking and thinking and praying through. I urge, encourage, exhort you to set aside some time to pray during our 24hrs prayer. Not just for immediate needs, but to pray for whoever and wherever God places on your heart. When we devote time to God, he can do far more than just trying to do it in our own efforts and we become more fully alive in the process. Practical details will be in the church WhatsApp or contact me if you want to know more.
Thirdly, as I look back, I think of the many times we have seen the Holy Spirit impact people through our services. Sometimes bringing healing, sometimes in his kindness leading us to repentance (Romans 2:4), and sometimes empowering us to obey his will. We are in a season of wanting to give more space and time in services to respond to God, we do this differently in each service, (the Holy Spirit is infinitely creative), and amazing things happen when we respond to God. To do this more, we would love to equip more people in prayer ministry. We don’t want to create another team or rotas or limitations, but we do want those who pray to be trained, to ensure we do so honourably and safely for all. On Sunday 1st November at 1pm we are going to have a short prayer ministry training session, in church, after the 11am service. See below for more details.
So, thank you for all you have given to us as a family in the first fifteen years of our time in Romiley. The love, generosity, wisdom and kindness we have received from St Chads is immeasurable and we are truly grateful both to God and to you, the St Chads family.
With love,
Richard
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