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Our Church - Vestry
ANNUAL GENERAL VESTRY MEETING 2008
Good evening everyone and thank you all for coming this evening. As I said on Sunday morning this year my address will be slightly different from past years. This June I will have been ordained 15 years and all of those will have been spent here in Carrickfergus. 12 of those years have been directly spent in ministry within Holy Trinity, 8 of them as your rector. As I said to you on the first Sunday of this year it has been an immense privilege and there is nowhere else I would rather be, or believe God would have me, than here with you. You are people of love and warmth to us as a family and to one another. You are people of faith in Christ which shows itself in selfless service within this congregation and in the wider community. You are a people with amazing gifts that you are willing to lay before God for His glory and for the service of others. These past 15 years have gone quickly and to be honest I can honestly say that it is only now I feel that I understand my calling to be a pastor and I pray that you see that reflected in my ministry with you and amongst you.
I do not intend this evening to go through a long list of people, organisations and events from the past year. I do want to say thank you to all who serve in leadership within Holy Trinity and all who serve by being here Sunday by Sunday to worship almighty God. We are blessed with godly, holy and faithful leaders and I want to publicly acknowledge that fact before God and you all this evening. I also want to say that there have been times when we have failed you as a congregation. We have sometimes failed to support you with our presence on certain occasions and we have failed to support you in prayer because we are not involved in your organisation. For that I ask your forgiveness and call upon us all to be much more visible in our support in the year ahead. We are blessed beyond words by your self-sacrifices in leadership. Thank you for all that you do for God and His kingdom here at Holy Trinity. I do want to mention one person by name - that is Jack. I personally want to thank him for his faithful commitment to Christ Jesus and for selfless service here at Holy Trinity. I value his friendship, his advice, and his leadership more than he realises and more than he will ever know. I have watched and learnt a lot from him, especially on a Sunday morning where he makes a point of getting to know people, especially welcoming those who are new. I am always amazed at his ability to remember names, which puts me to shame. So thank you Jack.
I want now to turn to the future of Holy Trinity. Some of the things I share this evening may provoke all sorts of reactions and emotions amongst us but may I say at the very start my hearts desire is to bring God glory, to win people for Christ and to build God's kingdom by building a fellowship of faithful people here at Holy Trinity.
Where are we as the people of God?
If I had to describe HT I would say that we are a faithful people who are struggling to live for Christ. You may not identify with that description but as your pastor I want to say to you that many in this fellowship struggle to live for Christ. I would never dream of breaking pastoral confidentialities but we are a fellowship were many people turn up on a Sunday wearing masks of respectability and religiosity and yet the rest of the week live lives of quiet desperation and despair. The sermon series that we have just completed and the one we are about to start have brought, and will bring, to the surface just such desperation and despair. If we are to be truly the people of God we need to be honest with ourselves before God and before others whom we trust to help us on the road to healing and restoration in Christ. I am not asking for us all to come and pour out our deepest darkest secrets but I am calling us as a people to stop being hypocritical and to stop wearing 'religious masks.' It is not an accident in Scripture that Christ sent his followers out two by two. Nor is it an accident that Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, described the church as the Body of Christ with each member of the Body playing their part. This is truly a kairos moment, a God-given opportunity in time, for HTW to look in the mirror of Scripture and examine our lives before God and together to walk to Christ and with Christ in the year ahead. In the year ahead, I believe God would have us concentrate on the holiness of our lives. Can I say to you all I cannot demand holiness from any of you but I challenge you from God's Word, as your pastor, to be holy because He is holy. Our holiness, (or lack of it), is witnessed in our obedience to the Word of God which Christ Jesus said was the outworking of our love for Him and for one another. As a people we need to take on board seriously Christ's dictum that as His followers we will be known by our love for one another. How we speak to and about one another is as much a witness to our love for Christ as what we say in worship to and about Christ Jesus. I want to be very honest with you at this point about our inter-personal relationships at HTW. Gossip, lies, hurtful words, and the ignoring of others in HTW, is to do the work of Satan in this fellowship. Equally the holding on to hurts, real or imagined, is neither biblical nor godly and will quench the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the individual and in this fellowship. So I am calling us all to bring before God our relationships one with another and to strive to follow Christ's command to love one another as He has loved us. In obedience we will be blessed as individuals and as a people by God.
