Dear church family,

I pray you will read this letter with a spirit of hope and joy and that you will be able to see yourself becoming involved in what is being proposed.

There are many dots to join right now. The dots of what we do and why we do them; the dots of worship and how it connects with life; the dots of being a church family alongside neighbouring churches; the dots of what we want to do in Christian witness, mission and worship and what we are currently able to do; the dots of being energised by the Holy Spirit into acts of service and commitment.

The foundation of our dots is that we are a church which has simple and clear mission. It is to love God, make disciples and transform communities. This is a mission which has stood the test of many years and more recently it has risen to the challenges of lockdowns and covid. It is a message of looking up to God, into ourselves and out to our area.

Loving God, making disciples and transforming communities is a mission which is rooted in our evangelical, Bible centred beliefs; centrality of the cross of Christ; personal response to Jesus as our loving saviour; the most generous spirit of invitation to every living person no matter their past or present situation; and a commitment to create communities of good through involvement. These foundations run deep because they were first stirred in Hambledon Church and village over four hundred years ago and in Busbridge over half a century ago. There is real meaning in this because the common-shared patron of our church family is the evangelical mission agency, CPAS.

A patron is like the owner of a church. It is a uniquely Church of England creation which stretches back centuries. There are good reasons for this set up and it has served the Church of England well through many a time of change and turmoil. We’ll be hearing more about CPAS in the next few weeks. CPAS is our mission focus for October and a CPAS mission partner, Rev John Valentine, will be preaching on October 17th.  John is a member of our church.

Secure foundations

Foundations matter because when opportunities for new things come, we look to our foundations to test them. Our foundations have served us well and they have brought us to today. Our foundations are expressed in much that we do, for example in our commitment to children’s and youth work; or our care for older people in the wider community. Our foundations are centred on the love of Christ for us, so we too must love. John put it in seven short words:

“We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19)

As we come through and out of covid we need to ensure that what we do is secure and viable so that we can show the love that we know. We know that every ministry, act of service and moment of worship matters and we’ve resourced these things and built on them for a long time now. Covid and other pressures mean our church trustees (PCC) are looking carefully at what is secure and viable. Some of the questions being considered are:

·       Do we continue to develop music ministry in worship and outreach?

·       Should we expand or scale back our ministry with older people?

·       What priority is having excellent children’s ministry which is resourced through a member of staff?

·       Where will people volunteer their time and energy so that we can grow mission and worship?

My own answer to all these, and other questions of ministry and mission is “yes!” these are all priorities, but realistically, after covid unless we cover the cost of them for the long-term they cannot all be current priorities. If they truly are God’s priorities for loving God, making disciples and transforming communities then this will become clear as we pray about our secure foundations.

Towards the end of October we’ll be approaching the church family to ask for a response to ensure that we are ready for the future and this is about stepping into volunteering, a heart to step out in faith and get involved and ensuring our finances are secure. This starts with the harvest of generous giving (CPAS mission Sunday, Oct 10th) and we’ll follow this with exploring the impact and potential of giving energy, time, commitment and financially (Oct 17th and 31st) including a special ‘join the dots’ mission and ministry experience ‘fayre’ (10.30am, Busbridge Church, 24thst Oct). There’ll be a special ‘join the dots’ service at Hambledon (10.30am Hambledon Church, 31st October).

Secure direction

With the dots of secure foundations and viable mission, ministry and worship we will be ready for the future which God has planned for us. We need to start this by securing what we do right now, guided by the Holy Spirit but we are now able to explain to everyone that there are some big dots that we might like to consider joining as we head into the future.

On Monday of this week (27th Sept) the Bishop of Guildford and the Archdeacon of Surrey visited the PCCs at BHC and the town centre parish of St Peter and Paul and St Mark’s Ockford Ridge. Bishop Andrew outlined a vision for unity which would encourage loving God, making disciples and transforming communities in a more joined up way. This vision is about mutual flourishing of Christian witness by building on deep foundations and offering a true breadth of Christian worship.

Our deepest foundations are Christ and being visible for the good of all in our local area but there is a related deep foundation. Godalming was once one of the original, ancient Christian Minster Churches which predate the formation of the United Kingdom. Godalming used to be a Minster town with a significant Minster ministry of love, care, proclamation, teaching, worship and presence.

We are being invited to work with others to consider what it might mean to deepen this Christian heritage and bring greater good to many through uniting BHC with the town centre ministry.

This is a significant direction to consider. Some exploratory work has been done in recent months and this has been to ‘stress test’ several ideas to see if they might hold water. A small group of people have been looking at very practical areas such as finances, buildings and staffing. These have been explorations rather than about decisions. There is much to be discussed!

The Bishop of Guildford has invited the PCCs to consider an invitation to unite. It is an invitation. If we unite we will do so through prayer, consultation, listening carefully and being graceful in all our discussions. This could be the start of an exciting direction which brings profound growth in the Kingdom of God and good for all in Godalming and the villages nearby. There is something quite appealing and special about being a Minster town with Minster status.

Please read the accompanying pamphlet from the diocese.  There will be a special prayer and Q&A evening in Busbridge Church on 10th October at 6pm and we’d invite you to attend.

Simon Taylor, Rector
Busbridge&Hambledon Church