Dates for your Diary

Nov 6th 10am Sunday worship Rev John WhittonNov 7th Extra Elders meeting The Hub

Nov 12th Church Clean – up day 9am start Nov 13th 10am Remembrance service

at St Albans Joint service

Nov 15th Quiet Time 2.30pm Church Nov 16th Elders meeting The HubNov 19th Wessex Synod Gathering High Cross, Camberley

Nov 20th 10am Sunday Worship Julie Young

Nov 26th Beacon Hill Concert 7.30pm start

Nov 27th 10am Sunday worship 2.30-5pm Beacon Hill

Christmas market

Revd Ruth Dillon

Dec 3rd Advent Quiet Day Rev Ruth Dillon Dec 4th 10am Sunday worship Rev John Whitton Dec 8th Nursery School Nativity 2pm In Church Dec 11th 10am Carols and Christingle

Followed by Christmas lunch Rev Ruth Dillon

Dec 13th Quiet Time Revd Ruth DillonDec 18th 10am Sunday worship John WhittonDec 19th 2pm Whitmore Vale carol service

7.30pm St Albans carol service The churchSt Albans

Dec 25th Christmas Day service Maggie Bridget

Beacon Hill United Reformed Church

We are a welcoming congregation, showing God’s love to all and serving our local community

The New Messenger

November / December 2016

Churt Road, Beacon Hill,

Hindhead Surrey GU26 6NL

Telephone :- 01428 606711www.beaconhillurc.wordpress.com

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From the Manse…………November/December 2016

It is part of a minister’s lot, I suppose, to have to anticipate the various seasons and festivals of the Christian year, and so it is that I am writing this letter for the Christmas magazine just before Remembrance Sunday. I have already been thinking about the seven Carol services that I will be undertaking in

December, and it is s till only October!It is unfortunate that in the final three months of the year we often call ‘the run up to Christmas’, and even Advent, a time for waiting, preparing and expectation is swallowed up by pre-Christmas events. I entirely understand that schools for instance, should want a Christmas celebration before term ends; but I fear the desire to start the Christmas build-up so early is a sign that, as a society, we are not good at waiting. The world has become a very impatient place. We move from one supermarket checkout queue to another in an attempt to get served more quickly, only to discover that the first queue was moving more quickly after all! Try sticking to a rigid 30 miles an hour in a speed limit area, and you’ll soon become aware of people desperate to overtake, so that they can reach the next red traffic light three seconds before you do! Of course, the revolution in information technology encourages us to expect a very rapid response in all our communications. So we become less used to having to wait. I feel we are in danger of losing the importance of the present moment; of being alert as to what is going on around us; of really stopping to listen to other people and being sensitive to them, of enjoying the here and now rather than rushing on towards the next thing.

If this is how we sometimes live, what chance has God of being allowed in to our hearts or ‘getting a word in edgeways’? Christmas demands a time of preparation and ‘waiting’ if we are to take seriously the need to be challenged by God coming among us, in the babe of Bethlehem, Jesus. We all know the uneasy feeling, perhaps even panic, when a guest turns up too early for a meal or meeting and we wish we had given ourselves more preparation time. A visit can be truly spoiled in that way. This Christmas Day, William, Hannah and me, will be sharing our Christmas dinner with a large group of lonely people, who would otherwise be alone. It was planned in September, however in planning early, we may be able to share the joy with others on Christmas Day. So even though you are reading this in November, may we all make time to be ready for the coming of Jesus at Christmas, by asking whether we are prepared for his demands, for what he expects from us his disciples, and being attentive to the present moment when he might challenge us and expect a response from us in life’s many ordinary situations. May I wish you all a very happy and blessed Christmas and all good wishes for 2017.Every Blessing Ruth

Christmas Prayer of the month

Two years running, Tom Hanks received the Oscar for “Best Actor” - in 1993 for his role in “Philadelphia”, and in 1994 for “Forrest Gump”. A line that he repeats as Forrest Gump is to say that “life is like a box of chocolates.” We can focus on “Quality Street”

chocolates as we think of our own character. The green triangle of chocolate. On the seashore we never see pebbles of this shape because, of course, any sharp edges are knocked off by others in the sea. Do I have any

sharp edges to my character - do I get at people, annoy them? Do I make fun of others? Yet still there is good in the person that this might represent. This is good solid chocolate, but I need to knock off some of my sharp edges. Those edges - the negative things - tend to be knocked off when I really share my life with others, as we see in the round toffee cup. I become more WHOLE as a person, more rounded in character, keeping life in balance, living life peacefully one day at a time.

