King's continues to recover from the legacy of Covid, and I am very encouraged by the strong start we have made to the new church year. We had a remarkable Sunday last week when we baptised 23 people across our four sites. God is at work transforming lives.This Sunday, 25th September, I am looking forward to speaking at our Vision Sunday, and I am asking everyone at King's to make every effort to be there. I will be preaching out of Acts 2, which I hope will inspire us to rediscover God's heart for the church as his primary agent for the Kingdom of God.Although we have much to be encouraged about, King's, like many other churches in the nation, faces real challenges as we rebuild. For our recovery to continue, we are going to need your time, treasure and talents more than ever. As you will hear me say on Sunday, we can only do this together.We have endeavoured to pace our return following this once-in-a-century global pandemic, but now I appeal to each of you to fully reengage with church life. If you are able to come to worship in-person, then come to one of our venues and worship with God's people - make the decision to step back into fellowship. Our serving teams continue be stretched. Let's serve one another and rebuild the church community spoken of in Acts. It will require a massive team effort - we need you all to play your part.I thought you would be encouraged to know that over the last two church years, King's has given away £688,000 to ministries outside our local church community. These include food projects, JRP and the Love Your Neighbour initiative; vital relief projects delivered through partner churches in Kenya and Zimbabwe; financial aid for our Ukrainian brothers and sisters, driven from their homes by war; and support for our global church family, Newfrontiers. We plan to give away another £200,000 in this coming year.However, your consistent, generous giving is even more important now. We are all facing increased costs, and we are all having to make decisions on the priorities for our finances. The increased pressure on our incomes brings a fresh test to our togetherness. We will need to remember the Bible's teaching of giving from our first fruits. We must continue to steward the resources God gives us. I will be talking more about this, and the challenge we are facing, at our Vision Night on 27th September. I encourage all of you to come along to this as well.Our collective response over the coming months will determine whether we continue to move towards the fulfilment of the vision God has placed upon us. I look forward to seeing you this Sunday, 25th September, for our Vision Sunday. Let's do this together.
