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Dear Friends of Acorn Chaplaincy.

We have some good news to celebrate with you! We are now a registered charity! We received our certificate and charity number 1194419 on May 11th. You can see a few seconds of us celebrating in the garden in the video above. We applied before Christmas and there was quite a lot of work involved so this is great news. 

Team

We have interviewed three great potential volunteer chaplains, who just have DBS checks and training to do and then they’re ready. We are still advertising for more and for group leaders so that we can start in September 5th with two drop in sessions per week and The Recovery Course. Group leaders need personal experience of their own addiction recovery, but chaplains and co-facilitators don’t, just spiritual maturity, listening skills, pastoral care experience and also personal experience of God’s transforming power.

One of the women we support has applied to help with admin. She has relevant experience and we feel that it would be helpful for her recovery too, as long as we are careful not to overload her. Please pray for her and also for Michelle, who brings her personal experience to our Think Tank. Pray for day by day strength and ever increasing maturity in their recovery. Michelle is already an inspiration to many, but the enemy will always try to interfere with that.

Sharon Hawkins, has also been helping with minutes short-term, until we find a regular admin volunteer. Thanks Sharon.  Admin is not my (Tricia) strong point, so I welcome lots of prayer for the Lord to send us people who love it. Also people who love all things digital and “techy” to help us move ahead more quickly, in an organised way and also to get the message out about Acorn Chaplaincy. Feel free dear supporters, to forward this to anyone you think would relish that opportunity.

We also still need a prayer coordinator, as we are snatching people out of the darkness and bringing them to the light so that they can see and walk ahead with confidence. Satan will try and interfere, to hold on to what he had, as we recently experienced on the National Online Recovery course: the two main leaders both had accidents injuring feet/ankles on the same day. So please pray for this person to hear God’s call, for God to open the way for them to commit the time to making prayer a core part of the ministry – someone who has a passion for the church hearing and obeying the voice of God and staying faithful to His priorities, so that his word, both Logos and Rhema is fed into all we do.

Niki has joined Simon and Tricia to make a Social Media team. She brings a lot of experience that we don’t have, as well as a wonderful “can do” enthusiasm and knows the devastation that addiction can bring to families as her beloved found freedom from addiction through Jesus. Ruby joined us for a meeting in Palmerston park.

Training

Mary and Tricia are working on a training programme. Induction is set for June 30th. We will add safeguarding training and addiction training from outside agencies after this. Pray for us as we prepare.

Funding

We haven’t got round to filling in applications yet to trust funds, but hope to get a few done this month. Derek is in the process of opening a proper charity account with the Coop, now that we are a registered charity. Please pray for that to go through smoothly, then supporters can start setting up standing orders. Also Derek will be registering with HMRC so that we can claim gift aid. 
In September Tricia, Alice, Denise, Pip, Hana and Anthony will be running in the ABP 10K around Southampton to raise funds for and awareness of the work of Acorn Chaplaincy. We’ve started training, so please pray for us and for others to join. The bigger the team the more we can raise and get the message out. Pray also for Simon to be blessed as he designs the running shirts.

We need a base

We are exploring with two churches at the moment and could possibly use space in both. There is still some uncertainty about the exact type of space that can be available because of the pandemic related changes. Also Southampton Voluntary Service conducted a survey of how the needs of local charities and their use of buildings may have changed, which could lead to unused space being made available. So do keep praying for the Lord to lead us to the place he wants us to start. 

  • Praise and thanks for our successful registration as a charity and our new volunteers!
  • Pray for the trustees and think tank to make Holy Spirit led decisions
  • For more volunteers, especially Chaplains, Group leaders, Prayer Coordinator and digital support.
  • For a base
  • For the training programme
  • For grace, strength, hope and protection for guests and team.

Thank you so much for your support. Jesus came to “proclaim freedom for prisoners, recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed..” and you are team together with us in this part of His story.
The Acorn Chaplaincy Team