Fudge - the paper comes off quietly, so this is the one to take if you’re trying to sneak an extra one out of the box when no-one’s looking! As there is a lot of sugar in fudge, so

this individual has great richness within - a lot to offer

others. People are the richer for having been with this person - the one who always smiles and forgives; the person who often speaks a word of encouragement and support; the one who is generous in doing something they’d rather not do. These people will make the world a better place for having walked in it.

The purple hazelnut in caramel - a little showy, flashy on the outside. I have two wrappings - maybe to protect or hide my real self. Maybe I don’t want anyone to know what I am really like

deep inside - because, deep within… here is a nut! The coconut. 10 minutes after eating this, you find little bits of coconut between your teeth - something more to chew over. Maybe I am like this coconut - a challenging person because I leave

things for others to think about, to “chew over”. These people leave a little of themselves wherever they go: that compliment that really encourages someone; passing the joy of a contagious smile to another.

Strawberry. I might appear quite firm on the outside, perhaps giving the impression that I’m a little difficult to know at first, maybe rather shy. Inside there’s something very special: a quiet

person who gets on with life peacefully; a gentle character, happy with who I am; a person who quietly brings support and healing to those who are hurt; one who shows others how special they are.

Orange. This melts in your mouth if you let it, but some people find dark chocolate a little sickly, too. But why am I saying “BUT”?

If I set out to look for negative things in others, I will find them. If I “LOOK” for the good - the quality - in other people, then I will come to see so much good around me. That “WAY OF LOOKING” (which should mark out a Christian school) - that “way of seeing” - will affect my whole life. Setting out each morning to look for the good in others will bring peace in my heart and a smile on my face throughout the day!

The brown caramel. This is the one you find in your pocket a week after putting it there! It’s been squashed a bit, but it doesn’t go “gooey” in the pocket. It is firm: a solid character, faithful, trusting, accepting others for who they are, a true friend through good times and bad.

It’s a great compliment to be told that you are a friend on whom others can rely.

Maybe I am one of these yellow caramels - normally left to the last in our house. Do I sometimes feel a bit left out of things, feel

that I’m not as popular as others? The last one to be chosen for something? And yet Jesus said that the way of his Kingdom is that “the first will be last”; that the ‘insignificant ones’ are the important ones - the sparrows, the sinner, the lost coin, and Zacchaeus (the tax-collector whom people thought little but who was great, and walked tall in God’s eyes). And even if I don’t think too much of myself, there is One who tells me that he “has written my name on the palm of his hands”, as though I am the only one that exists. Quality Street are all different: they would not be Quality Street if they were all the same. And when I come to meet the Maker of all this QUALITY, he will not ask me: “Why

weren’t you Mother Teresa?” He will be asking me if I have grown as the person he called me to be. We are not called to try to make people into something that they are not, but to invite people to be and to grow as who they already are. Let us be people of quality! Let us do the ordinary things of life in an extraordinary way! We hope to see a street-cleaner collecting rubbish in the same committed way that Shakespeare wrote poetry! Let us make extraordinary use of our ordinary talents, because we are all called to be FULLY ALIVE, to be saints of God. PrayerThank you, Lord, for making us people of quality. We pray that we may use our gifts well and not keep them unused, unwrapped, because a gift is no good unless it is shared. We thank you that we are people of quality whom your hands have made. May you be blessed forever! Amen.

Quiet Time The monthly Prayer group will meet on the following dates at 2.30pm in the Church at Beacon Hill Tuesday 15th November Tuesday 13th DecemberCome and join us for 30mins of quiet meditation and prayer followed by a cup pf tea.

Minister’s comings and goings

Annual leave, October 28th-5th November Annual leave November 20th - 22nd

.Church Tea Party

May I thank everyone who helped to make our Church Tea Party on September 7th such an overwhelming success.Sybil and Diana arranged tables, food presentation and managed to keep everyone’s cup of tea full!!

