Clergy

The Rector Writes…

Clergy

Do you believe in the transforming power Jesus can have for people’s lives?  Paul’s life changed in the moment we read about in our Acts reading.  So has Peter’s – a fortnight ago he was denying Jesus three times before the cock crowed, today he has answered “yes” three times to the question we are each asked by Jesus – “Do you love me?”  John’s Gospel records Jesus’ final words to Peter: “Follow me” – Matthew tells us Jesus’ first words to Peter: “Follow me”.

As the new edition of the Parish Magazine (thank you Elizabeth!) makes clear the next month or so of our common life will have a significant focus on discerning what it will mean for us to follow Jesus as individuals and as a parish.  This week the first sessions of the “Everybody Welcome” course will be held.   If you want to come along, please do so – details here.

Whether or not you are able to take part in the sessions, it would be wonderful (and potentially transforming!) if the whole church community could be praying daily:

Heavenly Father, you have welcomed us into your kingdom and your heart’s desire is to draw every human being to yourself.  Grant us clear eyes to see people as you see them, sensitive feet to stand in their shoes, and warm smiles to welcome them in your name.  Give us such generous hearts that our church becomes a foretaste of heaven where every soul you send us finds a loving home in the community of your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ.  Amen.

From The Rector…

Clergy

Our New Testament reading today continues St Paul’s exploration of the theme of unity and diversity in a passage that proves remarkably poignant for our common life at this time – and not just because we reach the end of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.  On Wednesday Bishop Mark and Archdeacon Fiona (of Horsham) came to discuss the Crawley (& Horsham) Parish Review with the PCC.  Careful and often profound observations made for a positive and engaged meeting in which your PCC reps did you proud (and, as the Chair of the PCC, I express my thanks to all those who came).  Much of the time was spent exploring the recommendation that we consider whether the church’s mission in this part of Crawley would be better served by splitting the parish into two or remaining as one.  Unity and diversity again.  It was encouraging to see how the needs of the communities we serve were in the foreground – and that the recognition of Jesus’ mission (and ours!) offered in today’s gospel was the starting point rather than any pre-conceived idea of church structures.  Elsewhere in the Review there were concrete recommendations about splitting the other three parishes in Crawley and we were reassured by the visitors that the recommendation had been framed to emphasise that it was for us to consider and work out the best way forward in our context.  Questions of resourcing were also discussed and it was clear that the focus our current Home Groups are giving to identifying and releasing the spiritual gifts of diverse members of our congregations to collaborate in our common mission was an essential first step (ring any bells with the Corinthians reading?).

Every blessing to you all

From the Rector…

Clergy

As we come together in the Parish Eucharist this morning to recall the Baptism of Christ, and to welcome Andrea as a new member of the Christian family, it is an appropriate time for each one of us to reflect on what our baptismal promises mean to us and what we do to sustain ourselves on our faith journey.  This Tuesday, the first of our new Home Groups begins. I use the term ‘new’ loosely as we have had the Pilgrim Course Group meeting for nearly two years, which could well be described as a Home Group.  Many churches encourage such groups as a further opportunity for providing fellowship and support to one another as we journey through life as well as offering a safe and open opportunity for learning more about our faith. We are seeking to build on the success of our Alpha Course and the experience of the Pilgrim Course by now offering the chance for all of you to become part of a Home Groups (initially there will be 4 across the Parish).  In baptism, we come to share in the priesthood of all believers, but can often struggle to work out what that means in practice.  Often when people make a (much needed!) offer to help we have listed the different roles that need filling as an indicator of where they could be involved. We have not always looked at the particular gifts or experience of those offering their precious time. The ‘new’ Home Groups will initially look at helping each of us identifying the gifts that we have been given (we have ALL been given them!) and then how we might nurture them and use them at our work, in our homes and within our Church family as we live out our baptismal calling.  The times and locations of the Home Group meetings are available from the Parish Office, Steve or me.

Epiphanytide blessings to you all!

From the Curate…

Clergy

As we approach the New Year – we have as a Church gathered on several occasions to celebrate the birth of the Hope of the World – Jesus Christ.  I preached before Christmas at St Nicholas’, that if we choose to really follow the teaching of Jesus Christ then -‘how quickly our world could change’.  Our world could change if we said words like “I’m sorry” to those we were estranged from, “forgive me” to those we had wronged, “use me”, “guide me” or “cleanse me” to God in order to make him the centre of our lives. That is quite a challenge, and if you felt that after too much Turkey the challenge of the Gospel – good news, would simply disappear amongst our own overeating and tiredness – then think again!

