Abbey October Diary

While we redevelop the Abbey website, which sadly doesn't have a diary page, we thought it might be helpful to have the monthly diary viewable here. 

Thursday 11^th October

4pm                Evening Prayer

7pm                Choir Practice

8pm                Café Theology

Friday 12^th October

9am                Organ Practice

10.30am        Creative Response

Saturday 13^th October

9am                Prayers

10am              Healing in the streets

10am-2pm     Possible ITV filming in the Abbey

3pm                Set Up/Rehearsal/Concert

Sunday 14^th October

8am                1662 Holy Communion

10.30am        Harvest Holy Communion

4pm                Informal Worship & Junior Church

6.30pm          Choral Evensong (Harvest)

Monday 15^th October

2.15pm          Prayers for Malmesbury School (St Aldhelm’s Chapel)

7pm                Malmesbury Singers Rehearsal

Tuesday 16^th October

All week         Removal of carpet in South Aisle

Wednesday 17^th October

10.30am         Holy Communion

7.30pm           Workers' Prayer

Thursday 18^th October

4pm                Evening Prayer

7pm                Choir Practice

Friday 19^th October

9am                Organ Practice

Saturday 20^th October

9am                Prayers

10am              Healing in the streets

Sunday 21^st October

8am                1662 Holy Communion

10.30am        Holy Communion

4pm                Informal Worship & Junior Church

Monday 22^nd October

All day            Portable Appliance Testing

7pm                Malmesbury Singers Rehearsal

  

Tuesday 23^rd October

9.30am           Women Alive! (Le Flambé)

10-12pm        Malmesbury Primary School Harvest Service

2.30pm           Funeral

Wednesday 24^th October

10.30am         Holy Communion

3pm                Renewal of Vows/Marriage Blessing

Thursday 25^th October

10.30am         Funeral

1.30am-5pm  Servicing of Sound System

4pm                Evening Prayer

7pm                Choir Practice

Friday 26^th October

All morning     Servicing of Sound System

10.30-12pm   Creative Response

Saturday 27^th October

9am                Prayers

10am              Healing in the streets

  

Sunday 28^th October

8am                Holy Communion

10.30am        Morning Prayer & Healing

4pm                Informal Worship & Interview

8pm                ((resonate))

Monday 29^th October

7pm                Malmesbury Singers Rehearsal

Wednesday 31^st October

10.30am         Holy Communion

Dinner for Kigezi

‘All good things around us are sent from heaven above…’ The Harvest Festival season has arrived in North Wiltshire and churches are whipping out their harvest hymns and decorating the church with impressive home grown produce; (the pineapples last Sunday at St John the Baptist, Brokenborough perhaps suggesting that not everything is locally grown?) In truth this has been a tough harvest for our farmers so our gratitude to God for His provision has a fair dollop of relief served with it this year.

However, this Harvest at Malmesbury Abbey we are taking a different approach. We are asking you not to bring carrots or turnips, or old bicycles or mobiles as we have done in previous years (when we worked with Bikes4Africa and WaterAid.) This year, on Sunday October 14th, we want your dinner money. Fast for a meal and put the money you save in a Dinner for Kigezi envelope, or simply work out the cost of your family meal, or dinner at The Old Bell, and put the same amount in an envelope marked Dinner for Kigezi. Why?

As part of our diocesan link with the church in Uganda, the Deanery of North Wiltshire (our bit) is linked with the Diocese of Kigezi, based on the city of Kabale near the Rwanda/Ugandan border; I visited there last year (see above.) In the mountainous south west of Uganda access to water and sanitation is limited, and the diocese there has an outstanding project that is improving the general health of children and particularly the lives of girls and women who are no longer having to work daily long distances to fetch water. Alongside this there is an HIV education project running which provides safe water for those living with HIV. Through Tearfund we are becoming a connected church to this project over the next few years, and you can find out more about it at 

http://connected.tearfund.org/en/project_link/choose_a_project/africa/uganda_-_water/

If you put your dinner money in an envelope from the Abbey and fill it in we can reclaim the tax through gift aid. Many thanks.

