New Chair of New District Revd Rachel Deigh

The beginning of the Methodist year saw the new West Midlands Methodist District (the amalgamation of the Birmingham District and the Wolverhampton and Shrewsbury District,) formally initiated at a Service at Walsall Methodist Central Hall. The Service also welcomed the new Chair of the District Revd Rachel Deigh, who will Co-Chair alongside the former Birmingham District Chair Revd Novette Headley.

The changes herald a new era for the Circuits and church members, not only in the new geographical boundaries but in the ways the new District will operate and how staff, church members and congregations will work together. A future of working for God in partnership was very much the central theme of the Service.

Weaving and threads being woven together analogised the vision for the District which will create opportunities to use resources more creatively, stop practices that are no longer appropriate to the changed and changing church and find new ways to work God's mission within, without and around the church. At the Service, church members representing the twenty Circuits (320 churches,) gave strips of ribbon that they had brought along, to be woven together during the Service as a physical recognition of this. Readings from Nehemiah 8: 1-3, 5-6, 8-10, Philippians 2: 1-13 and John 15:1-11 reinforced aspects of our individual gifts, talents and purposes, our differences, diversity and our collective calling, which underpin the vision for the West Midlands Methodist District to be a growing, evangelistic, justice-seeking and inclusive church without walls.

The full Service can be viewed on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctiblKxAF7A

Further information on the West Midlands Methodist District is available on the website at: West Midlands Methodist District | Home