Hillside Parish Magazine

June 2009

I’m always encouraging people to listen carefully for God’s call – it can come to anyone, at any time, and it does! Just remember some of those Bible stories or the lives of the saints. Of course they are the “special ones”, the ones who got written about, but the same thing keeps happening to ordinary people as well. Just to prove it here are two pieces taken from this month’s York Diocesan News.

The church needs more well-equipped leaders and ministers for several reasons. First of all, God calls all of us; sometimes to stay just where we are, but at other times to do new and risky things which take us right out of our comfort zone. So it’s important to keep listening and to follow the urging of the Holy Spirit when it comes, for that is how we become the person that God wants us to be!

Secondly our churches need more leaders. There is so much more that we could be doing right across the benefice - in our worship, in our pastoral care, in our work with children and schools, in our local church life - if more people were available to make it happen. It’s been great to have Bob Sidgwick with us for the last three months as an example of what is possible if we follow God’s leading and as an inspiration for others to follow

So do keep listening, and keep praying too – that God will raise up leaders and ministers among us for his church in this place. As you learn more about the people that God calls, you will realise that God calls some very unlikely individuals.

You have a vocation from God.
If you already know what it is, pray to be faithful.

If you are still searching, pray to hear God’s voice and to respond generously. (Do get in touch with me if you think God is calling you to something new - so that we can share the process of discernment together.)

With my prayers

Ian Houghton