By the end of the afternoon, most of the mouth-watering delicacies had vanished and our church funds had increased by an amazing £210, no one was more surprised than me.Thank you once again to everyone who helped me plan it, and particularly those who supported it on the day and helped achieve such an outstanding financial result. Michael Orchard

Philip Le Fanu, ‘Part 3’- Calais

You become so concerned about the refugees’ plight that you start to forget you are only one man.

There was very little I could do in the grand scheme of things. This fact was hard to swallow. Many of us ended up working ridiculous hours to maximise our impact. You forget that you have a duty towards yourself. If you’re not in good shape, you get less done, and eventually crash. One of us, after working for a month in a donation distribution point on site, told me he had become completely desensitised to other people’s problems. I told him to get out of Calais as soon as possible, before a full-scale burn-out took hold. Ignore this advice at your peril. After my burn-out in November, I spent three weeks crawling around at home, my sleep tormented by crippling thoughts and images. When I returned back to Calais, I chose to work in the warehouse and all but stopped visiting the Jungle, as it was ever more unsettling. The longer you spend in this kind of place, the more real and inescapable it becomes.

The refugees don’t want to be in Calais. Locals don’t want refugees. If the border to England was opened, it would at least solve one of those problems, as the refugees would reach their destination. You can interpret the situation as you like, but, at the end of the day, by shutting the border, we are simply dumping the problem on France. The locals are understandably angry at the UK government. We are taking advantage of the fact that we happen to be an island. Don’t think for a moment that this is anything to do with the ‘common good’.

People in the UK are generally unaware of the fact that someone cannot seek asylum here without entering the country illegally. The asylum centre in Calais was decommissioned over ten years ago. I’ve met unaccompanied children in the Jungle whose entire family is in England, but they are stuck. It seems that so long as there’s no media coverage, the government simply doesn’t care.

I’ve been listening to ‘Money Trees’ by Kendrick Lamar on repeat since I left Calais. They could do with a few money trees in the Jungle. Migrants have to pay a people smuggler several thousand pounds to get an almost guaranteed passage to England.  Every now and again one of my mates makes it through. I see a picture of them in front of a British landmark on facebook.

I also keep listening to ‘Swimming Pools’ by Kendrick Lamar, in which he meditates on his relationship with alcohol. I stopped drinking a few weeks ago. I don’t know if the way alcohol affected me took a turn after my stint in Calais. It seemed to have changed from an infrequent source of relaxation, to an essential coping mechanism. A lot of the refugees would visit the bars, (marquees with speakers), that some of them had set up within the camp. When your family are inaccessible or dead, alcohol can provide a welcome comfort. Through strobe lighting you’d see lone men rocking on chairs sipping beer. The vast majority of the refugees were Muslim, and some had never touched alcohol before they arrived.

Several well-known figures visited the camp during my time. Jeremy Corbyn and Jude Law are the two that come to mind, but there were more. I always seemed to be on a day-off when they pitched up. Neneh Cherry helped out for several days in the kitchen where I was working. I had no idea who she was. I hadn’t even heard the name before. But I guess I wouldn’t have treated her any different if I had been a big fan.

In Calais, every volunteer was the same – a human being that wanted to help other human beings. Everyone crowded into the warehouse at one o clock for a group lunch – vegetarian of course. On Saturdays and Sundays there would sometimes be two hundred present. People bonded for an hour and often never saw each other again. Most of us had lives at home we had to get back to.

I guess it is inevitable that the Jungle will get completely destroyed. If there’s anything you can count on with French people, it’s their obsession with cleanliness. They see the Jungle as an eye sore. Of course, barely any of the locals have actually bothered to visit it. The presence of a load of refugees miles away from the town centre probably has very little real impact on their lives. But anything foreign to blame all their problems on is welcome.

The irony is, the refugees were generally far more friendly than most Brits and French people I’ve interacted with in my life. I’d happily live alongside them, and deport everyone grumpy and self-righteous

who rants about how awful their life is because the council only collect their bins every two weeks now instead of every week. Nation is an abstract concept. The older British generations seem to be clinging to every remaining piece of out-dated pseudo-loyalty. When they’ve passed away in twenty years time, everyone might look around and wonder what all the fuss was about. I have lots of foreign friends and I don’t see them as particularly ‘different’ from us.

