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JULY 2010
from the Minister : Revd. Malcolm Hickox

Dear friends,

As we left for our holiday on June 3^rd we were still trying to take in the previous day’s horrific events in West Cumbria when Derrick Bird, a local taxi driver, went on a shooting spree killing 12 people and injuring 20 others, before finally taking his own life. It was even the topic of conversation the first day in Lanzarote as a waiter quizzed us about what had happened. Thankfully, such events are rare in Britain, which is perhaps why it had such an impact on the people of Hungerford, who were forced to re-live their own ordeal of August 1987 when Michael Ryan shot dead 16 people, and injured a further 15, around that market town in rural Berkshire. We might speculate about what was in Derrick Bird’s mind, but there will never be any adequate answers as to why he embarked on his dreadful journey.

In many ways life is much more about living with uncertainly, with questions and an open future, than with knowing the answers and being sure about events. At our Circuit Service on the morning of June 20^th, Rev’d Dr Andrew Wood, Chair of our Southampton District, reminded us that being a Christian doesn’t protect us from the difficulties and traumas of life. It is not possible to be completely safe and secure and so there are times when we have to wrestle with the implications of living in the midst of uncertainties. However, it is in the searching and questioning as we confront the realities of life that we discover God’s presence. The strength of the Christian community should be that we support, sustain and carry each other through the difficult times, allowing God’s spirit to work in and through us.

With this in mind, as we were about to depart for our holiday on June 3^rd I sent the following message to Rev’d Richard Teal, Chair of the Cumbria District, and to the circuit staff in Whitehaven:

“The news of the tragedy yesterday has left us numb and in deep shock and we cannot imagine how some of your folk in West Cumbria must be feeling. However, just as our thoughts and prayers were with you at the time of the floods last year so they are with you again. The additional pressure on you as ministers in the area to say and do the right things will be great and we pray that you will receive all the strength you need at this very sad time.”

With the love and prayers of our Methodist folk in Salisbury

When we returned to Salisbury I discovered that Richard Teal had himself returned from holiday the day after the tragedy to be confronted by the horrific news and he went straight to Whitehaven. He expressed his appreciation for our thoughts and prayers and then more recently the members of the Whitehaven circuit issued the following statement:

“We would like to thank everyone who sent messages of concern and support and all those who are praying for us after the tragic shootings on June 2^nd.

So many people from other circuits (including the churches at Hungerford and Aberfan), previous Whitehaven circuit ministers, Christian Aid, Smile International, the Methodist Church in Argentina (with which our district is linked) and even a school in Zimbabwe sent letters, e-mails or made ’phone calls all expressing prayerful support. Words cannot adequately express the comfort gained from knowing that people throughout the country were praying for us as we struggled to accept what had happened.

The District Chair, Rev’d Richard Teal and our superintendent minister, Rev’d Philip Peacock, stood with their ecumenical colleagues in torrential rain to lead our communities in outdoor services and their pastoral care is much appreciated. After all the trauma and shock, all the media bustle and attention, our communities are grieving and caring for each other. God’s love will sustain us as we face the future.

Thank you from all of us.

At last year’s Methodist Conference the President, Rev’d David Gamble, chose as his theme ‘Creating safer Space’. In one of the most significant parts of his address to the Conference, he said. “When I’m talking about creating safer space I’m talking about places, situations, moments, relationships, occasions where and when people feel accepted as they are, able to tell their story, not judged and not put at unnecessary risk.” As Christians in Salisbury we may have little influence over the safety and security of our world, but we can certainly take David Gamble’s words seriously and attempt to create the sort of space he speaks about within the life of our church.

Every blessing Malcolm Hickox

A hymn from Andrew Pratt

God would not will what we have seen,

the terror, horror, death;

for God is love, the source of life,

the essence of our breath.

God would not break the damaged reed,

the smouldering wick is fanned;

yet human power, our want and greed

can counter what God planned.

Our will is free, our way we choose,

to act for good or ill,

to offer love, to calm or heal,

to damage or to kill.

God give us courage in the face

of carnage that we see,

to work for life, to live for love,

to set your people free.

A Prayer

O God, Creator of us all, in your Son, Jesus you have walked the way of darkness and death, you send your Spirit of healing and truth to all in need.

