From A Churchwarden

I wrote the opening article for the magazine for the first time in March and again in July and on each occasion knew not what I should write until I sat down to do it. I believe God gave me the words then and I pray that he will do so again now.

Today is Tuesday 16th September, four days after the deadline for the magazine, but Jean, God bless her, is giving me a little lee-way. The reading in New Daylight for today is from Romans, chapter 12 verses 4 to 10 and is headed "Body beautiful":

"For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness. Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honour."

When I became one of the Wardens in 2007 I had been a member of the church at St Edmund's for about 25 years, in two different periods from 1971. I had experienced our fellowship in different ways and with varying degrees of intensity over the years. However, the past eighteen months has been a rollercoaster in that fellowship as I have been given more awareness of the gifts we have through the people we are. There is enormous commitment, mutual affection and no little honour and yet there is some hesitancy about our mission.

I'm not worried though since a little doubt and hesitancy is natural and even necessary. Without it what would we have to tackle with the faith given to us by Jesus? And now I sense that we could be on the threshold of exciting times for St Edmund's in that we are going to be given yet more challenges and opportunities to discover gifts in ourselves and others as we grow to know what our mission is and to engage with it.

My exhortation is that we owe it to those who have been with us on the journey and to those who are choosing to join us to unify as the body of Christ, to dismiss our hesitancy and to bring our gifts fully in to the service of God and his children.
In this way may we aspire to be a "Body beautiful".

Best wishes,
Ted

© St Edmund's Church, Roundhay - Charity Number 1131904