TG The Gathering Network // thegatheringnetwork.co.uk // The Gatherin9 Nelwork is a Registered Scottish Charity. 11 OSCR: SC047556 Trustees Annual Re ort 1st September 2023 - 31st August 2024 The trustees of The Gatherlng Network have the pleasure of presenting the annual report along with the financial statement and the independent examiner's report for the year 1/9/23 - 31/8/24. Reference and Administrative Information Charity Name: The Gathering Network Charity Number.. SC047556 Registered Address: Current Trustees: Structure and Governance: The Gathering Church is a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation ISCIOI. It is governed by its constitution which was adopted on the 5th June 2017. Appointment of Trustees: The trustees meet on a 2 monthly basis. Application to become a trustee is open to anyone with an interest in furthering the cause of The Gathering Network. New trustees are elected by the current trustees at the annual general meeting which is normally held in November, or at any other trustees meeting if an application to become a trustee has been received, Under the constitution there must be a minimum of three trustees and a maximum of six. There are currently 4 active trustees of The Gathering Network.
Management The trustees are responsible for the financial oversight and the strategic direction of The Gathering Neork, along with the collaboration and support of the Core Leaders from within the network. The Trustee Chair, co-leads the operational day-to-day activities of the organisation along with and lead a team of volunteers and vocational part-time staff that form the operational core leadership team of The Gathering. Adam attends all trustee meetings and reports on the operational activity of the organisation. Objects and Activlties Objects.. Advancement of religion. In furtherance thereof the organisation shall seek to.. 4.1 Start a new networked Christian church initially based in the Glasgow area 4.2 Start multiple mid-sized communities of Christian believers around Glasgow with the intention of enriching the local communities through practical seNice and demonstrating the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ in love, action, deed and word. Actlvltles: Our long-standing vision is to empower and equip God's people to be his church and to reach out and show the love of Jesus to the people and communities around them. We prioritised and trained our people to do this through a number of strategic initiatives; Actlvatlng Prayer: Activating prayer is a specific type of prayer that is movemental in nature. It operates comfortably in the supernatural, expecting signs and wonders, dealing with the demonic. and knowing how to appropriate the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit. It includes spiritual mapping, prayer walking and strategic prayer. and harnesses the spiritual authority God has delegated to us and exercises the power of blessing. Such prayer changes the spiritual atmosphere within people, groups. cultures and lands. It creates the necessary conditions for the expansion of God's kingdom in our ministry contexts. We believe that this type of prayer is powerful and brings tangible results of transformation. change and healing to the people and places that our Microchurches exist in and are called to. To that end, all of our Microchurches practice regular rhythms of activating prayer on a weekly basis together. And a5 a wider network we a150 prioritise this through early morning prayer, monthly worship together and in our monthly corporate gatherings. Engaging Culture: Engaging culture means wisely undertaking an array of cultivating activities and actions-all of intrinsic Kingdom value in and of themselves-which serve as powerful
“bridges of God” into the cultural context for the good news of Jesus, to take root and spread. Such engagement means meeting the felt needs of people in the name and power of Jesus. It may include redemptive initiatives to bring transformational impact to areas of brokenness and need, discerning where the Spirit of God is uniquely active, and partnering with Him in response. For movements to occur, cultural engagement (the gospel in deed) must be fully integrated with the gospel in power through activating prayer, and must lead to and connect with the gospel in word as people become fully committed and obedient disciples of Jesus. In cultural engagement the gospel of the Kingdom is both embodied and proclaimed. All of our Microchurches look for ways for them to uniquely engage the people they feel drawn towards and create spaces and activities to enrich, bless and connect those people and cultures in Glasgow.
Making Disciples:
As dedicated followers of Jesus, it is incumbent upon us to create spaces for those that don’t yet know about God to come and discover more about him, in loving, safe spaces free from condemnation where people are allowed to voice their own thoughts and opinions. To that end we are building effective tools and processes to help people far from God become committed followers of Jesus and then make disciples of others. Such multiplication is at the heart of our understanding of discipleship and spiritual growth. While the history of the Church contains many evangelism and discipleship models, we favour a highly effective “discovery process” which does not rely on experts, is organic, and is easily reproduced regardless of setting or culture.