Our reading from Colossians  doesn’t lower the bar so we may, in our post-Christmas heavier state, just limp over it. No  – it raises the bar even higher by issuing us with the challenge of the Christian life. ‘Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other’. Clearly this is written by a man that has never spent a Christmas Day with the in-laws!  But there it is in black and white – followed by the words ‘above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony’. As Christians the bar seems high and it is – for we can only achieve it with the help of the Holy Spirit.  But if we do aim high and invite the Holy Spirit to help us then we might also grow as Samuel and Jesus grow in wisdom, stature and favour.

Blessings,
Steve

From the Curate…

Clergy

John the Baptist would have been a difficult character to be around. A camel-hair shirt-wearing, locust-eating prophet whose words came straight from the hip.

If I was preaching this weekend, I might seek to avoid the Gospel reading and concentrate much more on the more palatable Philippians reading – Rejoice and pray. Now I can do that – and it will cause me little harm – I can rejoice and pray with the best of them.

However, would John the Baptist be shouting at me and others  – ‘you brood of vipers’? Would he be saying just because you come to Church and wear a dog collar what makes you think that you are safe?  John the Baptist makes us feel uncomfortable just as he made King Herod uncomfortable enough to have him beheaded.  So rather than ignore John’s words in our Gospel, I think Advent is time to lean into the readings to help us prepare to celebrate the coming of the King.

Advent has become a word that lost its power and seems old and archaic.  However, to me Advent should be an important season of preparation and anticipation. Preparation – that we are able to do by leaning into the words of John’s warning and checking our own hearts in the light of them, to ensure that we are not sitting smugly behind a dutiful type of faith but have hearts that are transformed by the following of Jesus Christ.  If we have self-reflected, as some did on our Quiet Day and prepared properly for Advent – then we can be full of joyful anticipation for the coming of Jesus.

It is only when we are prepared and in a state of anticipation that we are more likely to see God’s glory now in the everyday and in the ordinary. To see God’s glory in those that God has placed around us.

Steve

From the Rector…

Clergy

We extend a warm welcome to Archdeacon Fiona as she visits the parish and preaches at St Nicholas’ Patronal Festival this morning.  This afternoon she will take her place in Chichester Cathedral, our mother church, as Bishop Martin blesses a specially designated door to herald the Year of Mercy he has declared for the Diocese.  Pope Francis, whose call Bishop Martin is supporting, describes such a door as “a Door of Mercy through which anyone who enters will experience the love of God who consoles, pardons and instils hope”.  It is a welcoming door through which all in need may enter, but also a door from which the Church must go out to proclaim mercy to all.

As our Alpha Course concluded this week I was struck by how much it had anticipated (and modelled) some of the key principles both of the Year of Mercy and how we can be “church”:  the open welcome, the fellowship (and thanks again to Higgidy Pies for another wonderful meal on Tuesday!), the learning through clear teaching and free discussion, the building of a common purpose respectful of individual needs and journeys and the going out challenged yet resourced.   The final evening spoke powerfully as in the talk and discussion we considered what the church could be and, quite naturally, put it into practice in the support of two of our members – one who received (during the talk) news of the death of a family member and one who was then in hospital and died shortly afterwards.  It is that bond, within the church family and with all God’s children, that was modelled by St Nicholas.  His is an example of a life infused with pastoral care, teaching and worship that continues to proclaim the gospel in our own day and challenges us to do likewise.

Anthony

From the Curate…

Clergy

“Right!”

Liz fears this word in our house.  It comes out of lips at the meal table in our kitchen or we are just about to go out as a family or in mid conversation in a coffee shop.  I do it sub-consciously (but occasionally consciously).  It signifies to Liz and the girls that I have had enough of waiting and this is the time for action.  Right!  Time to leave a meal table and get on. Right! Time for us to actually try to leave the house somewhere near to the time we actually agreed we would (I live in a house of girls!) or Right! I have just done my mental to-do-list in my head and unless the day has 36hrs I need to get going.

That is how it feels to me as I enter the season of Advent. Right! Here we go – time for action – if I thought I was busy before Advent then just wait for the next few weeks. There will be lots of ‘Rights!’ My very summarised to-do-list looks like this

  • lots of services
  • six School Nativities
  • advertise this and that
  • last Alpha meal/talk

Oh and Christmas, buy presents, work out what we are eating and write cards! The pew sheet just isn’t big enough. I think if Jesus returned, as described in Luke this week, I might, if He was lucky, find a slot in my list (but way down the bottom).  All these things are important but are they the most important and what should I be saying “right” to?