In relation to that I believe one of the essential courses for this fellowship is the Freedom in Christ course - there will be a training day on May 2008 and it would be good if some men especially came forward to do this course so that we could lead other men through it.
Prayer
When I look at the timetable of this fellowship each week, and I have no doubt that many of you pray, we are a busy people and yet I fear that in our busyness we fail to make time for God and space for God to speak to us and into our lives. In our busyness as a parish there is a glaring area of neglect, and I am holding up hands of guilt here as your pastor. Robert Murray M'Cheyne said "What a man is on his knees before God, that he is, nothing more." The same can be said of a congregation. We neglect, apart from a Sunday morning, to pray together as the people of God who believe in the power of prayer. There are a group of faithful people who pray for this congregation and community each Thursday evening, but it is only a small group from within our fellowship. To rectify this neglect, I intend over the next year to create just such a time and space within the timetable at HT for us all to come together to pray and equally importantly to be silent before God. I am proposing that on the first Wednesday of each month, beginning in May 2008, we will come together to pray and to seek God's face as His people. I am starting it only once a month because I know that if we made it every week numbers would start big and dwindle away to a small faithful remnant. I pray that what starts small will grow as we see God answer prayer and as our faith is encouraged. These evenings are for everyone, of every age, and we will ensure that it is all age - because we want our children to know how much we value prayer and we want them to learn to pray and for they themselves to pray. I want to say to you all it is not my intention to make anyone feel guilty about prayer but without praying together as the people of God we cannot ever hope to walk together as the people of God.
Bible Teaching at Holy Trinity
Jack and I have always sought to teach the Scriptures faithfully to you. We both take the preaching of God's Word very seriously and I pray that you see that in what we bring before you when we preach and when we teach. However, this is a two way process and I am asking all of us to examine in the year ahead our attitude to the Word of God. I was struck when I was in Uganda that in one of the churches which we attended the pastor had asked the congregation to read through the whole Bible in the year ahead. I was amazed at the number of people who had taken up that challenge. Every time I looked at our driver he was reading his bible and he informed me it was because he wanted to fulfil the task set by the pastor. He was so thankful for the bible reading notes we were able to give him to help him understand what he was reading. Don't worry I am not about to issue such a challenge to you but I am going to ask us all to take seriously our participation in Bible study at HTW in the year ahead. I want to challenge you all to bring your own bible to church on a Sunday morning. I know many of you already do and it is a great encouragement to see so many people open their bibles on Sunday morning. What I would also like to encourage you to consider is to bring a notebook and pen and to take notes of what is being taught, or to make use of the excellent new website where you can download the written or listen to the audio podcast of the sermon.
The second area I want us all to examine is our response to the Word of God on a Sunday morning and at Bible study. Hearing is not only what we do with our ears - we must also engage our minds and our hearts. It is also about how we respond and speak about the teaching when we engage in conversation with others and especially with our young people after the service on a Sunday. The Word of God is not simply the passing on of information but is primarily concerned with Transformation. Our lives must be transformed and so conformed to the Word of God. We must respond with the whole person to the Word of God and not just with our ears and intellectual consent. It must make a difference in how we live and it must be seen to make that difference. Can I encourage us all to set a godly and a good example of taking the Word of God seriously in our lives in the year ahead? Set the good and godly example of daily bible reading and of meaningful engagement with the Word of God on Sunday mornings.
If there is one area in our fellowship that there is ample opportunity for everyone to participate it is in Bible study groups, at least once a month. However, and I don't mean this to be a criticism of anyone in particular. I am concerned that what we continue to teach is based on Scripture and that the Bible takes priority within such groups and not the opinions of the participants. During the month of June I will be leading a series of evening workshops on how to interpret a bible passage and how to apply a bible passage to our lives. These evenings will be both theoretical and practical. Again they will be open to everyone, of all ages, because again we want our children and our young people to know the importance we place on Scripture, and to its correct interpretation and application. It is important that our children and our young people see that we take Scripture seriously and that we teach them how to handle it aright. May I say to you as adults there is absolutely no point in teaching Scripture to children or young people in HTW if we do not live by it before them. Authenticity and holiness of life is important to them and it should be to us also.
