From the Rev Sandy Horsburgh, Interim Moderator

I have been invited by the Editor to contribute to the Christmas issue of The Link and so I thought that this would be a good opportunity to introduce myself to you, even if only in print. The Presbytery of Lothian has appointed me as your Interim Moderator following the retirement of Wendy Drake and I will be working with you throughout the vacancy ahead as together we seek to discern the right way forward for Cockpen and Carrington, Lasswade and Rosewell. I look forward to meeting many of you in the months ahead.

I am minister of St. Nicholas Buccleuch Parish Church in Dalkeith, where I have been since March 2004. Prior to that I was in London, as associate minister at St. Columba's, Pont Street, and prior to that I had a charge in Bridge of Allan. Perhaps of more relevance is my experience as an interim moderator, first in Doune in Perthshire then, throughout my time in London, in Liverpool. These were both continuing vacancies. Most recently I took over from Wendy in the vacancy in Bilston, Glencorse and Roslin and that was the first time I had seen a vacancy through to the appointment of a new minister. What a good feeling that was!

Now, with you, I am in at the beginning, and I am sure that interesting and fruitful times lie ahead of us. The first priority will be to work out what, as the three parishes, we feel to be the best way to provide ministry in this area. The Presbytery has its plan, in which your Kirk Sessions were involved in developing, but it is also open to new insights and directions. By the time you read this, I will have started a series of meeting with the Kirk Sessions of the three congregations and with the Presbytery Advisory Group to try to establish a sense of vision for the years ahead. I look forward to good and creative discussions.

As I write, Christmas decorations are already vying with autumn leaves. The nights are lengthening and there is frost in the mornings. A time of vacancy can feel like a dark time for a congregation, a time of uncertainty, even worry. But it needn't. Remember that it was in the midst of the darkness that the early church chose to celebrate the birth of Christ, a potent symbol that God is at the heart of the world and of all we do and that hope and light will always prevail.

With best wishes,

Sandy Horsburgh