Minutes of the Church Council 13 February 2024
- Revd RS opened the meeting with prayer, when we remembered and gave thanks for the life of our friend R G who has recently died. The sum of £716.80 was donated to charity in R’s memory after the funeral.
- Apologies: J B, M C, J H, C M, P S,. This is the final meeting as members for J B, A E and C T. They will retire at the Annual Church meeting.
- Minutes of the last meeting were approved and signed as correct.
- J F presented the Activities report and introduced J M from the Baptist Church, who is co-leader with J F in Open the Book and Sparks Club (formerly Kids’ Club). Some of the children who have attended Sparks and our own Family Playtime have now joined in other children’s groups at the Baptist Church as well. It is hoped children and parents will talk about the groups to their friends and bring them along. Our church supplies the room and heating, the Baptists supply the food and prizes for Sparks. May ask for £1 donation each. The new children’s worker will join these groups.
- TRANSFORMING LIVES
a Eco Church: The silver award has now been achieved by our church. Thanks to S O for her work in achieving this. A local councillor has funded a large box for us to save our blister packs in for recycling.
b Recruitment: CAP debt centre manager and children’s worker. There has already been interest in both posts and interview panels are being established.
c Circuit Mission Statement, Action Plan and Planning for Growth were all discussed, the Mission Statement pointing to the aim of transforming lives. In light of the trends of the past five years when the number of ministers available all over the Connexion has reduced considerably, the Circuit Team need to know how many clergy will be available in Autumn 2025 before they can begin to reorganise all the churches more practically.
- SHARING THE GOSPEL
a Worship Leadership Training: J F is undertaking this and when qualified will return to our church as a worship Leader.
b Lent and Holy Week services were all listed in the Lent and Holy week circular and are spread across the circuit due to shortage of leaders. Amongst other services are the Ash Wednesday service on Zoom and the Good Friday service at Yeadon. Re the Easter Sunday service extra efforts are being made to publicise this – cards to be circulated and emails to be sent to the uniformed group leaders.
c The Maunday Thursday ‘Pause for Thought’ at our Coffee Stop has always been appreciated; R S will try to arrange for it this year.
d We must also advertise our Mothering Sunday Service amongst the groups and keep this in our prayers and keep extending the invitations.
e Advertising. Please send S O details of anything to be advertised on social media.
f Church communications:
– Notices on main doors: only when there’s a particular need but not routinely
– Foyer notice board now divided into appropriate sections
– Events around the Circuit are advertised in ‘Lookout’ BUT we are responsible for letting M F know when anything is happening here so he can include it.
– Our monthly notices and other notices are received online by most people. Those not online can pick up a copy at church, or perhaps if you know someone who doesn’t attend but likes to keep up with events, you could take them a copy.
-There was an inconclusive discussion that weekly events could appear on the church screens before the service, that of course needs someone to prepare the items. Council agreed that announcing notices from the pulpit was far from ideal.
- SUSTAINING HOPE
a Property report has been circulated. LED lighting has been installed in Fellowship Room and Council agreed to spending £1000+ on LED lighting in church. The stair lift is now working, it should be run once a week to maintain it. Council also agreed that (as has been done in the past) regular reminders should be sent to people who are renting rooms etc that:
– they must clean up after themselves, including and especially tables and kitchen.
– each leader must sign in even if they only use the back door.
– they must lock only the inner front door so others can ring the bell.
– lights must all be turned off
b Finance: The interim accounts were presented and discussed, especially increase in rental revenues and in interest rates. Gas and electricity prices are fluctuating too much to predict future years after our current agreements end. Council thanked K R for all the work he does looking after the finances.
c Safeguarding: Council agreed to the proposed additions re bullying and domestic abuse to the 2023 Policy, and the 2024 Safeguarding Policy will be on the notice board in due course. S M has kindly agreed to become one of the trainers on the Safeguarding Foundation Course. Every office holder in the church will soon be required to complete a new ‘Safer recruitment’ form.
Council discussed whether the new catering team would need to complete one each but no conclusion yet. Council agreed that D P and A P should continue as Funeral Stewards.
d Circuit Stewards’ report had been circulated and accepted
e Pastoral and Christian Aid reports also accepted. Christian Aid lunch to be held on Sunday 17 March.
f GDPR audit: the holders of personal data for the church are:
J H, RW, N R, R S – Pastoral lists.
J S – email list.
S M – list of leaders.
P B and A N – List of Keyholders.
NB We do not ask for written consent from people to allow us to keep a record of their details.
- ANY OTHER BUSINESS
J D emphasised the urgent need for more stewards. This will be discussed at the Annual Church Meeting.
- FURTHER MEETINGS
Annual Church Meeting: Sunday 28 April after morning worship
Church Council meeting: Tuesday 18 June at 7.00pm
A N
Church Council Secretary
Attendees: L B, P B, J D, A E, C F, E H, T K, S M, H M, R N, S O, D P, L P, K R, A S, C T, A N (Secretary)
NB: N R is no longer a CC member as she has retired from the Leadership Team
Guiseley Methodist church, activity coordinators report – JF
“Open the book” (Story tellers bible by Bob Hartman)
“Open the book” continues at Guiseley Primary School every month, this is with the Baptist Church and St Oswald’s. We currently have 5 volunteers including myself and Rev. C N.
The Christmas “What’s the story” with the school was very well received and we did receive thank you cards from some of the children. We dis manage to get enough volunteers and I would like to thank all of those who helped on the day, but also the preparation and clearing away afterwards.
Ghyll Royd and Primrose court care home church service
We continue to go to Ghyll Royd once a month and the numbers continue to grow each time. There are a few regular residents who are very pleased to see us and enjoy the service we offer. I do intend to continue with this and have two volunteers from YMC who come along as they are able. If anyone else is interested, please let me know.
Primrose Court service is also once a month, but this is not an easy service to offer as there is no place to have it and it ends up being in the dining area and is very noisy and busy. I have tried different times, and it isn’t any different. I will persevere for now but would welcome some volunteers to come with me.
Post-Christmas Quiz & Social
This took place on 30th December and S O organised it. It was a brilliant evening and raised over £400 for “All We Can”, however the weather put people off coming, so I hope we will have another in the lighter, warmer months.
Kids club on Monday evenings, now called “Sparks”.
After summer myself and J M from the Baptist church met and decided we would like to re vamp it as numbers were not growing and it was difficult because of the needs of the children and the number of volunteers.
We did say that we would have a break before Christmas, but the numbers went up again and we decided to stay open but start a new way in January.
Sparks is still on Monday evenings, but we now start at 5.30pm and finish at 7pm.
We start by having something to eat and go on to a Godly Play story led by Revd. H L, we then have a craft activity led by myself related to the story and finally we have run around games led by J M, children and young people’s leader from Guiseley Baptist church.
We have volunteers for the kitchen, two from GMC and 2 from GBC.
Numbers are going up due to Facebook and word of mouth.
Family Playtime
This group continues to meet on Thursday mornings, but we now run from 10 to 11.15am at the request of one of the parents.
This time seems better for the younger children, and it is a lovely group with regular attenders.
I recently put this on Facebook, and this has gained some interest.
We now have two volunteers which is brilliant.
Cubs’ faith badge
I recently offered this for the cubs attending GMC. We had 28 cubs and had a lovely evening in church, and they were so well behaved and very interested.
Junior church
This no longer runs and when we do have any children, we have been using the resources stored in the flower vestry, which has colouring sheets and pens, word searches and books in.
Children’s worker post
This is now advertised, and we have had some interest, so watch this space!
If you want me to meet with you about any input you want, or a new idea you want me to take forward please feel free to contact me.