Sunday worship
It has been a blessing to see our numerical growth over the past 16 years. God has richly blessed us with the number of people who come on a Sunday morning. Yet we have no grounds to be complacent. If there is one place where commitment, or the lack of it, is most obviously seen it is on a Sunday morning. We have many, too many, people who claim to follow Christ, who claim to have a personal relationship with Christ, but whose commitment to attending the worship of Christ each week is patchy, to say the least. On any given Sunday we have between 40 and 50 people missing from the congregation. There are families that we see for a few weeks and then do not see for a few weeks. There are up to 100 families that we will not see from June until September each year. Many of those parents claim to be born again Christians but the clear message to their children is that God is not for the summer months. Can I genuinely ask: What are we saying about the worship of almighty God if it is not our priority to be with His people on Sunday mornings. I know in many ways I am talking to the converted here but we all need to take this on board and to do something about it. We all need to be challenging and encouraging one another about our commitment to the worship of almighty God. If everything else at this fellowship closed this would remain - the worship of almighty God. The worship of almighty God is the only activity carried out on earth in which we participate with those in heaven now and which continues in heaven for all eternity. Maybe we need to remember that and take it on board. The worship of almighty God as the people of God together is not an option, as it is for too many, it must be, and continue to be, our main priority as a church.
Can I also say that it is sinful for anyone to use non-attendance on Sunday morning as a means of attention seeking or testing of the 'quality' of fellowship at Holy Trinity. I will not play such a game and make no apologies for the times I have, and will, challenge such behaviour.
I know that all who are involved in the preparation for Sunday worship work extremely hard to ensure the highest standard is achieved. We have a rich and varied music ministry and we thank them all for enabling us to worship God in music. We seek to involve as many people as possible in leading, praying, reading etc on a Sunday morning because it reflects our understanding of worship as the corporate act of us all and not just of the 'pastors.' Can I encourage you all to participate and to be prepared to read, to lead prayers etc. It is a blessing to us to hear other voices on a Sunday morning. All of us should come to participate in worship and with no other agenda than the worship of almighty God. Can I encourage you to pray before you come, to pray before the service of worship starts so that our hearts are ready to worship God? Can I encourage you all to come with the knowledge that it will not be just an hour and also with the intention of staying after and seeing that as part of the worship of God as we fellowship with our brothers and sisters in Christ.
In the year ahead it is my intention to keep worship rooted in Scripture, empowered by the Holy Spirit and which blends both the old and the new. It is sinful to neglect the past and only to focus on the contemporary and it is equally sinful to focus only on the past and to reject the contemporary. I believe we should be a fellowship, a body of Christ, where the old, the new, the traditional and the contemporary all have their place in enabling us to worship almighty God in spirit and in truth. I also wish to see us develop new opportunities for people to worship the living God and to encounter Him in the risen Christ. In the past year we had the multi-sensory/multi-media prayer evening and I know the great blessing that was too many of you. I want us to be open to such new things again in the year ahead. I am also proposing that we look at the format of our evening service and on at least one evening, if not more, we have a meal together as part of our worship of God.
Jack and I are always open to you bringing to our attention things which you believe would enable us to worship God in a more meaningful way. My only caveat to that is: Please do not be offended if we do not use your suggestions. Please trust us when we try new things, even if you are not comfortable with them. It has never been our plan or desire to offend but to bring God glory and to further his kingdom here.
As part of our worship it is my plan to have a 'spiritual retreat' day for the congregation. My initial thought on this is to have a day away from HTW where we invite someone to come and lead us in 'spiritual retreat' - this would involve prayer, worship, bible teaching and an opportunity for contemplative meditation on the Word of God and fellowship with God. The purpose of such a day would be to create the space, the time and the environment where we would meet with God, to learn more about God and His ways through prayer, Bible reading, teaching, through quietness and through spiritual direction from those who were faithful in following Christ in the past and who are faithfully following Him in the present. It would be my intention to have this open to all ages with age appropriate sessions. That will mean that some of us will need to sacrifice time to lead our children in a 'spiritual retreat' for that day. In the busy lives that we all lead we must create that space and time (and quality time only comes through quantity time) to be with God and to hear God speak.
