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You can read the contents of Richard's September letter - and download the pdf version of it below...
 Click on the image to open the pdf or right-click to save.
Thankful and Careful
 “We want to nurture what God has given us here...” (so says our purpose statement). Wonderfully, it seems plenty agree that All Souls is a gift worth nurturing - people come once and then keep coming back!
The Autumn is when we do plenty of thinking, praying and planning for the year ahead, so it’s a particularly good time of year to step back and take a look at ourselves. As we set out our vision for 2008 and beyond and as we set a budget to help us achieve it, being thankful for what we’ve got helps us to focus on what we want to achieve. Being careful with All Souls isn’t about being cautious and avoiding risks. It is about ensuring that, as we grow, we grow healthily. We don’t need to lose or water down what makes All Souls the place we love as God grows us numerically.
Nurturing What?So what is it about the All Souls church family that we want to build on and grow in the years’ to come? Perhaps you remember the first time you came through the doors. What’s kept you coming? Here’s my “list to give thanks for” as I describe the church here - what would be yours? I enjoy a church that’s...
- Welcoming - a group of people delighted to see newcomers and determined to help them feel at home.
- Informal - not asking people to look or dress a certain way. Come as you are, be who you are before God and with one another.
- Expectant - worshiping a God who changes lives today, so expecting to meet Jesus by his Spirit in songs of worship, through preaching and in prayer - it may be “come as you are”, but not “leave as you came”!
- All-age - children aren’t just “the church of tomorrow”, nor are older folk “the church of yesterday” - we’re all God’s “today” people.
- Jesus-focused - everything we do and are. In all that we stand for.
- Down-to-earth - a church where we’re real about life’s failures, hurts, disappointments, doubts and fears - and where we try to be generous with one another as God is with us.
- Whole life - our Monday-through-Saturday lives are valued as just as important as what we do on Sundays in church.
Enjoying the Ride All Souls is far from perfect - because we’re messy, fallible people - but we do have something here worth nurturing and growing. By being wise in our decisions, brave in our giving and generous with one another, we’ll still be able to talk about the gift God’s given us here in years’ to come.
God’s already taken us on quite a ride and the year that’s to come is a huge challenge. That’s why we’ve our two big sundays coming up in October (see overleaf) and why I hope you’ll make every effort to be there for them and to respond to the challenge I’ll set out.
If you’re someone who counts All Souls as your spiritual “home”, then you’ll know the gift we’ve got here is worth the effort - and the ride is just going to get better and better!
Richard Frank - September 2007 |
