This month, UCAN’s flagship “Cutting Edge” conference was streamed live from St. Saviour’s Church in Guildford. Over 80 delegates joined us from the comfort of their own homes and offices, watching live sessions and accessing on-demand content.

Wisdom, support, practical know-how… and this last month, laughs galore were all are to be found on the UCAN Forum (hosted on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/UCANForum/ ).

These notes list ten points that fair, perceptive, generous church members tell me they long to see in their Minister. The list might well be pondered by all Christians and is designed to shed light and provide practical ideas, not to induce guilt.

Note: interest in this specialist article may be limited to Church of England churches. It has been written for Patrons but also for PCCs, Administrators guiding their church through a vacancy, and clergy needing to brush up on the system.

It describes the patronage process from the Patron’s perspective and presents it as a drama in two acts with five scenes each. There is also a cast list and a number of scenery backdrops. The idea is to make the patronage process interesting!

Everything in the right order……God, people, task – a reminder we may need from time to time!

In less than one 24hr period, two friends and a bible daily reading App had all independently sent me the same verses of Scripture:

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths”.

Proverbs 3:5-6, NIV

That was such an encouragement because there were significant and challenging work decisions looming that I needed a reminder to trust God in, and with. But I almost went ‘thanks that’s encouraging’ and moved on. Then a third friend sent me the same verse the next day saying, “I think the Lord wants to highlight this for your Jules”. That made me take time out to sit, read the verses, think about their context, and ask God what he was trying to get my attention on.

We’re really excited about the opportunity to see each other, in person again. This month we’re aware that some of our local groups have been gathering to meet and our two ’Managing Church Well’ cohorts are busy planning their next in person meet-ups for July.

The conference platform is up and running, road-tested and raring to go, packed with 4 keynotes, live Q&A and breakout rooms, accompanying on demand seminars, and a fun social evening involving a kitchen cupboard (?!).

80 UCAN+ subscribers joined us and Douglas Mullen from Anthony Collins Solicitors for an employment briefing for churches. Free for all UCAN+ subscribers, Jules Morgan opened with a spiritual tonic, followed by Doug guiding us through a number of employment principles and updates that churches need to be aware of. A live Q&A session helped churches ask direct questions, and break-out rooms enabled delegates to follow up some of the issues raised.

This month we’re talking about our staff. In Exodus 17:11 we read:

11 As long as Moses held up the staff in his hand, the Israelites had the advantage. But whenever he dropped his hand, the Amalekites gained the advantage.

Here we have a picture of Moses being instructed by God to uphold his staff as he surveyed the battle before him. It was a physical sign of Moses being visible, watching, and prayerfully upholding the Israelite army before God. Moses’ role was not to be fighting, but to be looking out for the men who rallied to his call. It was a spiritual relationship between a team and its captain; between crew and pilot; between a community and its leader who was following God.

Whether you are a Minister or CEO moving on, an employee who is leaving, or a volunteer handing over a major responsibility, it makes good sense to prepare a ‘handover paper’ of some kind to help your successor get off to a great start.

If your church employs paid staff the Trustees are legally responsible for their selection, employment and management. But most Trustees fail to appreciate this. So the advice here is to appoint a specialist group to take on this role on behalf of the legal employers as delegated responsibility.