Positive in Polzeath

My daughter joined our family holiday in Devon direct from a stint with a beach mission in Cornwall. She thought we'd love Polzeath, so we spent a day there.

Polzeath, of course, is the place now famous in Methodist annals where the local beach side Methodist chapel was turned into a base and out-reach for the local surfing community.

We went and paid a visit, meaning to stay for a cup of tea, but ended up staying for lunch (the crepes were great!).

Whilst we were there the local Methodist Minister Peter Smith turned up, followed shortly by the Cornwall Methodist Chair Steve Wilder, pictured with me above. Both of them were really interested in our daughter's beach mission (which is nice because it means Mum and Dad take a back seat!) and delighted that us Methodists had called into see the project.

We found Steve so enthusiastic. It is good to know that someone with his vision and theology can become a District Chair.

But I found my conversation with Peter very moving. He described Easter Day 2009: he spent 45 minutes on the veranda of the church distributing the Lord's Supper to over 300 communicants. He clearly found it a profound experience and one that was a joy to share. How many other Methodist Ministers had the joy of 300 communicants last Easter?

There is so much that is good in the Polzeath project. It is a demonstration of what Methodism can do when responding to challenge and change. It was also great to see that the project works with Christians of other denominations.

Positive in Birmingham

I preached at my home church for the first time in over a year on Sunday. The last five years have been very difficult for the congregation. A combination of factors have almost led to our closure. I shall not go into detail here: those who need to know, already know.

However Sunday's service was overwhelmingly positive. There is now a real sense that the Church is recovering our sense of mission to one of the poorest inner-city communities in the United Kingdom. We have a rare combination of an Evangelical passion for the gospel, alongside a profound belief that the Church must bear a social and economic witness to the community.

We are a racially mixed Church - sadly something of a rarity - with our members coming from 14 different countries (15 if we allow my wife's claim that Cornish is not English).

Recently we've had some financial setbacks. I explained that on Saturday I had taken the communion silverware for a valuation. I was hoping it was worth thousands and we could repair the roof.

When I explained that the jeweller told me it it was worth virtually nothing, having been made from electro-plated tin, the congregation cheered: somehow celebrating the Lord's Supper with tin is more us than celebrating with silver. We will pray the money in. God will bless our work, just as he has in the past.

It is amazing how fast a situation can change. Just a few weeks ago many of us were spiritually and emotional drained and depressed by the problems that confront us, but now our Church seems to have taken on a new lease of life, with all sorts of ideas and enthusiasms.

but negative in Brighton

Like many Methodists I have been sorry to see recent letters in the Methodist Recorder attacking the Church of England for appointing a Minister from Holy Trinity Brompton to work at St Peter's in Brighton.

The letters have been both ignorant and spiteful. They demonstrate the sort of lack of vision that would have made a Polzeath impossible. I hope the Anglicans are not unsettled by these attitudes. My advice to the Anglicans is don't fall over yourselves trying to placate or reason with them - they don't represent the best of Methodism.

Business and pleasure often take me to Brighton, though rarely on a Sunday. However should I be in Brighton on a Sunday I shall become an "honorary Anglican" for the day. I certainly won't cross the threshold of the poisonous Dorset Garden Methodist Church. When I last worshiped there they seemed such a nice bunch, so something has clearly gone very wrong in recent years.

Positive, positive, positive

I think regular readers will find a change of tempo on this blog for the rest of 2009. Seeing the Polzeath project, feeling our own local Church change for the better, and the recognition that the Brighton correspondence is just a nasty little blip, all show that British Methodism still has much to offer.