Introducing Julia...

Dear...gosh, how do I address you?...Future Friends,

Sue honoured me by announcing my arrival at St Matthew’s in her last newsletter alongside the wonderful advent message of Jesus’ arrival to this world! It quickly made me reflect on humble beginnings and mixed expectations, and the years of living and learning that Jesus did before his short but transforming ministry.

And I wonder where God is calling me, Julia, to fit into His plan for His Church as an ordained minister? Believe me, from where I stand now it seems like He is placing a daunting task upon a very, very ordinary person!! Let me tell you a little bit about that ‘ordinariness’.

I moved from my Northamptonshire childhood home to London in 1974 to train in physiotherapy. After qualifying I married Tony and we have lived, and I have worked, in various places in Hillingdon ever since. So I’m beginning to feel like a local! We have two children, Joanna and William, both in their early 20s, working and saving hard to fly the nest one day.

For nearly all these years we have worshipped at St John the Baptist Hillingdon, except for a four year ‘sabbatical’ at St Andrew’s, Uxbridge, some nine years ago where I first felt called to priesthood. St John’s has been a wonderful training ground where I have received much love, support and encouragement and I’ve learned to recognise how God used me through leading worship and home groups, prayer ministry, preaching and music group.

FactFile Name: Julia Sheffield Age: 21 (+) Born: In Northamptonshire Marital Status: Married to Tony 2 adult children, Joanna & William Occupation: Physiotherapist Current Church: St John the Baptist, Hillingdon

I now wonder how God is going to use me at St Matthew’s. I must tell you that I had a sense of call to Yiewsley over a year ago when I discovered that your Co-op supermarket was a wonderfully peaceful place to food shop for Christmas. We’ve shopped there ever since! My work in the community and in the Health Centre has already brought me into touch with many local people and homes, and I realised that I had a growing sense of affinity for the area. So it came as no surprise to me when, in September, Bishop Pete asked me to look at St Matthew’s as a training parish.

Of course ‘training’ is the operative word; it’s two-way thing. God is bringing me and my various ‘gifts’ to you, but only because He knows you, and Sue, have got much to teach me. That’s what excites me (alongside the knee-quaking nervousness of being a newly ordained deacon), the prospect of discovering God working in a different place, through different people, and us becoming new companions in our journey of faith.

I wish you all a very blessed and peaceful New Year, and look forward enormously to meeting you all in July.

My love and best wishes,

Julia

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