Bradford North Circuit

Circuit Prayer Letters For the last seven years I have been preparing and distributing by email a weekly prayer letter for those who wish to pray for Bradford North Circuit. The letters offer brief thoughts on prayer, a short prayer, and a list of prayer points: a rota of ministers, office holders and churches; and Circuit events. Some congregations are well represented on my mailing list, but most have very few and one has no intercessors at all. So, to mark the seventh anniversary I’m having another go at publicising the letters in an attempt to strengthen our joint prayer efforts for the Circuit. I think prayer matters. I think God wants us to pray. Indeed I think we actually need to engage with him in prayer if we are ever to reach our full maturity as Christians. Prayer is one of our main means of relating person-to-person with God as our Heavenly Father: in praise and thanks, as well as saying sorry for our slips, trips and flips – and of course asking him for things. Odd...

Whither next? I was sitting enjoying the sunshine and breeze of a summer afternoon, and the view on the edge of rolling countryside, when a couple out on a walk stopped nearby and the man stared at his mobile phone on which he apparently had a map. Eventually, they inclined hesitantly towards a choice of direction, and then they spotted me. “We’re looking for the station,” he said. I was on home ground and certainly knew the way, several, in fact, but it would have been well-nigh impossible to give clear enough directions by any of them, so, as it was on my route home anyway, I said, “I’ll show you.” And I walked with them there, taking them by interesting footpaths they would never have found on their own, leaving them gratefully on the platform studying timetables. There’s an awful lot of us staring at maps in one form or another at the moment, wondering about the way forward. This is true for all the Churches in the Circuit, pondering plans for growth or decline and how to ...

The snippets below are taken from Baildon Methodist Church report to the Charity Commissioners for the year ending August 2017. Church membership increased to 187 by the end of the year. As a further development of the Jesus Shaped People programme, which we found so inspiring, (https://www.jesusshapedpeople.net/) a five-week teaching programme entitled ‘Parables For Baildon’ again took place in the New Year, studying the relevance of the Parables in relation to living today. A ‘Family Focus’ leaflet, updated seasonally, was produced listing all activities and events available at Baildon Methodist Church for children and young families. Events during the year included a harvest supper and entertainment, a Gilbert & Sullivan evening, a comedy night, a Church Anniversary social, Action For Children Christmas Fayre and concerts by Village Voices, Aire Valley Male Voice choir and Woodhouse Grove School. In the autumn, the Church hosted a visit by a group of young Palestinian dan...

Pancakes and Poems, what a great evening we had on 13th February (Shrove Tuesday), in aid of 2nd Mile Project. People were invited to come along for tea/supper and enjoy a variety of pancakes both savoury and sweet. The selection was most tempting with fillings such as chilli. chicken and avocado, mushroom or cheese and onion. The sweet fillings were too many to mention, but my favourite was fresh fruits with ice cream – yum, yum. Throughout the evening, many people had brought poems to read to everyone. The genre of this was amazing with funny, romantic, knowledgeable and even a little bit naughty. It was good to be together with laughter and smiles all round. A special thank you to everyone who came and all who helped. Elaine B, Thornton

Ladies of the Bradford North Circuit, welcome to an introduction to MWiB! Methodist Women in Britain is a movement within the Methodist Church, which seeks to resource individual women and women's groups in a variety of ways. It came into being in July 2011, formed through the coming together of Women's Network and other women's meetings within Methodism. MWiB is more than a meeting. Many women may feel that it is not for them, because they do not already attend a women's meeting. The movement is there for ALL women in Methodism. There are opportunities for meetings within circuits, and at District and Connexional levels, which are all held on a regular basis. MWiB seeks to offer a broader menu for women today. There are many opportunities to meet locally, nationally and internationally. Resources are available for individuals to use at home, at work or within their families. MWiB is very active nationally; details of events can be found in the Methodist R...

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound.” This was the theme of our one-church, all-age service which, as part of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, was held this year at St Phillip’s Church in Girlington on Sunday 21st January. The service had been designed by churches in the Caribbean for united services held by churches throughout the Christian world and was but one of the events organised during this designated special week. The church was full to overflowing and the tempo was lively. Participation by a congregation of all ages and all branches of Christianity from most of the churches in Girlington, Heaton and Manningham was enthusiastic. The young people of the churches played a significant part by establishing areas of oppression through the creation of links of a chain and then, by using their own words and ideas, showed how the chain could be broken in ways that led to freedom - of both mind and spirit. The younger children in their own, sometimes noisy but always livel...

How would a gingerbread church with icing doors and chocolate finger organ pipes appeal? Junior Church at Thackley had been busy building such an edifice for a couple of weeks, before the part-completed church was creatively used as the basis of an inspired service, put together by worship leader, Gill Dobson. Using the Lectionary readings and carefully chosen hymns, poems and prayers, Gill gave us a timely reminder that our churches are the people, not the building, and that we are all part of God’s Church – all our churches belong to Him – not us! We considered how the children were building their gingerbread church on the groundwork of the Junior Church leaders and how in a similar way we were building Thackley Church, in the sense that the church is who we are and what we do. We were asked to think how we might describe Thackley - a busy church? A traditional church? An ageing church? A lively church? A tired church? A caring church? Rev David admiring the ...