My church

Alan Reedie, an elder with Gillespie Memorial Church, Dunfermline, describes how the church has become family.

SYLVIA and I came to Dunfermline in 1971 and looked round for a church.

We tried several before deciding on Gillespie. Why Gillespie? A difficult question to answer but it was from day one where we felt ‘at home’. If anything, it was the choir that helped us choose as Dunfermline was blessed with several good churches at that time.

Gillespie is a town centre church and has always been regarded as an evangelical church. Perhaps in many ways it can’t be regarded as a typical Church of Scotland – if there is such a thing!

After a short time we found ourselves leading and teaching in the Sunday Schools – something which we did for over 20 years. About a year after taking on this role I was invited to become an elder and was privileged to accept this invitation. (At that time the Session was some 60 strong!)

Sylvia and I also set up the telephone prayer chain which has been superseded and is now the email prayer chain. We also introduced Our Daily Bread daily Bible readings/notes which are still used by several members of the congregation.

Gillespie’s evangelical tradition is exemplified further by the number of folks, even during my time in Gillespie, who have gone overseas as missionaries – to Sikkim, Nepal, India, Israel, Sierra Leone, and Canada, and add to this the folk who have gone into full time ministry. Before my time in Gillespie, D P Thomson was minister and he went on to become the Church of Scotland evangelist, starting St Ninian’s in Crieff and then the offshoot in Edinburgh.

“ About a year after taking on this role I was invited to become an elder and was privileged to accept this invitation.

As with all churches, we have experienced times of growth but also times of difficulty. After we came out of a period of Interim Moderatorship we were blessed to be able to call our current minister and pastor, Mike Weaver, and to be able to welcome him and the Weaver family to Gillespie and to Dunfermline. I should add that the times with the Interim Moderators were positive for the church and we benefitted from their ministries.

To me Gillespie is very much a family church and as such one experiences the loving kindness of one for the other. Personally the last two years have been particularly testing. Sadly Sylvia died some 18 months ago and I cannot express sufficient gratitude for the amount of support given to me – both in prayer and also in practical ways – by folks in the congregation. Currently I am experiencing health problems but once more have support with shopping, hospital visits etc from folk in the congregation.

Gillespie as a church is very much alive, missionally reaching out through Alpha, Try Praying, a twice weekly ‘Open House Café and Messy Church, plus discipling one another through Life Groups (Bible study groups) and supporting our church family through the email Prayer Chain.

Summing up, Gillespie is ‘my family’ and I know as such is in turn part of the much wider Christian family. ¤