Skip to main content

January message from the Ministry Team

Dear Friends,

As I came to preparing this article, I started to think about the years in my life, which ended with a six and what of significance for me, personally, happened in those years.

1966    My brother was born and as a family we moved into the house in Leeds where my mum lived, up until a year ago.

1976    I attended my first cricket match at Headingley, Leeds.  A match between Yorkshire and Lancashire.  A little disappointed that Geoffrey Boycott did not play.

1986    I finished my Accountancy and Finance degree and started work as a trainee Chartered Accountant.  Beth and I got married.

1996    Beth and I went to Oxford for me to train for ordained ministry.

2006    Beth and I went on a tour of the Holy Land.  A fantastic experience.

I have a love of history, with, my favourite battle happening in Sussex on 14 October 1066.

It is interesting, when you stop to think about it, how you can map things which shape our lives, across the decades.  Other years have contained other things, some of which have been good and some have been hard, at times very hard.  In all of this, God has been and continues to be with me, loving, caring, forgiving.  Sometimes I am aware of this and sometimes I am not.

Perhaps you already have something of a sense of significant things coming in 2016; moving house, birth of a child, finishing a course, surgery; or perhaps not.  However 2016 unfolds, Jesus invites us to keep close to him, to allow him to work in and through us.  For us to be a people of prayer, engaged with the world Jesus came, died and rose again for, and for us to share him, as we share our life with others.

Every blessing for 2016

Revd Andrew

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

July message from Rev Phil

Dear Friends,      The Methodist Church makes provision for its ministers to take a three-month sabbatical break from the routine of ministry every seven years – this year, in my case! By the time you read this letter, I will have already started my sabbatical and I will be absent from the circuit from mid-May to mid-August.     This is not an extended holiday but an opening to do something different, as a way of being refreshed in ministry; an opportunity to ‘power down’ and to get away from a hectic, diary-driven ministry, in order to spend more focused time with God. It is a requirement and not an option for ministers to take their sabbatical break.     There have been two main aspects to consider in planning the sabbatical. The first has been to decide how I should use the time. For your interest, I am pressing on with studies begun through Leeds University (which could lead to the award of a PhD), reflecting on my wor...

Godly Ways 8-10 March 2013

Godly Ways CODEC  and the  Dales Biblical Literacy Project  present: A weekend of Worship – Teaching – Workshops. WHEN : March 8th to 10th 2013 (Starts Friday evening) WHERE : Elm Ridge Methodist Church and Bondgate Methodist Church, Darlington and Ingleton Methodist Church SPEAKERS: Revd. Professor David Wilkinson  is a Methodist minister and Principal of St. John’s College, Durham. Well-known as a writer, speaker and broadcaster, David has wide-ranging interests, although he is especially concerned about science and religion. Revd. Dr. Peter Phillips  is a Methodist minister and Director of Codec, a research centre housed at St. John’s College, Durham. For many years, Pete served on the staff of Cliff College. He has a great interest in the New Testament and in communicating the faith in a digital age. Revd. Ron Willoughby  is an ordained minister with the Southern Baptist Convention in the United States, now living in this cou...

Summer Coffee Evenings raise over £1,200

Wilsden Trinity Church We would like to say a big thank you to all who supported us for your help in making our Summer Coffee Evenings such a brilliant success. The evenings have proved to be very popular and have been really well attended, attracting people from Wilsden village as well as members of other churches in the circuit.  Together we have munched our way through a tonne of biscuits and home-made scones and consumed gallons of coffee and tea. We have baked and bric-a-bracked and book sorted and are all exhausted and half a stone heavier than we were in May but feel it has been well worth the effort. In addition to enjoying very pleasant social evenings, with God's help we have succeeded in raising over £1,200 - approximately £250 each for the five chosen charities: Yorkshire Air Ambulance , Parkinson Society , Alzheimer's Society , Multiple Sclerosis Society and Martin House Children's Hospice . We are already planning for next summer and look forward t...