Growing & Training Leaders:
We believe in the importance of identifying, equipping and releasing every-day believers to lead the Microchurches in our growing network; people who have normal jobs, but carry the anointing of the kingdom of heaven as followers of Jesus, Such movement leaders will exhibit a wide array of gifting, all of which are necessary to guide and build ministry momentum that will go far beyond themselves. It is imperative that these leaders know how to identify new leaders and how to appropriately coach, mentor and launch them into ministry.
We put lots of our time into connecting, resourcing and developing the leaders in our network, and identifying new potential leaders who will be able to lead future Microchurches too.
Forming New Churches:
We believe that the church, in its truest form, exists as a spiritual family centred around a commonality of belonging to Jesus, living our lives in worship of Him, and engaging in mission together. The Church is the people of God, and not a building. And to be most effective in spreading the good news of Jesus and impacting Glasgow (and Scotland) positively means multiplying new expressions of churches, therefore extending our reach and impact in a diverse and densely populated city.
Achievements and Performance:
As ever, we value many ‘infinite’ and intangible factors to mark our performance and achievement, such as the amount of activating prayer completed by each of our Microchurches, and engaging culture initiatives started or trialled in our network. However, we count it a big success that we have seen around 15 expressions of small missional churches across the city and region of Glasgow, all led by every-day followers of Jesus who are a part of our leadership core and training collective in The Gathering Network.
We have continued to develop intentional peer-to-peer connections, over zoom, to equip, coach and encourage teams translocally, and form a fledgling network of leaders to that end. So far we have established intentional coaching relationships with teams in Anstruther, St. Andrews, Edinburgh, Bicester, Oxford, London, Helsingborg Sweden, Belgium, Hungary, Germany, Spain, France and Toowoomba Australia, with other potential new leaders in other locations across Scotland, England and Europe. We are hopeful for each one of these connections to grow and thereby multiply the work that we feel called to establish by God beyond just the scope of Glasgow.
In The Gathering Network, a marker of the kingdom and infinite success and alignment is the hours spent both in prayer and on mission to intentionally share life and build relationships with those that don’t yet know Jesus.
We have continued to develop invitational community spaces that are sharing the good news of Jesus, of his truth and power, to those around us. We have further developed our capacity to reach out to our communities, neighbours, friends, coworkers and families and show them hospitality in the form of service and also inviting them into our times as a community, both online and in-person, which is integral to how we display the love Jesus has for them.
We received a funding grant of £3515 to film some of our training on the above principles, in order to better equip even more people across the UK - we expect this to be filmed and edited this coming financial year.
One particular area of note to mention is our first rental of a physical space for our operations as a charity at 12 Douglas Street, in Milngavie town precinct. After hours of prayer walking and seeking the Lord, our team felt that the Lord was inviting us to rent this shop space. It is at the heart of Milngavie Town Centre, and at the beginning of the West Highland Way walk making it a very strategic and public place for us to maintain a presence from.
Our plans are to use the space to expand the work of our local teams in the North of Glasgow, as well as providing a space for some kingdom creativity to interest and engage other people.
We have been successful in securing an initial £17,978 to cover our rental, utility and operational costs of opening and maintaining the space. Our plan is to continue to fundraise to cover rent for 16 months, as agreed by the commercial property agents who are renting the space to us.
We got the keys to the space on 16th January 2024, and were given 1 month free of charge in order to renovate and repurpose the shop space for our use. We opened the space to the public on 24th February 2024 and then held our first gathering for our people to worship, pray and bless the place on Sunday 31st March 2024. We plan on offering a full report of our activities from this space in our next annual report, given that our planned time of occupancy is from January 16th 2024 - March 24th 2025.
Currently the employed staff for The Gathering Network consist of as Co-Leader responsible for the big-picture oversight and pioneering of the network, as Co-Leader responsible for organisational rhythms, the children, and the pastoral care of the leaders, and who is employed for 8 hours per-week as financial administrator.
