Recap of Sep 2023’s Vision Sunday
In our Sunday Morning Meeting
Even in soaring end-of-summer heat, it was great to gather again this past Sunday and worship together as we reset for a new term. Beccy and I, in our first ever joint-preach, were privileged to share how we first met and began working together long before we began to lead the site together (if you missed that one and are curious to know, you can listen back to the Bracknell Podcast here).
Here’s a brief recap of some of the things we’ve seen God do this year, as well as a sense of where we believe God is still steering us to in the short term and beyond.
With a focus on Pilgrimage in 2023, Simon pointed us to this passage at the start of the year:
Then we turned back and set out towards the wilderness along the route to the Red Sea, as the Lord had directed me. For a long time we made our way around the hill country of Seir. Then the Lord said to me, “You have made your way around this hill country long enough; now turn north.”
Deuteronomy 2:1-3 NIVUK
We quickly realised that with our growing numbers from after the pandemic, coupled with a prophetic word, the outworking of this passage for us as a site was not to just add on a duplicate Sunday morning meeting but God wanted us to birth unidentical triplets. That meant starting two new meetings in May this year: our 4pm All-In Families meeting and our new expression of the 6pm meeting with a focus on creating more space for the Holy Spirit, worship and prayer.
After 4 months we are starting to see that God is doing a new thing in us, not necessarily the polished experience of church but something that’s building community and a playground to explore new ways to learn together!
Looking at some stats of what God’s been doing in our morning meetings, we were able to gain the insight that with an average weekly attendance around 500 worshippers weekly, for every 5 people that attended Kerith Bracknell, one of those was an under 18. That’s an incredible ratio of young people given that across the nation not many young people are desirous to go to church.
However, we realised that when looking at the ratio of safely-recruited volunteers needed to run children’s church and ministry, we still needed more boots on the ground so that our children are not turned away and have to sit in the adult meeting with their parents.
Volunteer Team : U18s Ratios
With a new term of small groups about to begin, looking back over the Spring and Summer terms, there had been a slight drop in the number of leaders, yet a rise in the number of groups available and members attending groups.
Bracknell Small Groups over Spring & Summer 2023
In light of these stats, we have a strong sense of God wanting us to focus a great deal of our energy this term and beyond on:
serving our under 18’s well; and
all of us getting involved in small groups to grow in faith and friendship — very key to our communal discipleship and care for one another.
We’re also grateful to God to see how He’s been doing a steady work and great things in the lives of those who connect through Encounter, our Sparklers Toddler Group, Foodbank, the Revive Community Café, Fresh Start Group (life controlling habits), Money Management Courses, Kintsugi Hope Groups, CAP Debt Help (1 of every 3 people, in the over one thousand people who have accessed this since it began in Bracknell have become debt free!)
It's brought us great joy to witness the start of a new ministry of School Teams (which includes some TLG work and running assemblies) as well as the relaunch of our Young Adults gatherings across our mainland sites.
God’s been blessing us as a community through all of you who serve midweek and on Sundays (our Host Teams, Worship bands and Production Teams) – a huge ‘Thank You’ to you all!
We are thankful for God’s provision to serve those who access Foodbank. We’ve also seen amazing generosity to raise funds to help those who have need a little extra help with the current rise in the cost of living and as we plan to review and renew our auditorium lighting and public address systems.
Foodbank parcels provided in comparison within the same period last year
Funds: Cost of Living Funds and Bracknell Building Fund
Refreshed Vision for a New Term and Season
Beccy and I have been struck again by these verses in the new Testament – written to the church in Ephesus by the early church leader, Paul:
“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, you may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, (Ephesians 3:17b- 18 NIVUK )
And in the Message it reads:
“And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.”
So, our heart for this site, this term is:
Yes, we want to Go Deeper. Go Together. Go Wider.
Go Deeper
Here are some of the ways we’ll see this expressed as we gather round each other in community (mark your calendars!):
Go Together
Introducing Kerith Care…
What used to be referred to as our Pastoral Care ministry, is being restructured and relaunched as ‘Kerith Care’ with the team’s main focus:
to pray and support in practical ways; and
to signpost to professionals and organisations where necessary; both local and national.
Pastoral support through Kerith Care
To access this support, please fill out a ‘Prayer Request’ card (‘Answered Prayer’ on the reverse side) and hand in at the reception or visit the ‘Help and Support’ page on the Kerith website and scroll down to ‘Kerith Care.’
Go Wider
We had a brilliant sermon series based around learning to share our faith with others using the Isaiah 61 Movement app and this term we felt like we’ve maybe got a bit rusty.
We want to get back to monthly reminder of how we are doing to
SHARE our LIFE,
SHARE our FAITH,
SHARE JESUS
EVERY MONTH We'll be reminding ourselves to track how we are doing via the Isaiah61 app heading into inviting people to Christmas and then in Alpha in late January 2024
Isaiah 61 Movement: the i61m app
Christmas Plans
Kerith Bracknell Christmas Dates
Looks like there’s a lot in store for the new term and as we head into 2024. Not everything that’s happening will be for everyone, but we believe there’s something in here for everyone in our community. So ask yourself once again, “as God’s holy people, how is He prompting me to go deeper, together and wider?”
Let’s go!
Love and Blessings,
Pelumi
To catch up on the evening stream of our One Church Vision Sunday (across all of our sites) with Simon Benham and Ben Pocock, please head over to our YouTube channel.