It is important that we continue as a congregation to create opportunities for people to experience God through new, innovative and creative worship experiences. These will always be Scripture based and focused on Christ Jesus, His death and resurrection. In the past year we have used such opportunities as puppets, drama, decorating the church, the multi-sensory prayer nights, song café etc as a means to engage people of all ages in the worship of God and providing that opportunity for them to encounter God afresh in Christ. Can I encourage us to look at new creative art projects as a means of worship. Banners for the walls would be an idea that immediately springs to mind. It would be aesthetically pleasing and beneficial to have some more banners hanging from the walls. We must continue to create opportunities for all ages within our congregation to worship God through creative artistic projects. Children especially learn from participation and the visual is extremely important in reaching this generation for Christ. It may be misunderstood by some, and we may even face some criticism for some of the things we try, but I would rather face the criticism than to stagnate and become dead in our worship of the living God.
Pastoral Ministry
The burden of pastoral care in HT continues to grow. It is one of the greatest privileges of my life to be allowed to be your pastor and to bring the Word of God and the presence of Christ to bear on the joyous and the sad times in your lives. The pastoral ministry continues to grow at HT and in light of much new legislation (especially in relation to vulnerable adults and young people) we will need to look afresh at how we provide pastoral care within HT. The diocese has provided an excellent training programme for 'parish pastoral visitors' and I would want in the next 12 months that several people from this fellowship would avail of this training opportunity and complete that course so that they could be commissioned as pastoral visitors within HTW. Please, please, hear what I am about say now. I am not abdicating my role as you pastor and I am not trying to lessen my workload in any way. These people would be visiting people I am unable, genuinely unable, because of other priority pastoral issues, to visit. I am sorry but I have to prioritise my visiting and even the best laid plans to visit homes are sidelined by pastoral crisis and especially bereavements. It is important that people within HTW know that we care about them as individuals and that through the pastoral ministry of this fellowship they encounter God's touch, love and compassion for them in and through the touch, love and compassion of God's people. Also, if we desire to be a biblically faithful church then we must not only believe but practice every member ministry as the body of Christ here. In the next few weeks I will provide some more information about these training opportunities and if you are interested please speak to me.
Summer Outreach
The new initiatives of Godzone, Leapfrog and The Point have proved very popular within our ministry to young people and children. We hope to build upon their success and we will, again, this summer be running a holiday bible club for the younger members of our congregation. If you would like to be involved will you please speak to Lisa as soon as you can so that we can have the necessary forms filled in and police checks carried out.
On that note I should point out to all our leaders that new forms have arrived with me in the past few weeks and the police checks are now being carried out through AccessNI and once the new SV have seen the forms I will be organising an evening for the main leaders to inform you about the new procedures for appointing new leaders. Can I say on this issue, please do not shoot the messenger. We have no choice but to comply with the legislation and it is as much for the protection of the leaders as for the protection of the children.
A new initiative that will be happening this summer is an outreach programme targeted at teenagers. This will involve a team of young people from our own congregation living in HTW for a period of time. Living on the premises will provide them with an opportunity to bond as a team and to receive teaching and training so that they will be enabled to share the gospel of Christ with their peers in an effective and relevant manner. Lisa is leading this venture and I want us all to pray for it and to support it in whatever practical ways we can. There are simple things like the provision of food, transport, and other practical ways of helping these young people as they seek to share the good news of Christ with their peers. The best evangelists we have to the younger generations are the younger generation - so please pray for them and encourage them as they seek to reach others for Christ.
Wider Community
One of the good things over the past years has been our involvement in the wider community. It is a joy to see our building being used by many groups and all ages from within the community. It is something I think we should continue to develop as a church and we should continue to actively seek ways in which we can engage this community so that we create the bridges over which we can bring the gospel to bear on this community. Over the past few months Lisa and I have sought funding for a new mural for outside our church. This new mural is to be based on our aim: A Bible in their Hands, a Saviour in their Hearts and a Purpose in their Lives. The young people within our congregation have designed the mural and we have secured funding from the town council for this mural. We are at the moment awaiting the cheque. This is another means of engaging the wider community with the message of Jesus Christ.
As a congregation I want to encourage us to continue to look out into this community to places where we can help. To places where from our richness we can bless others as God has blessed us. To that end I want to encourage us afresh with our support for places like the Source pregnancy crisis centre, for Noise, for the provision of toys at Christmas and for the provision of food etc on the 4th Sunday of each month. I pray that we continue to do that in the year ahead and to seek new ways in which we can develop and strengthen those links.