All Change

Having just said farewell to Lee and Mary Barnes, as they left for the Diocese of Liverpool in July, and now preparing to welcome (Revds) John and Alice Monaghan as they join us in June 2013, it’s sadly now time for the Abbey to bid farewell to Paul Tilley as he leaves us for the University of Bristol at the October half-term.

Paul is about to take a new direction in life as he studies full-time for an M.A. in Educational Psychology and then undertakes a paid Ph.D. in Educational Psychology. This is really great news for Paul and it will be sad to see him go after he’s become such an important part of us over the last three years; but after a pretty rough 2011/12 I’m pleased for Paul that his life and learning is being refreshed and that he faces new challenges and opportunities in Bristol.

Pipeline, Trax, and the Friday Night Thing will be losing a good teacher and friend at half term and we will say goodbye to Paul at our 4pm service on October 21^st.

What next for our Youth department at the Abbey? Well, myself and the PCC have decided not to rush to answer that question but to listen to the needs and insights of the leadership teams for both Abbey youth and children's departments. We’ll also want to look at our 2013/2014 budgets and plan wisely and sustainably before we make staff appointments, if any.

Our first task is volunteer personnel. Sarah McGrory continues with us on placement during her final year studying for a B.A. in youth and community work. Sarah will continue to oversee Trax (11-14) and SiB (at Malmesbury School) and serve on the leadership of Malmesbury Abbey Skate 2013 with myself. We are immediately looking to recruit, from our congregations, volunteers with a passion for God and young people to serve as leaders and assistants for Pipeline and the Friday Night Thing, who will be supported and trained by myself and the youth leadership. Initially we’re asking people to commit from early-November through to next summer and particularly asking mature Christians with teaching experience to step forward. But we also are looking for people, who want to grow in a new area of ministry, who love young people and who are considerably cooler than the vicar, to commit to serving once or twice a month. Our Youth department is a great place to grow in your own faith, to help shape the lives of young people, and to go insane.

Please e-mail neill@malmesburyabbey.com to explore this, and pray for Paul, Eloise, Isaac & Reuben as an exciting new chapter begins in Bristol.

The Monaghans are coming

We have a real passion for encouraging new ministry and leadership at the Abbey, so it is great to announce that John Monaghan is joining us in June 2013 as a full-time curate for the next three to four years. Some of you will have met John and the family as they joined us at the Abbey for worship at the end of August, albeit slightly undercover; but here is a brief intro from John and Alice:

John is from Dublin where he grew up and trained as a sports physio.  His father is an evangelical, charismatic Catholic who co-ordinates the Alpha course in Ireland, and his mother is a Pentecostal minister and clinical psychologist – so he’s enjoyed a wonderfully ecumenical upbringing!  John’s middle name is Emanuel – ‘God with us’, and he remembers making his first personal commitment to follow Christ at the age of seven, when he really wanted, (and then experienced) the assurance of God with him.  From the age of sixteen, he became more involved in his mother’s church – an Assemblies of God, Pentecostal church in Dublin.  His faith continued to grow as he stepped out in service (as it often does!) as a youth leader and worship leader in that church.

John met Alice in 2001 at a Christian conference in Ireland where John was leading the worship.  Alice’s parents are also Christians, and her commitment to Christ really came alive in a new way through an Alpha course her friend invited her to while she was studying architecture at Edinburgh University.  John subsequently moved to the UK, where Alice had just started training for ordination at Ridley Hall, Cambridge.  They got married in 2003.  Alice served her curacy at St James Church, Gerrards Cross, Bucks, under Paul Williams (currently bishop of Kensington).  Having been a clergy spouse for several years, John decided to return the favour (as well of course feeling deeply called in that direction!) and trained for ordained ministry at Trinity College, Bristol.

John and Alice have three adorable(ish) children – Philip (6), Toby (4) and Clara (2).  Alice currently works part-time as Assistant Vicar of Christ Church, Clifton, and when they are not doing churchy things they love having friends over for supper, family picnics and walks in the countryside, jumping on their trampoline (with the kids of course), running and mountain biking (okay – only John likes doing that!).  The Monaghan’s (silent ‘g’ by the way!) are really excited about being part of the community at Malmesbury from June 2013, and would value your prayers as our time in Bristol draws to a happy conclusion over the next year, and as we prepare to move next June.

