Dear RBC and Friends,
As the (joint) newest member of Ruddington Baptist Church’s leadership team, I thought it would be good for us to be sharing together about where we might be going as a church and what we think God is doing. This is the first post or letter in what I hope will be a regular series from different voices in the Ruddington Baptist Church family, starting with the leadership team, and addressed to “RBC and friends”.
Sunday 2nd July will be Sam’s last service as the minister of Ruddington Baptist Church, and we are very thankful to him – and to Esher and the girls – for all that they have given to us over the years that they have been here. For many people Sam has been the public face of RBC, and he has taken a lead in many of the things we have been doing together during his time with us. As Sam moves on to a new chaplaincy role in Bristol, we celebrate what he has brought to us and who he is.
As we enter a new phase in our life as a church it is worth celebrating the many godly and gifted people who together make up this little bit of God’s kingdom. It can be tempting to think about what we are losing, or the problems we may face. But God is good, and right from the beginning, God named the world “good”. So let’s keep coming back to what we have and who we are, because it will surely be enough and more than enough in God’s grace.
Let’s also keep our eyes open to see all of the different things that God is doing. God’s kingdom and rule is much much bigger than the church, and Ruddington Baptist Church is just one small part of God’s church, in Ruddington and world-wide church. Wherever we see the fruit of love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control emerging we can be confident that God’s spirit is at work. I hope that we will find lots of ways of working together with all of good will.
We are really quite a varied group of people. We each have our own backgrounds and experiences that we bring to today. Jesus repeatedly demonstrated God’s desire to include and embrace everyone, and especially those at the margins. We will each bring different perspectives and priorities, different voices to this conversation. I’ll be inviting the other members of the leadership team to share some of their thoughts over the coming weeks and months, and if you have something you want to bring to the conversation then just let me know.
So let’s listen well to each other, and to God, and encourage one another; I think that is the essence of church.
With love,
Chris
