In previous articles I have talked about the financial predicament of the church I am the pastor of in Plymouth. But now I write from a much better place.

So far the redundancy has been rescinded and reissued twice, and at the next Members Meeting that is likely to happen again. At present February is my current last month, but that is likely to be put back. The reason: three churches from the South West Baptist Association area have given financially; the church has started to respond financially and things are turning around.

Later this month we have four baptisms, and we have five people coming into membership in the autumn. God clearly has plans that go beyond ours.

For all the excitement, we are not out of the woods yet. But what we need is not money, but people. This will enable us to support ourselves financially but also to do the work that will enable us to make more inroads into the growing local community. Is this not the problem of every church?

For the time being though, we have the opportunity to find those people and start to become stable long term, but we could not have done that without the short term help from some very generous churches in our Association.

So I would like to say a big thank you to all those who have prayed and sent messages of support over the last six months, thank you!