We pray for those injured or bereaved by inexplicable violence. May your gracious compassion surround and uphold them.

We pray for all individuals and communities whose lives have been changed by this tragedy.
May your sustaining love be present in all expressions of support offered and help received.

We give thanks for the commitment and dedication of the emergency services

and pray that they may be given the strength

they need to serve others.

We give thanks for the resilience and courage of West Cumbrians and pray that the bonds of com-munity care and concern may hold fast at this time.

Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer
and let our cry come unto you. Amen.

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JUNE 2010
from the Minister : Revd. Malcolm Hickox

Dear friends,

“Have I showed you the picture of my new grandson?”

We’ve all been there; we’ve all shared the joy of a new grandparent keen to talk about the latest addition to their family, proud of the new life that’s brought a spark of something indefinable into their life. It just happened that we had a family gathering four days after the birth of young Oliver and my sister-in-law naturally made the most of the captive audience to show off her new grandson. Had all gone well the lad himself might have been there in person to make his presence felt in the way that only new born babies can. But I guess he might have stolen the attention from his cousin whose wedding celebration was the excuse for our gathering. Having said that, ours is a generous family and why stick to one thing to celebrate when you might encompass two or three!

Little Oliver’s absence, along with his parents, was due to the fact that he wasn’t quite so little. In fact he was 9lb 13 oz and with not laying in the right position his was a long and painful birth. When he did finally enter the world he had two black eyes and two days later he was diagnosed with a broken clavicle. When we visited Oliver in hospital on the Saturday of the wedding celebration he was in some discomfort and had been struggling to feed, so much to our disappointment there were no cuddles. But to us he still looked perfect and his dad just kept saying, “Have you seen my son?” as proud as any new parent could be. As for his mother, my niece, she was equally proud, if somewhat exhausted by the whole experience. I just kept thinking, I’ll try to be a ‘great’ uncle to Oliver, but it sounds rather old being a Great Uncle!

All this got me thinking about how we use some of the language of child birth in other aspects of life. Paul in his epistle to the Romans (8:22-23) has this to say: ‘For we know that up to the present time all of creation groans with pain, like the pain of childbirth. But it is not just creation alone which groans; but we who have the Spirit as the first of God’s gifts also groan within ourselves, as we wait for God to make us his children and set our whole being free.’ (GNB) It’s perhaps rather poignant so soon after the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile and the volcanic eruption in Iceland to think of the earth still giving birth after all these millions of years, and yet there is the reminder that disruption accompanies such actions.

We talk of Pentecost, which we’ve just celebrated, as being the birth of the Christian church and the picture we have in the New Testament is of everything being turned upside down. Giving birth to the church was a joyful experience, but it was also disturbing, disorientating, disruptive, challenging and at times painful – just like childbirth! And like the human experience those who looked on marvelled at what had happened and at the growth of the new baby – 3,000 added to the church in one day (Acts 2:41). If you want to take the human analogy further you could say that the church had its ‘terrible twos’, ‘rebellious childhood’ and ‘antagonist adolescence’ implied by the content of the various epistles to the young churches. But new life is rarely straight forward.

At our recent General Church Meeting we received a paper entitled, ‘Seizing the Moment’, which contained some challenging ideas for new projects at SMC, including the building of a garden room on the south side of the church. There may have been those present who thought that after the birth of the ‘new’ church in 1992 one child in twenty years was enough! But ‘Seizing the Moment’, isn’t about a new child, it’s about helping the one born in 1992 to grow and flourish in new ways. Like any new idea it may be challenging, it might be thought of as disrupting our routine, but God’s Spirit comes to stir us up and to blow us in directions we’d not contemplated. That was John Wesley’s experience on 24^th May 1738 as his faith was renewed with a heart-warming experience of the Spirit and our church was planted as a result. So is this a new Pentecost for us? Is God’s Spirit re-shaping us to be the church in news ways in the coming years?

To talk of the Spirit shaking us up in this way may be an uncomfortable thought, but the Psalms also give us an image of God as the midwife who helps to bring to birth new life: ‘Yet you brought me out of the womb; you made me trust in you even at my mother's breast.’ (Psalms 22:9) Perhaps the question for us is whether we can trust God enough to allow the Spirit to re-shape not only our church, but also our individual lives.