One of the great blessings of HT has been its desire to look further than Northern Ireland to see where we could help the work of God by helping others. I want to thank you all for the support that you have given in the past twelve months to raising money for Bibles for china, for chickens for Fields of Life, for the children's hospice and for the building of a school in Yei diocese in southern Sudan. I am now announcing that a project that I wish for us to take on in the year ahead is in the provision of bibles for secondary schools in Uganda. My plan is to ask other congregations to help us raise sufficient bibles to provide 200 bibles for each school - we need in total 1200 bibles but it would be a wonderful blessing if we could provide 1500 bibles. We will seek to do this by two means - asking people to bring unused bibles (but not King James - they do not understand 16th century English) and also providing an opportunity for people to give a financial gift. Our harvest project this year for Potter's House will be focused on the provision of the Word of God for children in Uganda and the theme of our Harvest decorations will be the Harvest of the Word of God in our fellowship and in the world today. Our invited speaker that Sunday morning will be the Rev Dr Maurice Elliot - who is the new director of the new Church of Ireland Theological Institute.
HTW is part of the diocese of Connor and therefore a part of the wider Church of Ireland. As a congregation we need to be aware of what is going on in the wider Church of Ireland because it does affect us. There are many means of being informed - the diocesan magazine Connor Contact, the diocesan website and the Church of Ireland website. There are also some excellent websites about issues affecting the global Anglican family. In the next few weeks links to all of these will be available via the parish website. The issue which most dominates conversation about Anglicanism is the issue of human sexuality. As I have stated in the past everyone is welcome at HTW, irrespective of their lifestyle. However, that does not mean we will condone any lifestyle or behaviour which is contrary God's Word. On the issue of human sexuality I think my sermon a few weeks back makes it very clear as to where I stand on this issue and where I believe Scripture stands. In a few months time the Bishops of the Anglican Communion will meet in Lambeth, prior to that there is a meeting of orthodox bishops in the Middle East. I am disappointed that, to date, none of the Church of Ireland bishops are planning to attend GAFCON but all are planning to attend Lambeth 2008. There is no doubt that the issue of human sexuality, and in particular the acceptance and blessing of same-sex relationships will be high on the agenda. Only last week a group called Changing Attitudes Ireland announced that it is working for the full inclusivity homosexuality into the Church of Ireland. The RCB pension board have recently, due to government legislation, had to agree that any partner of clergy in a civil partnership will be entitled to pension rights. At present the fact that southern Ireland does not have 'civil partnership' legislation, though that is going to change, prevents anyone from introducing a bill to the general synod for blessing the same. Changing Attitudes Ireland has made it clear that when such legislation is changed they will be pushing for just such a service of blessing in the Church of Ireland. As a congregation I want you to know that I believe such services to be contrary to Scripture and to be the blessing of what God calls sin and I would have no part of it. As a church we may well find ourselves out of sync with other parishes within the Church of Ireland on this issue. You should be aware that this issue is not going to go away and as a congregation we may well one day have to make a decision about our position within the Church of Ireland, as some parishes in the USA have had to do because of the departure from Scripture by the Episcopal Church (US) on the issue of human sexuality. Please pray about this issue and please be informed about what is happening in the wider church community. Let me say again to you all - everyone is welcome at HTW, none of us are without sin and there are no degrees to sin. We will seek to love and care for all who come into contact with us and we will seek to win them for Christ and call them to a life of holy obedience to Scripture. We must begin with ourselves and remove the planks in our own eyes before we deem to remove the speck from other eyes.
There are other issues in our own community that we need to speak up and out against. We need to speak against the inherent racism within this community against those who have come from other parts of Europe. We have a large migrant community on our doorstep and we need to seek ways in which we can share the good news of Jesus with them. I know that some of the churches in the town have started classes in English as a means to reach out to this community. I hope to have some further information concerning that in the weeks to come. We all can be involved in speaking out against racism.
Sectarianism and paramilitarism still dominate this society. We often hear of such on our TV screens in relation to other parts of Carrickfergus. Because it does not affect us directly does not mean we should not be concerned about it and we need to speak out when we hear of it.
The changing political and security situation in Northern Ireland has brought new challenges to us all. Many of those who served in the armed forces through the height of the troubles are now left traumatised by their experiences and we are not without such people within our fellowship. I believe as a congregation we need to remember to hold such people and their families up before God in prayer. We need also to ensure that HTW is a place where they know they are valued and their service is valued. It is important that we continue to remember their sacrifices for our safety, not least on Remembrance Sunday each year. On your behalf I want to thanks Captain Austin Ardill for the kind gift of the memorial plaque in our sanctuary which enables us to give a prominent place to the poppy wreath and reminds us of the sacrifices of others in times past.
