Before the Service this morning, we want to deliver you some very good news about the future of Bradfield Church.3 representatives from Sheffield Diocese came to our PCC meeting on Monday night. They told us that Bradfield has been selected as one of 5 Churches in Sheffield Diocese to receive funding from the central Church of England for a 6 year period. This funding will enable us to appoint our own Stipendary Minister, which is excellent news. During that period we will be expected to grow our congregation and discipleship and show that by June 2030 we can be in a position to maintain our own Rector. We hope to start the appointment process in the very near future.During the period we will be given lots of assistance, and additional funding to help us attract children and young people into Church and to enable us to work more closely with our local schools.We will be working closely with Wadsley Church and Reverend Dan Brown and to help with our growth, we will receive a graft of people from Wadsley Church who feel that their calling from God is more suited to the type of Worship we can offer at St.Nicholas.We always felt that to keep Bradfield as a viable place to worship, we needed to retain the Rectory. That has also now been confirmed and the Diocese have paid for it to be renovated and redecorated. In the short term, for a period of 6 months, Reverend Jordan Betts and his family will be living in the Rectory, and then our permanent Rector will live there once the appointment process has finalised. To help us move forward and start with all the planning needed Reverend Jordan Betts and Reverend Sara Goodman are going to be working more closely with St.Nicholas, and the PCC have approved their involvement.As Churchwardens we hope that you all feel as positive about this news as we do. There is going to be a lot of work to do but we know with Gods help, we will be successful.We are sure you will have many questions, as we did on Monday night, and we will be around after the Service if you want to ask us anything at all.God BlessJohn, Judy, Sandra & Jane
Today our Focal Ministers, John & Naomi, led our first ever All Age service. This replaces the Mattins Service we used to have on the 4th Sunday, and will be every second Sunday. We had one of our largest congregations for some time, with just over 50 people attending. The Service was really positive and well received, with feedback being extremely encouraging.Naomi’s talk was about Forgiveness of Sins. As an analogy, she brought along the family biscuit tin, and spoke about how she had been caught pinching biscuits from the tin in the pantry as a child, despite her Mum telling her she couldn’t have one before dinner! I’m sure this is something we could all relate to 😊. We had 4 lovely hymns including Give me Joy in my Heart, which everyone seemed to sing with some gusto. “Sing Hosanna” was very appropriate for a Spring morning in Bradfield.We also listened to a lovely rendition of Amazing Grace where we could just sit and contemplate the words or speak to God in our own way.Thankyou to John & Naomi for such an uplifting Service.
Our Easter Day service was led by Bill and Sara Goodman and was a lovely celebration of the Risen Christ. Our Service was then followed by an Easter Egg Hunt for our younger members, which was enjoyed by all those who took part. Thank you to Chloe Marples who organised this.It was lovely to see so many people in Church. Sara told the Parable of the Prodigal Son, getting 3 of our younger members to play the part of the father and 2 sons. We also took the opportunity to Dedicate the Restoration of The Bowlby and The Dixon stained glass windows.Bill & Sara brought a Simnel cake for people to have with their tea/ coffee, to say thank you for the support given to them by the Bradfield congregation. Various other cakes had been made, with donations going towards the kitchen and toilet project.
Rev John Barrett led a very special Palm Sunday Service, which was very well attended on a lovely sunny morning. So many people were full of praise for this well thought out Service, and our thanks go out to Rev John for his hard work.As part of the Service, the “Easter Story” was read by Sandra Barrand, Linda Denton and Naomi Marples, which gave so much more meaning to this special day in the church calendar.At the start of the Service palm crosses were blessed and the congregation then collected one from the front of Church.This was another of our services where we are trying to do something different to appeal to people of all ages and encourage the community to come and worship at Bradfield Church.