Every blessing, Malcolm

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MAY 2010
from the Minister : Revd. Malcolm Hickox

Dear friends,

As I write the UK’s airports and many others across Europe are closed due to clouds of volcanic ash being released in Iceland. However, an unofficial Newcastle United Football Club website suggested that the source of the dust cloud was in fact St. James' Park (NUFC’s ground) and not Iceland. Allegedly, Police arrested the Newcastle United trophy cabinet cleaners in connection with the incident – it’s claimed that in preparing for the expected arrival of the Championship trophy on Tyneside they inadvertently released a cloud of ancient material!

Newcastle have had a good season in the Championship after being relegated from the Premiership last year. However, the dreams of obtaining any ‘silverware’ have eluded the club for so long that I’m surprised anyone can find the key to the trophy cabinet! My walking football encyclopaedia of a son, Andy, tells me that it was back in 1969 that Newcastle last won anything - the Fairs Cup, but according to him it wasn’t really a proper trophy!

Bill Shankly, the former Liverpool FC manager, famously said, “Football's not a matter of life and death ... it's more important than that.” But, of course, the use of extraordinary metaphors and exaggerated language is well-known in football. Which commentator was it who once said, “If the ball had gone into the back of the net it would have been a goal!”? When Kevin Keegan returned for his turbulent, short-lived, second spell as manager of Newcastle he was hailed as the Messiah, the one who would bring fame and fortune to the club. That’s not quite how it ended, and then along came Alan Shearer, hailed by some as Newcastle’s Messiah Mark II. Now it’s the turn of Chris Hughton, Newcastle’s less well-known manager to be referred to as the Tyneside Messiah as he takes the club back up to the Premiership.

I’ve often wondered how Jesus would be judged if he was thought of as the manager of a team of disciples. Obviously, on that first Palm Sunday there were plenty who wanted to claim him as their Messiah and he certainly seemed to be better than those before who’d claimed the title for themselves. If some had got their way the coronation would have taken place there and then, with the disciples in the thick of it doing all they could to please Jesus. But then it changed and they started to question his tactics, one even went to the authorities having lost confidence in his ‘boss’. And when Jesus got into trouble they soon deserted him, went into hiding, clammed up and refused to comment. Club owners and the media may crucify football managers with their words when they get the wrong results, but in Jerusalem those with power did it with a cross and nails.

By the end of Good Friday, ‘team Jesus’ was certainly not capable of holding onto any sense of self-belief, let alone confidence in Jesus. Not only had his life been destroyed, but seemingly everything he believed in. Sadly the world is full of experiences that end in disaster - dreams can come to an end,

visionaries loose their supporters when the going gets tough, good people are misunderstood and the innocent do die. But what the world seems almost incapable of accepting is that these can also be signs of a triumph and not a loss and that the trophy signifying success is a cross, a means of torture and execution. And if that wasn’t enough to take in, somehow there seemed to be an even greater result several days later! A game may turn around before the final whistle, a win may be secured in extra time, but the result surely can’t change after the game has finished and everyone’s gone home?

Football in its excesses may borrow language from elsewhere, even from religion, but there is no language for the events of Easter. As the hymn, ‘O Sacred Head, sore wounded’ suggests: ‘what language shall I borrow to praise thee dearest friend’. If that’s true for Good Friday then it’s even more the case for the resurrection stories, because there is no human experience to describe resurrection. It doesn’t end there either, because there’s more to come with the astonishing concepts of Ascension and Pentecost! Perhaps that’s why the biblical accounts contain such extraordinary images with the risen Jesus appearing and disappearing and being lifted upwards, not to mention the sounds of wind and tongues of fire.

Two of my childhood friends recently celebrated their 60^th birthdays by organising an afternoon of outdoor activities at a Girl Guide centre. One of the challenges was to see how high you could build a tower of crates (not quite the tower of Babel). I trust you’ll be proud to learn that your minister and his brother got the highest with 12 crates to be followed later by the minister and his wife reaching the same height. We have the photograph to prove we took part and a plastic cup as a trophy! Often in life we encounter things we cannot prove and other things we cannot explain. Many of us struggled to understand why aeroplanes were not allowed to fly when we could not see any clouds of ash in the sky - we had to trust others’ judgement.

