Marion's induction celebrated in Hyde

An afternoon of joy, worship, thanksgiving, commitment and fun heralds the arrival of the Revd Marion Pengelly-Phillips as the new minister of the United Church, Hyde, writes Stephen Cornish  

Saturday 24 September was a great day at the United Church, Hyde.

The church is a joint Baptist and URC congregation, and the event was to celebrate the arrival of the Revd Marion Pengelly-Phillips as the church’s new full-time Baptist minister, and to induct her into the pastorate.

The church was well-filled with more than 80 in the congregation, including the church’s own membership and visitors from Marion’s former church, along with support from other local churches in the Hyde area.

The preacher was the Revd Tim Presswood, the Transitional Regional Minister of the North West Baptist Association. It was good that the Revd Stuart Nixon was able to represent the URC on the day, because Stuart spent a year of his ministerial training at Hyde, and has been a great friend and supporter of the church ever since.

The service was actually led by the church’s own lay-preaching team, with contributions from the Trustees and the young people, and the singing was led by the worship group. The afternoon was a great time of joy, worship, thanksgiving, commitment... and fun! Yes, an induction really can be fun, and we think that God will have smiled at quite a lot of what went on! Then, the following weekend, Marion’s husband Bob was received into membership.

But of course it is about so much more than just one great afternoon. It was a great afternoon, yes, but the church really believes that the day marked the start of something big. Marion’s young granddaughters actually set the scene as they started the service with a lively rendering of “Build Your Kingdom” and this is the call to which Marion had responded: to work with a small but determined church to build God’s Kingdom in all sorts of ways, to make church properly relevant to the people who at the moment feel that neither the church nor God is relevant in their lives.

Stephen Cornish is secretary at the United Church, Hyde