Financial Review:
Regular and one-off donations, from individuals and other organisations, and charitable grants were our only source of income for the year.
Receipts on the unrestricted funds were £106,999 and total payments were £100,799 leaving a surplus of £6,200 (Discrepancy due to rounding). The closing balance in our bank account is £15,322.
Plans for Future Periods:
The trustees are investing responsibility for the continued development and running of The Gathering Network to the core leadership team which is co-led by Adam Penketh and Charlotte Penketh
It will soon be nearly 8 years since we first officially formed as a charity. In light of this, the trustees along with operational staff and key volunteers in the organisation, we plan to have a time of official reflection and review of the efforts, work, focus and future plans of the charity and to make any shifts or changes depending on the outcome of these meetings.
We also intend to increase our fundraising efforts to allow for us to keep paying our staff in-line with inflation (as a minimum), and to allow us to expand our missional
efforts and eventually our staff team too.
The Gathering Network SC047556 Receipts and Payments Accounts Financial Year 0110912023 to 3110812024 seCth A Statements of Recolpts and Payments Flnance Report 01109123 - 31108124 Previous 01109122 31108123 Receipts Donations (and Grft Aid) 106,999 67,017 Bank Interest Total Recolvod 106.999. 67,017. Payments Directly to charitable activities 98,988 72,847. t)onations out 1,811 2.359 Total Payments 100,799. 75,206. Surplus l Deficit 6.200. 18,189). Sèction B Statèment Of Balances
The Gathering Network SC047556 Opening Bank balance 9.132 17.321 Surplus l Deficit 6.200 18.1891 Closing Bank Balance 15.222 (Santander) 110 (Wise) 7,633 (Santander) 1 499 (Wise) Soctlon C Notss to the Accounts 1. Trusteè Rèmuneratlon Dotslls Gross Salary fLY 2 trustees eMOyed as per SectKin 39 of The Galhedng Nekn SCIO constitution. 57,240 50.940 Payments for ¢£rfenCe travel and expense costs Incurred Nthllst travelllng 4.473 1,614 2. Recalpts related dlrectly to charltable actlvlty t)onations 69,448" 55,951 Novo Fuel for Fire Stsrters Grant 15,978" The Cinnamon Network Grant 2,000 Novo Training Grant 3.515 Grft Aid 16,059" 11,067 Total Receipts 106,999" 67,017. 3. Payments rnlated dlrectty to charltable actlvlty Adam & Charlotte Expenses 6,705 3,404
The Gathering Network
SC047556
| All-Together Meetings | 359 | 438 |
| All-Together Parties/Feasts | 404 | 264 |
| Apostlic Network Connections | 442 | 426 |
| Children’s Microchurch | 998 | 1,019 |
| Finance Administration | 1,204 | 956 |
| Generosity Giving | 38 | 586 |
| HMRC Deductions | 10.460 | 10,392 |
| Ministry Partner Development | 448 | 86 (Retreat Expenses) |
| Miscellaneous Expenses | 21 | 75 |
| Mobile Office Expenses | 199 | 716 |
| Novo Conference Expenses | 255 | |
| Novo Expenses | 6,151 | |
| Movement Pathway Training | 3,515 | |
| Open Space Shop Council Costs | 4,870 | |
| Open Space Shop Rent | 7.340 | |
| Open Space Start-up Costs | 3,409 | |
| Open Space Shop Sundries | 681 | |
| Open Space Shop Utilities | 747 | |
| Open Space Shop Sales | 58 | |
| Resources and Training | 126 | 162 |
| Second Home Microchurch | 77 | 5 |
| Tech | 878 | 586 |
| The Garden Microchurch | 145 | 64 |
| Training Leaders & Trustees | 315 | 218 |
| Visiting Missionaries | 188 | 513 |
| Wages (Less Liabilities) | 49,707 | 52,658 |
The Gathering Network
SC047556
| Web Development & Hosting | 260 | 269 |
| Wise Conversion Charges | -7 | 9 |
| Total | 100.799* | 72,847* |
01/09/23 - 31/08/24 taken from the General Ledger Summary *Discrepancies due to rounding
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