Stories of Financial Provision
Hey Kerith Bracknell,
It’s Ben O here, guesting on the Bracknell Blog following Fathers Day to bring you three stories of God’s provision to us as a community!
Well, our Heavenly Father has been providing for our needs in some wonderful ways and we thought you’d like to hear some of them. Yes, I know not everyone loves to look into the latest numbers around money - I’d encourage you to read the story about God’s provision, though - let it stir your faith! Others of you will want more than I’m able to share in this blog - feel free to get in touch and ask as we’ve got plenty more charts where these came from!
Firstly, our General Offering figures were announced last Sunday for the month of May. Thanks to a significant gift, we received £8,642 more than we budgeted for the month. You can see the actual giving in the darker blue bars in the chart below. The budget for the year wiggles its way across the months in the lighter blue line.
May’s giving means that so far this year (Year to Date) we’re just £8,851 below that budgeted wiggly line overall. It’s very close!
Thank you to everyone who gives as part of the community, whether that’s in Bracknell, Farnborough, Windsor, West Wight or Online. This is the result of us all joining together in generosity with what God has provided and stirred us all to give.
We’re also doing really well with reducing our spending. If you add up our income and subtract our spending, that tells you whether we’re in surplus or deficit overall. Surplus means we could choose to build up our reserves or initiate a new project. Deficit means we’re drawing down on our reserves to see us through. You may remember that in 2023, the Trustees signed off a Deficit budget for the year, that would see us draw down -£180k from our reserves. (We sold a property we owned in Bracknell to support this).
To keep an eye on this, my current favourite stat to track is how that predicted deficit is shrinking (or growing) as we move through the year month by month, Back in December last year, we were predicting a worst case scenario of a -£180k deficit. By the end of May, that predicted deficit has shrunk to -£98k. That’s a huge improvement! The chart shows how that prediction has improved month by month this year…
The good news is, with each month that’s passed, the predicted 2023 deficit has been dropping - we took an especially big chunk out of it in May. This is the result of God’s provision, our community generosity and the careful stewardship of what we’ve received. Another bit of good news for which to say “Thank you”.
Secondly (and I promise this will be shorter!) on the Bracknell Site we’re aiming to raise an additional £140,000 towards our Building Fund this year. This is for a number of renovations and improvements in our Kerith Centre auditorium - especially upgrading our house lighting to be more energy efficient, and less green in colour(!!) and replacing our ageing PA equipment to keep us hearing clearly what’s being said when we gather.
Well, progress is good here, too. We received a £10,000 donation in the last week or so, bringing our current total to around £28,000. Something else to thank God for!
Finally, we have also received money specifically for the purpose of helping Kerith people access theological training with our partners, WTC Theology. The Theology Bursary Fund has been set up, and awards 50% grants for one or two years towards anyone in the Kerith Community who would like to participate in any of the programmes on offer through WTC Theology. That includes their new, one-year Foundations Course, which comes with a much lower price tag (£1000), no commitment to essay writing, and online Zoom sessions from home. To find out more about the courses they offer, visit WTC Theology themselves. To apply for a Bursary from Kerith, first have a look at what we do, and contact Geri, our Hub Director, here.
So there you have it. Just three stories of God’s provision: General Fund, Building Fund and Bursary Fund. All saying the same thing - God is good - he is our provider, and he calls us to generous partnership with him as part of his church. Thank you again to everyone who’s part of that.
Much love,
Ben