West Kilburn Baptist Induction

The deacons ask their new pastor vital questions (Can you spot the back of my head?)

It was great to be at West Kilburn Baptist Church recently for the induction of their new pastor, Steve Palframan. WKBC is an FIEC church now but CHBC would have been in the same NW grop of LBA churches back in the day. I have known the previous two pastors (Peter Law and especially Paul Pease before him). The induction included a church rededication. Also taking part were Paul Wells, who Steve knows from his previous church in Liverpool and Bob Cain from Flitwick who served as moderator when WKBC were without a pastor. The preacher was Yannick Christos-Wahab of Stockwell Baptist Church who preached well from Psalm 96. It was good to see a few familiar faces, including Welshman James Sercombe. Tasty African style food to follow. We wish the church well as this new chapter begins.

West Kilburn 150

It was good to be at West Kilburn Baptist Church today for their 150th anniversary services (their building is five years older than ours but I think the work in Childs Hill actually began 1863). Peter Law the present pastor chaired, the previous pastor Paul Pease preached (above) and several others gave testimony and prayed. There was also a bit of the history and a lovely tea to follow.

Focus etc

Tuesday was a good full day. In the morning I drove over to Amyand Park for a fraternal with Gerard Hemmings, Robin Asgher, Peter Law, Paul Levy and others. We discussed the blind spots of our age. We solved little I guess but we aired some issues usefully. I noticed that those fresh to the ministry in London have similar gripes and concerns to those I had as a younger man (eg the way younger people are hived off to Central London churches, how to cohere as a witness to the community, etc). You learn to live with certain things.

After getting back home I headed down to Stanfords Maps where I met up with my good old friend Paul Pease, pastor at Hook Evangelical. We had a good old chinwag over some maps and a coffee. What a tonic fellowship is.

Then after returning home I headed off in the car again down to Epsom Playhouse where I saw the inimitable Focus. This was again one of these Classic Rock packages. Instead of the Groundhogs we started with the Strawbs this time. I liked the acoustic guitars but the singing didn't do too much for me. Loved "Lay Down" at the end though. Then we had (Martin Turner's) Wishbone Ash working their way through Argus. Just fine. Then into overdrive. Focus could only squeeze in an hour - a bit from the first album, a fairly long and jazzy Eruption, three more recent tracks plus the obligatory Sylvia and Hocus Pocus. Got the CD and DVD, which they willingly signed - something to look forward to come Christmas! Took an age to find where I'd parked the car but got home fairly quickly straight through London.

LIP Meetings

It's such a busy week! Saturday seems a life time ago now but I was at the meeting of the trustees of the London Inreach Project on that day, however, and then at the information meeting and the preaching meetings that followed.

I chaired the preaching meeting. My good friend Paul Pease of Hook Evangelical Church preached a fine pithy sermon from 2 Corinthians 4:5 on not preaching ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as his servants for the sake of God's people.

It was good to see so many supporters and to hear from Andrew Murray and Derek Sewell and Roger Carter. The work continues to be very slow and difficult but there are encouragements and opportunities galore.

Another week

It's been a slightly odd week in that Eleri and the two youngest have been away in Llangrannog for the Urdd camp so I've been 'looking after' the three oldest - basically feeding them and keeping them out of mischief. It's been Arts Week in their school so things have been unusual for them too. they seem to have enjoyed it.

On Monday I had an Evangelical Library committee. We seem to be making progress slowly but surely. We have a major task on hand at present putting everything on one floor for the moment.

On Tuesday I met up with my good friend Paul Pease, pastor at Hook Evangelical Church, down on the southbank by the eye (he can't come north of the river any more :-)). We used to meet weekly when he was in West Kilburn but that was many years ago. He is now in quite a different set up to me and we are still very different in some ways but with core beliefs meshed and many shared experiences we can talk and talk and talk. And we did. We also played 'who is this?' on each other's i-pods. Good fun. In the evening I had the church officers meeting here which is another sort of fellowship and also very good.

Wednesday night it was the midweek meeting, looking at Deuteronomy 8.

Nothing very special then the rest of the week. Tried to read, downloaded and burned some CDs, worked on certain projects and preps for Sunday, etc.

Nice weekend

It was a good weekend. We had well attended clubs for the children and young people on Friday night as we began again after half term. I was leading both, looking at Paul before Felix. In the younger group we had a spaghetti quiz and they decorated biscuits with icing sugar, etc.

There's always plenty of preparation to do on a Saturday - working on the sermons, choosing the hymns, preparing the notice sheets. In the evening Eleri and I drove down to Hook near Surbiton where my old LTS friend Paul Pease was celebrating his fiftieth birthday. He used to be nearby in West Kilburn and we would meet once a week but since he's moved to Hook EC we rarely see each other. The women had to dress up town and the boys downtown (some really went to town with workmen's reflective jackets, etc). Fifty candles, as you can see, presents a genuine fire risk! It was mostly family and church members (Hook adn som W Kilburnites) who we don't really know but it was nice to chat to Ian (ex-LTS) and Lynn Rees who confessed that they sometimes visit the blog (hello again - sorry we didn't say 'bye properly!). The church gave Paul a nice chair for his study and he spoke of his thankfulness to God. We enjoyed it but sloped off once the dancing started.

The Lord's Day was good. I preached on the woman with the issue of blood in the morning to around 40 I guess. Two of our Nigerian families were away for different reasons but another one was out in force as one of them was presented with her PhD this last week. There was a party on the Saturday which some members had attended. We couldn't go because of the prior arrangement but we were kindly given goody bags marking the occasion and others had special pens.

We had lunch in church together. That's always a happy time although I often think we could make better use of the time together and do something more. The rest of the family and several others then headed off down to Sidcup where there was a baptism of two young men who grew up here but have with their family been down at Days Lane, Sidcup, for a few years now. One of them is Tom - a regular visitor to the blog and even a contributor on occasion. I was sorry not to be there but I felt we should have an evening service. In the end we were eight all told (representing as many as five [seven if you divide the home nations] different nations would you believe) including one lady who is new to us.