This weekend we hosted a little Christmas drinks party.  Hannah put on a wonderful spread of yummy nibbles, mince pies and mulled wine and mulled cider.  We borrowed a friends outdoor fire grate which gave a extra Christmas feel.

We were really glad that a number of neighbour’s came along.  Some who we are already getting to know and others we had not properly met before.  We are enjoying getting to know the crescent and feeling more part of the community.  It’s surprising how much more homely a place feels when you know the others living there.

I am so glad to be part of my local church family but on top of this so glad to be part of a world wide family of churches.  This week we went back to Exeter (from where we moved) to the church we were part of in order to let them know how we are getting on.  They were all glad to hear how much we love Birmingham and impressed with facts such as ‘Birmingham has more canals than Venice’.

As well as having fun in seeing friends, it was great to receive prayer, input and words of encouragement from people we know have our best interests and God’s glory at heart.  It is certainly true that we can do more together than we can apart.

A few weeks ago for the first time I went to the far north of Birmingham to Sutton Coldfield in order to attend a Birmingham 2020 event.  The Birmingham 2020 initiative has been set up in order to unite churches across Birmingham, in the vision of seeing 20 new churches started across the city before 2020.  It was great to meet both with leaders of established churches (from different denominations and families of churches) and also with leaders of church plants involved in doing similar to ourselves.

It’s encouraging to know that the Church across Birmingham is increasingly working together for the good of this great City.  Recognizing the essential role the starting of new God centered communities plays in this.