Bromley Hub Christmas Newsletter
A Christmas update from Bromley Hub
Hello All,
Greetings from the Spinnaker Bromley Team!
The last time I wrote to you was during the summer term when we were busy with preparations for the Bromley Schools Festival and our Spinnaker Charity Quiz Night. Both events were held at The Parish Church Bromley, and both events were very successful. Thank you so much for all your prayers and support for our work over the past few months - we have been truly blessed, and I would like to share with you some of those blessings and what we are up to this term.
As a supporter, you will probably know that this year has seen some ups and downs with finances at Spinnaker. It was therefore encouraging for us as a team in September, at the beginning of the new academic year, to know that so many of you consider Spinnaker Christian Schoolswork to be such a vital ministry to schools, children, and the teachers in our community. So much so that we have the funds to carry on! We praise God for his provision and thank everyone who has given so generously to our mission. To those who give…please continue… there is still so much more to be done!
Schools Update
One of our newer team members, Helen, has completed her Spinnaker training and is a welcomed regular visitor now at Elmstead Woods Primary School. She wrote recently ‘It amazes me that in these times of political correctness, Spinnaker still manage to send people into schools to help them provide compulsory “collective worship” time and teach children about Jesus… what an amazing opportunity!’ Helen has led ‘It’s Jesus!’ assemblies on the themes of Jesus Heals, Friendship and Jesus Inspires boldness, after which, during a time of reflection, she was able to share her personal testimony of healing. In a hall full of 300 children – you could hear a pin drop!
Jess has been busy leading worship this term at Trinity CE Primary School, St George’s Bickley, Keston CE Primary School and is also part of the newly formed ‘Spinnaker Southborough Team’. Jess loves to dress up, but she really pushed the (Spinnaker) boat out when she went into schools wearing odd socks for her anti-bullying assemblies. Well done, Jess. What a great way to remind children to be kind to everyone, even though some people might be a bit different.
It has been a joy working at Southborough Primary School this term and co-ordinating the ‘Southborough Team’ consisting of Pastor Paul Flynn from Coppice Community Church, Rev. Rachel Winn from St. Augustine’s Church, and Jess. It’s such a blessing to work together as a team and so much more fun than going solo! It was also a nice treat getting together over coffee to share ideas, plan and pray together.
Paul has been working with me each time we visit Southborough leading the Infant (KS1) and Junior (KS2) assemblies. We had a great time re-enacting the Parable of the Good Samaritan and what it means to be compassionate, as well as other themes. In our last ‘It’s Jesus!’ assembly we talked about how Jesus teaches us to pray. It was a moving experience to see the children, perhaps for the first time in their lives, really understand what prayer is, how they can pray to God, wherever they are, at any time – and what they can pray! At the end of the assembly, Paul prayed for all the children and staff and it was wonderful to chat afterwards with a member of staff who asked us to pray for them. I asked Paul to give me a quote to sum up his experience of working alongside Spinnaker. He said…
“What an opportunity, a joy! How important it is to invest in the future of the young. To get alongside Spinnaker and collaborate with them and celebrate the Gospel getting into schools. To pray and encourage all to engage with a faith for the future. Here I am walking through school for the assemblies today – it’s a God given opportunity and I want to make the most of it. To do it now, as a Minister, and as a member of the local community, and later as a Grandad!”
I also regularly lead worship at St Mark’s CE Bromley, St Nick’s CE Chislehurst, and St Paul’s Cray CE Primary Schools. It was good to be able to support these schools with an ‘It’s Jesus!’ assembly on the importance of remembering before they had their own Remembrance Services. Here is a photo of the Poppy Pots the children at St Mark’s made – aren’t they lovely?
Katie meeting Pastor Adrian Elms (Katie was a guest speaker at Darent Valley Community Church and led an ‘It’s Jesus’ assembly on the Parable of the Lost Sheep.)
An important part of my role as Hub Leader for Bromley is to get to know you and your churches so that we can work together in partnership to fulfil our mission of inspiring children in Bromley to engage with the Christian faith and explore its beliefs and values. I have had the pleasure of attending the Transform Bromley Borough (TBB) prayer breakfasts where I have been able to meet many new faces but if I haven’t met you yet, please come and say hello! We love sharing what we do, so if you’d like me or one of the team to come and talk about the work of Spinnaker at a group or at the church you’re involved with, please contact me.
We are now all preparing for Christmas – such a busy and exciting time in schools and an amazing opportunity for us to shine the light and love of Jesus to everyone. Jess and I will also be helping at St. Augustine’s Church ‘Christmas Journey’, where a number of the local primary schools have been invited to witness the Christmas Story as an interactive experience.
Our SPINNAKER CHRISTMAS cards ‘Journey to Bethlehem’, illustrated beautifully by Sarah Horne, and commissioned for the ‘It’s Jesus’ resource series, are now available to order from our website for all your family and friends. All the proceeds will be going directly to Spinnaker and can be ordered here: www.spinnaker.org.uk/christmascards and if you are reasonably local to our Chislehurst office, we can probably deliver them to you.
Or why not give the gift of SPONSORING AN ASSEMBLY to someone you love this Christmas?www.spinnaker.org.uk/sponsoranassembly
HOT OFF THE PRESS CHRISTMAS PRESENT IDEA………
I am thrilled to announce that Spinnaker Bromley is a Charity Preview Partner with Bromley Little Theatre who have kindly donated tickets to us for 2 of their productions. In November, they allocated tickets to us for their performance of ‘The Incident Room’ which raised £230 for Spinnaker. It was an absolutely fabulous play – and a great night out. We would like to thank our friends at BLT for their generosity. If you would be interested in buying tickets for the 2024 charity evening production of Jane Eyre (directed by Jess) on Thursday 12th September 2024, tickets are £10 each and can be booked via our website:
If you want to keep up to date with Spinnaker Bromley throughout the term, then follow us on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/spinnakerbromley
Finally, thank you for all your support. We wish you a very happy and peaceful Christmas and a New Year full of God’s blessings.
Katie Burtonshaw