Easter Vestry 2009

Rectors Address

Easter Vestry Address

2 April 09

A. Facts and Figures

Families inside parish               484 (569)

Families outside the parish        192 (152)

Average morning Church          160 (163)

            Morning Prayer           158 (157)

            Family Service            181 (184)

            Lord’s Supper             143 (157)

Explorers                                  40 (48)

Average Evening Church            55 (62)

Average Midweek                      12 (15)

Baptisms                                     4 (3)

Confirmations                              0 (12)

Weddings                                    3 (5)

Funerals                                     21 (12)

Registered Vestry

            Additions                        21 (18)

            Subtractions                      1 (3)

New FWOs                                 11 (17)

Total Income                            £182,067 (£192,835)

Total Expenditure                     £ 179,681 (£197,613)

B. Address

What I would like to do over the next few minutes is to explain to you the priorities that the SV have agreed to and have been working with over the last 12 months. And God willing, will continue to do so over the next 12 months and beyond. Broadly speaking these priorities divide in to three.

Reach.

Build.

Send.

RBS. 

Nothing to do with the Royal Bank of Scotland you’ll be glad to hear.

Much more important than that.  It is to do with God’s plan for his church and his world.

Reaching the Lost.

Building Believers.

Sending out Workers.

First then, Reach.

To reach is all about reaching out, proclaiming and teaching the Lord Jesus Christ to people outside the church.

So Matthew 28.19-20 should always be our signature tune because it is God’s signature tune. And we should be dancing to it.

All authority on heaven and earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.

Dundonald has a population of roughly 10,000 people.

There are 11 churches within the wider area of Dundonald of varying sizes.

And a number who live in Dundonald attend churches outside the area.

But lets say there are 1,500 people who are active members of a church.

That leaves 8,500 that are un-churched within the parish.

So there’s a mission field on our doorstep.

And God has commissioned us to be his missionaries.

First and foremost that will happen most effectively by you and I praying for and seeking to win our friends and neighbours to the Lord.

That ongoing, unseen work is foundational and essential.

And what we as a church are seeking to do is to provide opportunities to help each other do this effectively.

For example, Christianity Explored. 

Its good for Christians to come to CE because it reminds us of what we believe. 

But what we want more of over the next 5 years are Christians inviting and bringing their non-Christian friends to CE. And the best way to gain confidence in doing that is to come along yourself so you know what you’ll be inviting your friend to when you ask them.

Some of you have already done that.

But if you haven’t – do consider joining the next CE at the start of 2010.

Other ways of reaching out include the February Open House event on Sunday evenings.

That certainly it seems caught people’s imagination.

And we hope to repeat Open House again.

There’s also the teenage work on Sunday nights. 

And although its not overtly evangelism, the parent drop in provides opportunities to build friendships with parents of children attending DP.

So the most important way we care for our community is by bringing the gospel to those in our community.

We mustn't sell out on that one.

Social projects are all very well and good and necessary.

And followers of Jesus will find themselves involved in these.

But in themselves they do nothing for people’s spiritual welfare.

Nor ours.

And that is why the church needs to devote itself to gospel work.

So reaching out.

And the B of RBS stands for BUILD.

Building the Believer.

That is proclaiming and teaching Christ to those inside the church. It is discipleship.

I want to commend to you the Seniors Weekend in the middle of May in two months time.

The purpose of this is to build up and encourage the older people in the congregation.

And to help us we have a small team of three joining us – Chris and Eileen Knowles and Jenny Cheetham.

Jenny’s area of expertise is in bereavement. Helping those who are bereaved.

And helping each other to care for the bereaved in a gospel focused way.

At St. E’s we have had a significant number of the regular congregation who have died over the past 12 months.

And Jenny will be able to help us in this area of ministry that none of us find easy. But which affects all of us.

The w/e will also include a men's breakfast.

And a tea on the Saturday afternoon with some song and a short talk.

And then Chris will preach on Sunday.

But I mention this because its part of building each other up in the Lord and his gospel.

Of course there’s plenty of other things we do to build each other up.

For example, confirmation class. The fellowship groups.

The new Young Adults Group—Inform.

The church weekend away in October to mention but a few.

But it’s an essential part of church life. To be built up.

And to be building others up.

Building Believers.

So R for Reach. B for Build. And S for Send.

Sending out Workers.

That is recruiting, training and sending people to proclaim and teach Jesus Christ within the church and outside it.

One of the great encouragements since the autumn of last year has been the new leadership team of Explorers.

And the hunger there’s been to be trained for this work.

Gospel workers need to be recruited and trained.

We need to entrust to others the deposit of God’s word so that they in turn can teach others. Especially a new and younger generation of believers.

And the Explorers leadership team is an example of this.

But there are other things as well.

Once a month we run TASTE—Training at St. Elizabeth’s—to offer training in leadership and preaching and we have at least 3 men who are looking into the possibility of ordination into the Church of Ireland over the next few years.

And all of this is part of Sending Out Workers in obedience to Christ’s Great Commission in Matthew 28. All kinds of worker.

Being sent out in different kinds of ways

But each committed to the gospel.

So I want to commend to you this framework of gospel ministry.

Reaching the lost.

Building Believers.

And Sending out workers.

Please use this framework in your prayers alongside the Prayer Diary.

And with prayer in mind, some words of Jesus from John 14.14 to finish.

You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

Now is this how you pray?

Is this how we pray as a church?

To pray in Jesus name is to make our requests on his account, not ours.

You and I in ourselves have no grounds whatsoever to come into God’s presence and to ask things of him.

We have no right to pray.

But Jesus does.

He is God’s Son.

He has perfectly obeyed the will of his Father.

And he now sits at God’s right hand in heaven.

And the Father loves to grant the requests of his beloved Son.

Jesus has every right to make requests.

And in his graciousness he does so as our advocate and mediator.

So to pray in Jesus’ name is like presenting a cheque to God the Father signed by Jesus.

With his authority.

His guarantee.

And that’s an enormous privilege

And it gives us confidence to pray for anything that will forward the work of God’s Gospel in Dundonald and beyond.

So in the 12 months to come lets focus our prayers in specific ways on:

Reaching the Lost

Building Believers

Sending out Workers.