The refugees would often ask you why the UK doesn’t want them. It was probably the most uncomfortable I’ve ever felt. What do you say? You try to change the subject as quickly as possible. You don’t understand any better than they do. However much you try to persuade them that attempting to enter the UK is fruitless, they always endeavour. New migrants arrive in Calais every day. It’s a one way street. Don’t think for a moment that demolishing the Jungle will dissuade anyone. The remainder of the camp will soon be destroyed, but whilst this might end a chapter, the book is far from finished. I feel it won’t be finished for decades.

Whether I meet up with any of the Calais volunteers again remains to be seen. In a way, I want to cut off all connection to the place. We will have a special bond that I don’t have with anyone else. We’ll be on the same page. Then again, we will possess the same sadness. We will have seen horrors that most others at our end of the world haven’t. Spending time with each other is in one respect indulgence in something that

might be best left buried. I yearn for the sense of unity we had, but life moves on.

Perhaps the most lasting effect of my time in Calais will be a change in attitude towards money. A year ago, anxiety about avoiding an empty bank account pervaded my thoughts. Now, my ethos is that money comes and goes. Unless you’re up to your neck in debt, the number that appears when you check your balance won’t make a big difference to your life. As long as you have your basic physical needs met, you can’t have much cause for complaint. The penny dropped when I realised that the Sudanese guys in the camp, whose futures couldn’t be more uncertain, were more relaxed about life than I was. Ask them at any time of day how they were doing, their answer would be the same. They’d prop their head up in a dignified fashion and say ‘I’m FINE’. Some of them made brilliant banter. Once I was carrying out a distribution, where the refugees would line up to receive donations, and a Sudanese chap came up to me and asked whether he could skip the queue. ‘Go to the end of the line’ I said. He said, ‘But line is long’.

When I come home from Calais, I get bombarded with questions about it. I do my best to describe the situation, but you really have to go there to understand what is going on. There’s really not much point reading what’s in the papers.

Comment

Philip, Thank you so much for the insightful, honest, poignant and personal description you have written in the Messenger about your time in Calais, especially as the camp has now been dismantled. May God bless you and know that this journey you have taken has not been in vain. You are sharing your experience and that means that attitudes will be changed. Ruth

Beacon Hill Post office update The meeting held in September was well

attended by all members of the community, and the people of Beacon Hill voted

unanimously to support the proposed relocation of the Post Office in the Hub. An article was written by Jenny for the Hazelmere Herald, where the Mayor of Haslemere is also supporting the relocation. The next meeting will be held in January at the church, and hopefully we should have more information from the representative at the Post office.

Advent Quiet Day Advent Quiet Day on Saturday 3rd December 10-4pm.

It will be an opportunity to reflect on the coming of Christ at Christmas. The Theme is the Scent of Love. Cost £10. Lunch included.

Please see Hub for details

 Duty Elders November December

6th Hugh Le Fanu 4th John Harris 13th St Albans Joint service 11th Christine Dean20th Jenny Radford 18th Michael Orchard27th Michael Orchard 25th Hugh Le Fanu

. Autumn Prayer from Michael Orchard, (which he read before the Elders meeting in October)

Lord, we thank you for the opportunity of meeting here together. We cannot help but wonder at the rich autumn days,trees transformed into beautiful colours, seasonal fruits, vegetables and nuts in abundance, clear blue skies and that nip in the air that makes a walk so enjoyable , all created by you and to date never surpassed by us.

We thank you, but ask that you will comfort and bless those who wake each day to Uncertainty and gloom,shortage of food and little or no water to drink and wash , no permanent home with a warmth and security that goes with it,poor health and the threat of being moved on.

These are your people, many unable to live in their own country because of war and political instability, and so we entrust them into your loving arms that they may find a place to call home, and enjoy the quality of life we often take for granted.

We also remember the people of Aberfan in Wales who still feel the loss of a generation of primary school children fifty years after a coal tip engulfed the school. May they know you are always there to give them the strength and courage and overcome their loss. We these things in your name, Amen

Christmas Crackers What does Santa suffer from if he gets stuck in a chimney?Claustrophobia!

What do they sing at a snowman's birthday party?Freeze a jolly good fellow

Why does Santa have three gardens?So he can 'ho ho ho'! What kind of motorbike does Santa ride? A Holly Davidson!

What do you get if you cross Santa with a duck? A Christmas Quacker!

What is the best Christmas present in the world?A broken drum, you just can't beat it!