In Advent, we should be giving ourselves space and time to prepare for the birth of Jesus.  The Advent Quiet afternoon on 5th December is much needed time and space in order to re-evaluate my to-do-list, so I can focus on the most important aspect of life in Advent or any other season – my relationship with God through his Son with the power of his Holy Spirit.

Steve

From the Rector…

Clergy

I’d like to start on this, the last Sunday of the Church’s year, with a huge thank you to all those who were involved in offering hospitality and otherwise supporting our guests on the Pilgrimage2Paris last weekend.  The comments posted on social media gave a very positive image of the parish.  And that, perhaps, is a link into some reflections from my own ‘pilgrimage’ last week in Egypt where time and again I was struck by the way in which the Christian community (about 10-15% of the Egyptian population) lives out its faith through service to “neighbour”.  Projects to provide education, medical services, micro-loans, relief of poverty, refugee assistance abound and are offered to all, irrespective of faith tradition, in the midst of challenging (and often discriminatory) circumstances .  One of my colleagues on the pilgrimage said that he had come expecting to find a church “needing us” and instead came away challenged and encouraged by what we saw.  The phrase from the Alpha talk I had given just before leaving that– “we are not saved by good works, we are saved by grace, but we are saved for good works” kept coming to mind.   And the Coptic Church’s service (“good works”) seems to be borne out of, or has itself produced, a remarkable blessing.  The church next to where we were staying regularly had over 100 coming for daily Morning Prayer followed by Eucharist (1.5 hours!); one church dug out of the rock in the “garbage city” on Cairo’s outskirts has 6,000 (really!) for their Thursday evening bible study; 40 years ago monastic life was dying out with only a few hundred monks – now there are over 15,000 … and all in context where “mission” is amongst those who are already Christian.  You can imagine my prayer for the impact of yesterday’s Holy Spirit Day on our parish life !

Anthony

From the Associate Vicar…

Clergy

During a four month exchange to the U.S. I came across a hymn which has pretty much become my favourite. The hymn “If you but trust in God to guide you” was written in 1641 by Georg Neumark and comes to us in English by the prolific translator of German hymns Catherine Winkworth. The hymn was written during the 30 year war which ravaged Central Europe during the first half of the 17th century. Georg a young musician and administrator was robbed and lost nearly everything when travelling from Gotha to Kiel on the Baltic coast. The only piece of his possessions he was left with was a collection of recommendations from his former position in Gotha. He had lost nearly everything but due to these letters he was finally able to secure a position as a teacher in Kiel. And so he is able to write,

Sing, pray, and keep His ways unswerving,

Offer your service faithfully,

And trust His word; though undeserving,

You’ll find His promise true to be;

God never will forsake in need

The soul that trusts in Him indeed.

 

Today’s readings have a similar tone to them. They speak of the broken and hurting world we see around us today – but they hold onto the assurance of God’s faithfulness.

Today as we part ways it is my prayer that you will continue to “approach the house of God with a true heart in full assurance of faith” as the letter to the Hebrews puts it: You here in Pound Hill, Worth and Maidenbower, and I in Shoreham. Let’s continue to sing, pray and offer our service faithfully.   Amen.

James

From the Curate…

Clergy

I can’t quite believe that it was a year ago that we all experienced those dramatic, beautiful and thought provoking images of the ceramic poppies outside the Tower of London.  They cascaded down out of an office window and then spread like a flowing river across the moat around the tower.  We took the girls up to see them and as we queued, I noted that for the number of people, there was an atmosphere of reserved dignity as the beauty of the image was interjected with the stark realisation that each poppy represented a young life that had been lost in the First World War.

I often pause and read the list of names of the fallen on Phil Mann’s display to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the First World War in the window of the Lady Chapel.  Today as I type these few words at my desk, I have three orders of service of funerals I attended next to my laptop. They are for Tony Hiscock, Theo Ball and Jean Winter respectively; all dearly missed members of our congregation who have died in the past year.  All of them connected by their service during the Second World War within the armed services.

It made me think that I not only wear my poppy to remember those that died and continue to die in war, but also to remember those that survived and then wore or continue to wear visible and invisible scars of their military service. To remember them and continue to tell their story so that its echoes can stop us from making the same mistakes as before and to remind us to continue to help those struggling with the impact of conflicts that still occur too frequently across the world. The Poppy, a symbol, yes, to remember sadness, but also to remember there is hope.

Steve