New life from an old root stock
Richard’s Story
This picture stems from a time when the Tab had gone through a major restructuring and redirection in the mid to late ‘80s and early ‘90s. A lot of people had left the church in the mid 80’s following a discussion about whether the we should close completely. The remaining small group recognised a call from God to remain but focus much more on the local community rather than the preaching centre / commuter church that the Tab had become.
The building was a major concern with rainwater pouring in, a lot of dry rot and very outdated, not to say dangerous, plumbing and wiring. The remaining group had managed to raise funds to refurbish what is now referred to as the pre-school hall together with the rooms above and were meeting there with the long-term view that we should demolish the rest of the building.
Into all this the church had appointed a Pastor, Terry Jones together with his wife Ann and daughter Sharon, but did not have the funds to support them and were reliant on the generosity of two London Churches, Esher and Walton Baptist who had stepped in when they heard Terry’s story.
At that time there was a lot of concern amongst the church members about what the future would hold and indeed whether we really had a future or we had just bitten off a lot more that we could chew! One Saturday I was driving in North Wales with some time to spare in the afternoon and I decided to walk up to Aber Falls. I was thinking a lot about the church when at the side of the path this tree caught my eye. As I looked at it God started to speak to me about our future together, the salient points were:
Here was new life coming from an old root stock. The tree had fallen but was still able to provide a firm and secure foundation for the new sapling.
The new tree shared the DNA of the old. The founding vision of the first Pastor, W.P Lockhart together with that of the first elders and deacons continues to flow through the church, and it is remarkable in reading Lockhart’s story to discover that he founded the church to meet the needs of the local community as the streets around were still evolving.
The new sapling was extremely weak and vulnerable needing the shelter and protection of the other trees around speaking to us about the importance of having other more mature churches around who could support us and not feeling any guilt in accepting that partnership. At the time the fellowships in Esher and Walton went on to provide significant financial support for a number of years, but also provided working parties and skilled professionals to help renovate the building. It is worth mention Mike Denham who worked on transforming the basement into the space we needed to run Level 3 and Richard Toms who rewired the building. Following that other groups have helped us from time to time, Norman Hamilton from Belfast associated with Jesus in the city, Bloomfield Presbyterian Church and Queens University Christian Union all come to mind. Apologies to those who I have missed.
Whilst the DNA was shared with the former tree, the new sapling would grow to reflect the environment of today. It would be shaped by the prevailing winds, its growth rings would point to the lean times and the times of growth and plenty in which it had matured. In the same way the new church growing from the old foundation would reflect today’s physical and spiritual environment and should be ready to understand and adapt to what is going on around it. It needs to remain flexible and avoid becoming a rigid and dying structure which would ultimately lead to its demise.
As I had for many years been interested in photography, I had my camera and tripod with me so took a picture of the tree which, on sharing with the congregation of the time, helped us to appreciate that we did have a future within God’s plan and that we should continue to value the past history and ethos of the church, whilst it was ok to also move on and adapt as we mature into the being salt and light in the world of today.