Audacity

Last year, after eating Sushi for the first time, yes pretty pathetic I know,  I talked with the Dean of Singapore Cathedral, Kuan Kim Seng, as he outlined two developments that were particularly exciting him in the life of the Cathedral. These were not something mundane and straightforward for his church, like church planting in Vietnam or providing schools across his city, but something really big. The first of these was taking five youth pastors and sending them to train for six months with Bill Wilson and Metro Ministries in New York City; on their return they were to start a new Saturday morning ‘Sunday School’ for 1000 young people. At the same time he was taking 400 people from the largest of his nine Sunday congregations and starting a brand new Saturday evening congregation. As he described these huge projects I knew I was talking with a man who believed the future belonged to God and for whom to believe audacious things for God’s kingdom was nothing particularly remarkable. I asked him if these two significant developments appeared in any of the Cathedral’s recent strategic planning and he replied ‘no, God sometimes surprises us!’ And you might think that sometimes Singapore Cathedral surprises God.

In the early chapters of John’s gospel you see Jesus, while he still can, attempting to go under the radar: humbly being baptised by John with the rest, trying to avoid a miracle with water at a wedding, talking one on one with the Samaritan woman and Nicodemus, gathering a few disciples. But soon the highly visible and audacious starts breaking in – a healing in Jerusalem, 5000 fed, Lazarus looking pretty well for a dead man, and perhaps most unsubtle of all, turning over the tables of the bureau de change in the Temple. Audacity is a Jesus characteristic. In Dean Kim Seng it has also become a kingdom priority and a leadership characteristic.

At the Willow Creek leadership conference in 2011, Stephen Furtick, senior pastor of Elevation Church, Charlotte NC, talked about daring to believe God for the impossible and the audacity it takes to get started. Then he delivered to assembled pastors an enormous kick up the backside: ‘if the size of your vision isn’t intimidating there’s a good chance that it’s insulting to God.’ The boldness of these two leaders has remained with me since, a holy nudge, so that when the task ahead seems immense I simply need to ask ‘is God scared yet?’

Morph-ing

Morph didn't use to be a verb, it was just a noun, but then it slowly changed into something else. Our small groups have had different names and branding - house groups, bible studies, home groups, cells, missional communities, the brotherhood of darkness (we didn't use that one in the end.) Our even smaller groups have morphed similarly - prayer triplets, prayer partners, life transformation groups, accountability groups. But my passion for small community life in the church is not that it conforms to one model, or has a particular name, or meets on the same night of the week, but simply that it happens.

Hopefully you are starting to notice that a priority this autumn at the Abbey is to strengthen our small community life and broaden its range. Change is already well under way; we are morphing in the light of God (apologies, yes I know that was really, really bad.) Three groups have already emerged with a fresh focus on theology, marriage and the creative arts. There are new welcome and discipleship groups at our 4pm service and our new 10.30am daytime home group is growing well. Some groups are meeting monthly, others fortnightly and some weekly. Some are studying John's gospel to accompany our autumn series, others aren't. Some groups will last for ever; others will last for a season. We don't want a utopian conformity in how we meet together but a realistic diversity. In the midst of this flexibility we are seeing new life emerge and already 50-60 people have reconnected to small community life. 

And when we disagree with someone, or don't like the carpet of our homegroup host, or get bored with X saying the same thing every week and Y doing their irritating prayers, we would do well to think on these words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer from his Life Together:

Christian community means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. There is no Christian community that is more than this, and none that is less than this. Whether it be a brief single encounter or the daily community of many years, Christian community is solely this. We belong to one another only through and in Jesus Christ.

There is a profound and liberating simplicity to what Bonhoeffer says, community life is at the foot of the cross. Life together, it seems, is unchanging, profoundly uninfluenced by culture, chemistry, tradition and dynamics; life together is founded simply on Christ. But life together does change as it grows, and it grows as we join in and grow up together.

You can find more information at abbeysmallcommunities.blogspot.co.uk , where you will also find discussion starters from our Sunday talks on John’s gospel. Please contact Sandie in the Parish Office if you'd like to get involved in any way.

Usain Bolt at Malmesbury Abbey

I'm sure he was there somewhere?!

P.S. This was to illustrate a sermon about John the Baptist pointing to Christ, not just mindless frivolity (like most weeks.)