What no work?

With the final piece of work - my reflective journal - submitted to the college September offers a Spurgeons free month in terms of formal work although there are always books to read!
This month of freedom is welcome as thoughts turn to resuming programmes and activities suspended over the summer and there is the necessary planning of autumn events to finalise.

As one might expect life is really no quieter than any other month and I type this blog update after a busy Sunday when we marked Home Mission Sunday with our good friend Rosie Davies leading our morning worship and representative of the 21 churches in our network coming to join us for tea and a Celebration Service in the evening.

Blessed with a pleasant day it was good to meet friends from the churches of East Kent, showcase ourselves, our facilities and activities and of course be encouraged and encourage our regional team from SEBA.

We have received news from Didcot that our BU Mission Grant application has been successful although we will only receive half of the sum we had applied for. Having looked at the figures we submitted it is adjudged that we have the resources available to fund both my half stipend, our running costs and our aspirational maintenance costs with a little less help.

This is a disappointment and prompts a close look at the figures by myself and our treasurer so that we can submit to the Deacons and Church Meeting an accurate picture of our current financial position and our financial needs in 2011.

We will need to set clear spending priorities and be seen to eating into our reserves - a financial strategy I, for on,e am uncomfortable with, but it seems is one the BUGB is encouraging churches to adopt.

Priorities for me are to move ahead with moving the church kitchen which will ultimately enhance our facilities. I'm meeting an architect next week to discuss the feasibility. Church Meeting will vote on the proposal in October. We need to finish the lighting in our 'new' Games Room and launch this new resources upon the church.

We've finally repaired our Induction Loop which is good news for the hearing impaired, the lounge carpet has dried out after last month's flood and we now have a superb new outside noticeboard to attract the attention of passersby and the passengers of the No.13 bus who draw up alongside it every hour as the bus turns onto Dover Road.

Oh, and the County Council have 'pleaded' with us to submit a grant application for play equipment for Kids Kingdom as the 'pot' of money they have is under subscribed. Hopefully we will be successful.