Finance Update November 2022

Financial Update November 2022

Encouraging Signs - Financial Update November 2022

In April 2022 the Trustees wrote to regular members of West Wilts Vineyard regarding finances and giving. After a difficult season with the pandemic, regular giving was down and expenditure exceeded income. The Trustees anticipated that the general fund* reserves would be depleted by the end of May 2022. Throughout the pandemic, the Senior Pastors (Formally Jason and Sam Whiley) and Trustees were committed to good stewardship and continued investment in the Kingdom of God.

We are delighted to be able to update you with good news for the last six months (May-Oct 2022).

• Regular giving and givers have increased steadily (6.5k - 7.7k per month).

• Salary expenditure has reduced slightly (8.4k - 6.4k per month).

• Hire income has increased.

• Ad-hoc donations have totalled over 30k.

The result is that income from regular giving now exceeds regular expenditure in the general fund. Combined with significant ad-hoc donations and an increase in hire income, we are on the way to rebuilding reserves which will enable us to continue to be effective in resourcing the Kingdom of God through Vineyard in West Wiltshire.

Thank you to all of you who are giving, or have given, financially (however large or small) to the work at WWV. Especially if you have started to give regularly in the last six months or given an ad-hoc donation; whether you give your time, talents or resources, we are hugely thankful for your partnership in seeking first the Kingdom of God.

Discipleship is about following Jesus every day. WWV is a community that gathers around the person of Jesus, with the purpose of the Father, empowered by the presence of the Holy Spirit. We want to equip everyone at WWV to seek first the kingdom of God. Living generously, even in tough times, is part of that discipleship journey. Your regular and ad-hoc giving to the general funds helps us to do the ordinary things that resource you for kingdom living.

Be encouraged:

• new people are continuing to show up at WWV

• people continue to give their time, talents and resources

• new people are discovering what it means to follow Jesus

• together we are responding to the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit.

We will continue to provide regular financial updates and are planning our next AGM in late spring 2023.

Thank you!

Mark and Meg Searle - Senior Pastors and the Trustees. November 2022.

*These figures do not include Storehouse, which, while part of West Wilts Vineyard, has its own restricted fund. This means that external donors can be confident that funds given to the Storehouse are used for the Storehouse. The Storehouse reserves have continued to be healthy. Operating costs for the Storehouse, including staff costs, are paid from the Storehouse restricted fund.

Pray-fully Locally

WWV is a church which seeks to serve a wide geographical area and is made up of lovely people like you, however we also know that the gospel is for everyone and hopefully you are excited about sharing that wonderful message, like me.

I think we all realise that it is going to take prayer to change our area and Martin Scoitt in his book ‘Sowing Seeds for Revival’ suggests we should invest some time into learning about the places we live; we should find out its history and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal His heart for our towns and villages. This is sometimes called ‘Spiritual Mapping’. Victor Lorenzo says that spiritual mapping combines research, divine revelation and confirmatory evidence in order to provide complete and exact data concerning the identitiy, strategies and methods employed by spiritual forces of darkness to influence the people and churches in a given region.

I live in Bradford on Avon and have spent some time looking at our town’s history and began to pray into what God might want to do here. I would love to invite other towns and villages to do a similar thing and to then share their research and impressions so that we can collectively start to pray for God to break through into our area. If this is something you would like to do I am happy to share the document I have put together for BOA and to give you any support I can.

I’m new to all of this but sense it could be an exciting journey to embark on. Do email me here and I will respond ASAP.

Jez

Come Holy Spirit Vineyard's National Worship Gathering 2023

WWV are going, more info here

A Message from the Trustees

We would like to express our heartfelt thanks to Alastair Morgan who has stepped down as a Trustee of West Wilts Vineyard after nine years of faithful service. Throughout this time, he has consistently remained an active member of the board and has been involved in some of the most critical decisions the Trustees have had to make; including the move  into Emmanuel’s Yard, navigating the challenges of Covid and the lengthy recruitment process required for the new Senior Pastors. In particular, he was integral to the planning, development and implementation of the full IT structure at Emmanuel’s Yard including the phone system, Wi-Fi, media and PA. We have deeply appreciated his gentle, thoughtful and supportive presence throughout this time and his skills related to IT particularly have been a Godsend for our infrastructure and communication and he will continue to be involved in our IT.  Thank you, Alastair, we’re going to miss you as a Trustee!

The All Wrapped Up campaign will be closing on 1 December ...

Our ‘All Wrapped Up’ Christmas campaign has launched

Storehouse Foodbank is looking to provide 75 or more families with all they need for a fresh and wholesome Christmas dinner. We are partnering with our local supermarkets to ensure that nominated families in our area can have a hot meal on Christmas day. We would love for you to help us achieve this by purchasing one of the following options:

COMPLETE HAMPER £65 you can gift a family a complete hamper that includes a voucher for one of our local supermarkets for our families to choose their favourite Christmas foods; we will also provide a Christmas goodie bag to include fun items such as pudding, custard, mince pies and crackers.

ICELAND VOUCHER £25

SUPERMARKET VOUCHER £25

GOODY BAG £15

You can donate £25 to purchase a voucher for the main hamper or £15 to buy a selection of Christmas trimmings, including Christmas pudding, custard and mince pies for the goody bags.

So that we can ensure that our nominated families have all they need in time for Christmas, this campaign will close on Monday December 5th.

Click HERE for more information and to donate.

Cost of living BBC article featuring the Storehouse Foodbank

This week the BBC West team spent the day with our Community Action team, spending time in the Storehouse, Refresh and Community lunch. They got to see a little bit of the amazing work that the team has been putting in and highlighting the issues around cost of living going up.

Well done Jill and the team!