A wining football team cannot refrain from celebrating and sharing its good news and neither should we. The events of Easter and Pentecost are so life changing they need to be shared with everyone, but with meaning and integrity. If we struggle to find adequate words then our actions and our lives must give truth to what we claim to believe. The joy of new life through resurrection and the strength given by the Spirit are not there simply to be spoken of, but experienced.

Every blessing, Malcolm

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April 2010

Dear friends,

Those of you with computers and access to the internet may by aware of the growth of what are called ‘online social networks’. These are usually groups who share a common interest, a concern for an issue or a friendship and keep in touch through the internet. One of the most popular in Britain is ‘Facebook’, which allows friends to communicate with each other and share information. I regularly receive invitations to be considered as someone’s ‘friend’ and to join their Facebook and also to join various campaigning groups.

One of the latest ‘Facebook’ groups I have discovered is ‘Fix our Potholes in Salisbury’, a group concerned about the state of Salisbury’s roads, with 2690 members at the time of writing. Apparently, the AA has described Salisbury’s roads as being the worst in the country for potholes. The winter rain and snow freezing and expanding in cracks in the roads has led to large holes in most of Salisbury ’s main roads, but according to a BBC news item it’s the road surface that’s been the real problem. It seems that ten years ago Salisbury’s roads were treated with an experimental asphalt surface that was supposed to last for thirty years, but it’s not worked and is now peeling off!

Those of you who use Churchill Way West and Fisherton Street will know that re-surfacing work has been taking place at night and we’ve therefore had some detours in Salisbury. We did have some warning of the work so most of us have been prepared for the inconvenience. However, it reminded me of the time when our street in Measham, in our last circuit, was re-surfaced. We had a letter through our door giving us a warning, but it contained a note indicating that inclement weather could delay the work for one or two days. True to form on the day appointed for the work the heavens opened and it rained almost continuously! It was therefore a day later that work began and all looked promising until a heavy cloud burst halted proceedings once again.

It’s been a bit like that in Salisbury with a number of days of inclement weather since the re-surfacing work started and I’ve been pondering on how much easier it must have been for God when the world was created and one act flowed into another without interruption! Except, of course, that is to simplify the nature of God's creative acts and to take the great poems of Genesis 1-3 out of context. What we learn from those passages is not how God created or how long the process took, but something of God's intentions and the source of all life.

Our scientific exploration (a God-given pursuit) has uncovered some of the 'hows' of creation, but it also reminds us that creation is an ongoing process with its rhythm and pattern and flow of life. Hence the seasons, the cycles of weather and the regeneration of areas that once appeared dead – something we are conscious of each spring. But we also experience the violence of creation, with the hidden energy of the earth building up and exploding in the earthquakes of Haiti and Chile and the volcano eruption in Iceland. We may plan our work programmes and inform folk that we intend to re-surface their road, but we cannot order dry weather to go with the bitumen and granite chippings and there are still many things that surprise us!

Our new road surfaces will look good when they are finished and they will not only make the roads safer, but will extend their lives. However, I doubt that anyone from the Highways Agency will be rushing to suggest that they might last for thirty years! But, of course, the new surface hasn't fundamentally changed what is underneath, the blemishes and cracks are simply hidden. We can be tempted to give ourselves a sort of 're-surfacing job' and hide the bits we don't like in our lives, but in the end it will not last. To change a life in that way is simply masking our imperfections, transformation has to take place from the inside, not the outside – that’s God’s way. For the creator, transformation and resurrection are the tools of the trade, so with God the imperfect is made perfect and new life becomes a real possibility!

If transformation takes place from the inside then for God that meant entering into our world in the life of Jesus, which is why Christians believe that the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus changed the world. Our commitment to The Way of the Cross is because we have a story to tell which still resonates today. It’s a story about one man, Jesus, but it’s also a story about every man and woman. We could have set up a Facebook for interested people, but we believe that ‘the greatest story ever told’ needs to be taken out of the church and onto the streets where it belongs. The world desperately needs to see how new life (resurrection) can appear where once there was death and destruction. It’s an act of faith and our prayer is that people’s lives might be touched in a new way.

Every blessing,

Malcolm

In a time of doubt, Lord,

be with those who are fearful.

