Prayer Letter
October 2002

Praying for Crisis Centre Ministries,
its work, staff and clients
in the context of Bristol's inner city areas.

AGM

Our AGM on 7 October went really well. The next Newsletter will include some of the information which was shared. New contacts were made and people envisioned regarding the work. Thank you for your prayers.

Volunteers

We do need more. It seems to me we are always saying this, but that does not mean it isn't true. We need more people to volunteer for the daytime sessions in The Wild Goose (our coffee shop - do you like the name? it's a celtic term meaning the Holy Spirit).

The CCM staff team is already fully stretched - and then some. We are therefore not in a position to take on other areas of work, yet there are important aspects needing attention - fund-raising and a new building. One way forward is for volunteers to be involved. We would need people who are prepared to take on some responsibility in these areas, and we ask that you please pray about this.

Because of the key role of all of our volunteers, it is important that we train, equip and support them. Monthly training courses are happening, 9.45 am start at Trinity Tabernacle. The next two are 9 November (Reaching out) and 11 January (Homelessness). Unfortunately, we are not in a position to remind people of the dates and so numbers can fluctuate considerably. Please pray that the teaching will reach the volunteers (we'd like a volunteer to take responsibility for sending out reminders etc).

LITE

Funding for an Assistant. The Church Urban Fund has promised us half the salary for an assistant for me over a 3 year period. The condition is that we find the other half. Please pray we find someone else who will match the funding.
Next LITE course starts on Monday 25 November 2002. I will be interviewing prospective students on 18, 19, 21 November. Please pray that we will get the right students, who will be committed to the course, day in day out, 3 days a week for 16 weeks.
Thank you, Lord. City of Bristol College have been paying my teaching hours since February this year, which is good news for our Treasurer. The College do want to see value for their money, so it is important that numbers on the course keep up.

Thank you people, for praying,

Andy Luxford

Sam

Sam has asked that you please pray for her, that she will be offered accommodation which will be a home to her.

Bridgehead

Bridgehead is going well. It can be a challenge to handle the personal issues which arise for our clients and between each other. Please pray that we will have wisdom to build church together.

The Wild Goose

Sam is still off sick and we are missing her as well as her work as pastoral care co-ordinator. We are looking for ways to continue to give appropriate pastoral care support to our clients, specifically using the skills of our volunteers. This is an important aspect of our work and we'd appreciate your prayers that we will have the wisdom and resources to appropriately meet the needs of our clients. Catering is the other major aspect of the shop and we are tremendously grateful for the work Jayne is doing. We need to continue to build on this in terms of food hygiene, storage etc and we are putting measures in place to facilitate this. A practical aspect, but very important and we'd appreciate prayer for this too.

Finance

We have been struggling for the last two months and have run into overdraft. Generally our financial position is strong. Please pray for ongoing funding to maintain as well as develop the work. Paying staff salaries is an important part of this.

Prayer

Our next Prayer Meeting will be on 18 November at CCM, 7.30 pm. Please come.

Trudie Lane
14.10.02

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Prayer LetterOctober 2002

AGM