Shuffle
Have you ever tried to do too much? Perhaps you offered to take on extra responsibilities at work and ended up letting people down? Perhaps you signed up to do some extra studying to learn a new skill and couldn’t fit everything in your brain? Perhaps you feel like you’re constantly trying to keep up with friends and family and never really have enough time with any of them?
A few weeks ago on our Vision Sunday I suggested that we might be trying to do too many things as a church, particularly midweek when most of our ministries happen between 10am and 2pm. I have continued to have conversations with people about that since, and it has become clear that we simply cannot sustain all the things we do during the week any longer.
Last week our standing committee discussed this at length, and asked me to contact those who serve at Warm Welcome Tuesday and Coffee Mates to see if – in principle – they would be willing to serve at Lunch Club instead, if we were to stop running Coffee Mates or Warm Welcome Tuesday.
I would like to emphasise that no decisions have been made yet about Warm Welcome Tuesday, Lunch Club or Coffee Mates. Tomorrow (Tuesday) evening it will be the main item on the PCC agenda.
There are a lot of moving parts so the decision is complex. Each ministry has different strengths. Coffee Mates and Warm Welcome are more similar to each other than to Lunch Club. Warm Welcome Tuesday is the newest of the three, but has built up a good link with Bereavement Group. Coffee Mates has integrated prayer into their regular pattern really well. Lunch Club provides a hot meal and activities, and now we have a midweek service before it. Warm Welcome Tuesday has run evangelistic courses more successfully than the other two. Coffee Mates links with art and knitting groups. All three offer somewhere to come for people who are lonely or struggling.
No decisions have been made yet – but the reality is the one decision PCC cannot make is ‘everything stays the same’. We need to offer our ministries safely at a minimum, but also healthily so those who serve don’t burn out and there are enough people to build relationships with guests and visitors. This is a key thing that we must not lose sight of. As we are seeing through our hospitality series, biblical hospitality has two goals: to show kindness to strangers and introduce people to our Father.
Please pray for everyone on the PCC as we consider the options, in particular that we would make a good and wise decision for the right reasons, to help us as a church to be faithful in our mission: making, growing, sending disciples of Jesus.
Revd Ben Green – Vicar