In a time of fear, Lord,

be with those who are desperate.

In a time of desperation, Lord,

be with those who are hungry and homeless.

In a time of hunger, Lord,

be with us who can help.

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March 2010

Dear friends,

Do you believe these headlines from 12^th February?

“Methodist church 'prepared to go out of existence'” (Daily Mail)

“Leader signals end of Methodism” (The Independent)

“General Synod: Methodists likely to merge with Church of England” (The Daily Telegraph). The Methodist Church is on its way to rejoining the Church of England in a historic move.

“Methodists declare 'we're ready to merge' with Church of England” (The Times)

Ruth Gledhill, The Times Religion Correspondent, went as far as to say, “The Methodist Church is prepared to be absorbed by the Church of England if that is the price of unity, Britain ’s most senior Methodist said yesterday.”

So where does all this come from and what’s it all about?

After many years of conversations the Methodist Conference and the General Synod of the Church of England met separately in July 2003 and agreed that for the sake of the mission of Christ’s Church the time was right for the two churches to draw closer together. They recognised that the long term goal was for ‘full visible unity’, but that such a goal would be a long time in the future. As part of the process of drawing closer together they agreed to sign a Covenant in the form of a set of affirmations and commitments. This was to be undertaken in: ‘a spirit of penitence for the human sinfulness and narrowness of vision that has contributed to past divisions, believing that we have been impoverished through our separation and that our witness to the gospel has been weakened accordingly, and in a spirit of thanksgiving and joy for the convergence in faith and collaboration in mission that we have experienced in recent years.’

Since 2003 a Joint Implementation Commission has been meeting to address the issues contained in the Covenant and to encourage joint initiatives, including projects like the ‘Fresh Expressions’ programme. Locally, we have been encouraged to explore the implications of the Covenant with our partners, in our case this has meant working more closely with St Thomas ’s and Salisbury URC. [The United Reformed Church is an observer in the whole process]. As part of the ongoing explorations the President and Vice-President of the Methodist Conference, Revd David Gamble and Dr Richard Vautrey, were invited to address the Church of England’s recent General Synod and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, will be addressing the Methodist Conference in July.

David Gamble and Richard Vautrey used the opportunity at the General Synod to state that the Covenant relationship between our two churches was a “serious, deeply committed relationship” and “not an irrelevant extra”. Responses to the challenges of the Covenant should therefore be driven by a desire for mission. David went on to say that, “Within God’s overwhelming gracious covenant relationship with us and with our churches, we are in a covenant with each other. For better for worse, for richer for poorer, but always for the gospel.”

As Methodists the word ‘covenant’ has a deep meaning within our worship and our understanding of discipleship and so Richard shared the Methodist Covenant prayer with the General Synod. David went on to explain that Methodists approach the Covenant with the Church of England in the spirituality of that Covenant prayer. He then continued: “So when we say to God ‘let me have all things let me have nothing’, we say it by extension to our partners in the Church of England as well. We are prepared to go out of existence not because we are declining or failing in mission, but for the sake of mission. In other words we are prepared to be changed and even to cease having a separate existence as a Church if that will serve the needs of the Kingdom.”

Does this mean that we are about to return to the Church of England

or cease to exist as Methodists?

Having read the full text of the President and Vice President’s address to the General Synod (copies available from the Steward’s Vestry) I am somewhat amazed by the newspaper headlines, which go far beyond anything that was even hinted at. For an experienced religious correspondent, Ruth Gledhill’s comments in The Times are frankly astonishing and are certainly putting words into David Gamble’s mouth! On a practical and theological level there is a great deal of debate that needs to take place before our two churches could move towards any visible unity scheme.

However, David Gamble has raised a deeply significant issue for us – what it means to be a church. Methodism’s roots are as a movement committed to mission and therefore the link he makes with the Covenant prayer should be a constant reminder to us when we complain that as a church we are being ignored by the world! However emotionally attached we may be to our buildings, our way of being a church, our worship, our expressions of faith - all that is secondary in comparison to our commitment to Christ and his gospel. Maybe as we journey through Lent we need to ask ourselves where God is leading us and what we are prepared to give up for the sake of the Kingdom.

Every blessing Malcolm Hickox

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