NHS and Education - the changing political landscape has led to a changing landscape in the health service and within the next few years we will see dramatic change, if they can figure out what they are changing to, in our educational system. As a pastor I am acutely aware of the stress that many people live with in their daily working lives. I am particularly concerned about those working in the areas of health and education in our community life. As a fellowship we need to be much in prayer for them. The increasing levels work of expected of them on ever diminishing financial resources is leading to a level of stress which is having a detrimental affect on people's health. We hear a lot in the media about the rights of patients in health and children in education but far too little about the rights of those working within those environments to be treated with respect, dignity and fairness. We all make use of these services but far too often we take them for granted or complain about them. We need to also remember to thank these people. Can I ask you all to do a very practical thing - write a letter of thanks to your children's school and to your health care providers. Say thank you to your doctor, the community nurse and those helping in the social services. Many of them are Christian people who are serving Christ by serving this community and we need to encourage them in their ministry.
Finance
This an area of the life of this fellowship where I fear to tread at times and yet it is an area which affects, and I would say detrimentally effects, our ministry and service of God. There is no getting away from the plain and simple fact that we need to take a serious look at our giving and especially in relation to the building fund. I am not, please hear me clearly here, passing a judgment on anyone but we are a wealthier congregation than our finances would suggest. Please listen and take note of the accounts when Edwin presents them this evening. I looked over them this morning and realised that in our FWO contributions 15 people give 34% of the total and 235 people give the remaining 66%. That cannot be right and should not be allowed to continue. The truth is that the debt on this building will inhibit and hinder the ministry of HT for years to come unless we address it with much more urgency and seriousness. To that end the new SV, which you will elect later this evening, must take seriously the issue of the finances of HT. The new SV must give a strong lead to the congregation in tackling the debt and we need together to be much in prayer before God about this debt and to support by our own giving what we pray with our lips concerning our finances. The truth for us as a congregation is that if we do not seriously address this debt then it will very quickly, as it is doing slowly, become a millstone around our necks and will soon begin to drain energy and finances from the work of God in this place. Please pray about this and please let us all examine our financial support for God's work at HT.
Personal
As I close I want to say some personal things to you as your pastor. There have been times over the past year, and no doubt will be in the year ahead, when I have dealt with very difficult situations, very sensitive situations and very damaging situations. It those difficult pastoral occasions when I have been most aware and valued most your prayers for me as I go about my daily work. Thank you also for your support, your understanding and for not asking questions why or how decisions were arrived at. I have tried in every pastoral situation to be faithful to God and to His Word in making decisions and in speaking into situations. There are times when people fail to understand what I have said or decisions I have made. There are times when people have disagreed with my judgment and my decisions. There are times, no doubt, when people have been hurt and angry at my response to a given pastoral situation. I want to say to you all it has never been my intention to hurt anyone in my pastoral work at HTW. I have sought to be faithful to Christ in all that I have done and that has always been my priority. With hindsight there are always things I wish I had not said, things I wish I had said and situations I wish I had handled differently. Hindsight is always perfect sight. There are occasions when I am called to make decisions with limited information and with limited time. There are occasions when I am called to make decisions with a fuller knowledge of the jigsaw than most other people and I am not in a position to reveal why or how I made such a decision. There are times when no answer in a given situation is the right answer and I am left to make a choice as to which is the lesser wrong. When I have got it wrong I pray I have been honest and humble enough to confess that, if not before you at least before God. As I said hindsight is perfect sight and I would value your continued prayers for my pastoral work amongst you.
As I conclude this address I want to thank you for allowing me to be your pastor and to walk with you on this journey of faith towards eternity with Christ. Thank you for your love and generosity towards Janet and Taylor. Thank you for treating Taylor like any other child in this congregation and for providing for her a safe place to grow, to become secure and to know Christ. It is a privilege to be here and to serve Christ by serving you. I ask your forgiveness for those times when I have failed to serve Christ by failing to serve you. Thank you for your graciousness, for your prayers and for all your love towards us as a family. As I said at the beginning of this year I know of no place I would rather serve Christ than here. I have never lived with a people whose heart was as much for Christ as yours and it is a truly humbling thing to have been called to be your pastor. May God bless you all and may we together build His kingdom in the year ahead.
Amen.
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