Proposal for Claire Luhman to be Student Pastor with Responsibility for Children’s and Youth Work
This document is intended to highlight the need for a pastor with special responsibility for Children and Youth work at West Leigh Baptist Church and Claire’s suitability for that role. As a basis for this document we have used the proposals Grahame Tosh generated following the review work he undertook as Elder for Children and Youth. As Grahame achieved much of what he hoped we will concentrate on the areas not yet achieved as well as adding some of our own.
- Encourage the Brigades as our principle point of entry for those children outside the church.
Work has begun on this as our brigade has been selected by GB nationally in partnership with Juliet Kilpin as a role model for outreach via brigade work. This will involve considerable work planning new events and evaluation of current practices and will need someone central to both church leadership and youth work to really see this work through. Claire is obviously in the best position to do this.
- Consider the concept of a non-church youth group.
As we already know at West Leigh, this is vital and potentially exhausting work. Expecting church kids to form links with those outside and effectively “do” the evangelism is, in our view, unrealistic. However, if there was a Pastor whose main emphasis was Youth work then they could be a very strategic person in making links between a youth group and the Church. Claire could also play a major role in the support and encouragement of those working in this area of youth work.
- Develop teaching opportunities for present and future leaders.
The pastoral care of our teaching staff at West Leigh is, we feel, something that could be developed further. These people give up many hours to do what they do and often miss out on their own spiritual food as a result. We should be nurturing them and developing their calling. Having a pastor who is responsible for this would be a good way forward in investing in our junior church staff as well as others working with children and young people.
- Develop Opportunities of Worship for Children, Young People and those with Learning Difficulties
Opportunities for Children, Young People and Young Adults with learning difficulties would provide access to the church for many people in the wider community, as well as expressing care for those who are already linked to West Leigh. Furthermore, we do not at present provide special care in any area of the church’s life for those with learning difficulties, something that has been on several peoples’ hearts for some time. To provide something of high quality will take time, preparation in terms of training, and someone with enough time to oversee development in this area properly.
- Changing the Standard Church Service.
This is a work in progress, as Church Council will be discussing the evening services over the summer. If we are to provide something meaningful for our children and young people the role of a youth pastor with up to date training and ideas will be very important, and, could have a very positive effect on our whole congregation as we learn to tailor different services to different needs more effectively.
- Co-ordinate teaching material to avoid duplication.
Whilst this a desirable and achievable goal without a youth pastor, it seems to us that having a pastor who is central to the vision and strategy of the church leadership co-ordinating the vision and teaching of the junior church, and perhaps other areas of our children’s and youth work makes perfect sense.
- Foster and develop links with the Community.
This could be a very important part of Claire’s role. We would hope to see her forging links with local schools, organising holiday clubs and perhaps looking at new ventures such as after school clubs.
This covers all of Grahame’s outstanding proposals and at least one further area. However we would like to add some further thoughts to this proposal.
- West Leigh has a significant history of appointing and overseeing the training of those called to ministry from its membership. We have done this with both John Stannard and Peter Dominey and hopefully will have the vision to do the same with Claire.
- At West Leigh we have a wonderful heritage of outstanding youth and children’s work. We feel we need to honour and value that work by giving it the supervision, vision and manpower it deserves. If we can achieve all that we have without the benefit of a pastor responsible for children’s and youth work, what more could we be seeing God doing if we were to really invest in this area of our church life?
- One of the exciting thoughts that has been recurring at West Leigh initially with the appointment of Lisa Kerry has been the concept of a team ministry. We are and want to continue to be a growing church. In order for that to be the case we will need to provide structures to enable and maintain further growth.
When Steve was appointed nearly 11 years ago it was with the intention of appointing at least another half-time pastor to work with him. For a three year period when Peter Dominey worked with us this half-time intention was realised. However, when Peter left to start ChurchFromScratch we continued to support Peter through giving to CFS. Our commitment to CFS concluded last year. We are grateful that Lisa’s appointment, at this point, is not a significant cost to the church. This should therefore now put us in sight of appointing a second minister to work among us.
Why Claire?
Church council have met and prayed with Claire and Clive regarding this proposal. We believe that Claire’s track record of effective youth and children’s work speaks for itself. We also regard it as evidence of God’s hand at work that the need for the role to be filled (the job specification) and the person herself (the person specification) have come together in a timely way.
The cost:
Following guidelines from Spurgeon’s and The Baptist Union, we estimate that the total cost per annum would be about £25,000 inclusive (this covers half-stipend, pension contribution, housing allowance, national insurance contributions and estimated travel costs).
However, the surplus income from 2007 (which we have not assigned to anything other than the start-up for the charity shop) could cover most of the initial costs for this current year from September. The cost for future years could then be included in the budget for those years.
We will also need to be committed as a church to praying for and supporting Claire in her training and in the development of her ministry.
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