#sasra #charity #armedforces #uk #faith #DavidMalam #RegionalManager #army #ScriptureReader #bible #teaching #christian #christianity #jesus #ChartridgeMissionChurch #chesham
SASRA Regional Manager David Malam updates us on the work of Army Scripture Readers Lee McDade, Dave Hossack, and Jim Henderson, together with a brief history of SASRA for those unfamiliar with this charity, whose main focus is to go where the Church can't go - behind the wire and take the Gospel to the armed forces.
SASRA YouTube Playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeLtfVhcCUFsZSr6cv3g3B9SySqs4EmIk
Chartridge Mission Church, a beacon of faith, was founded in 1844 and remains in the village of Chartridge, just outside Chesham, in the picturesque Chiltern Hills of Buckinghamshire, England, UK.
We are a warm and welcoming fellowship and would be delighted to have you visit us in person. Join us for our Sunday service at 6 pm, followed by refreshments.
Our Church is fully accessible, with wheelchair ramps and an accessible toilet, ensuring everyone can participate in our services.
Chartridge Mission Church, Chapel Lane, Chartridge, Chesham, Buckinghamshire, HP5 2TH
The village Church with an international audience.
Support our work at Chartridge Mission Church:
Donations via Stewardship.org.uk:
https://www.stewardship.org.uk/partners/20005300
Please make cheques payable to Chartridge Mission Church and send them to the address above, for the attention of Pastor Barry Kempson.
Recorded on Sunday, 1st November 2026.
Join us for our Sunday service at 6 pm.
www.Chartridge.UK
The Friendliest Fellowship.
SASRA Regional Manager David Malam updates us on the work of Army Scripture Readers Lee McDade, Dave Hossack, and Jim Henderson, together with a brief history of SASRA for those unfamiliar with this charity, whose main focus is to go where the Church can't go - behind the wire and take the Gospel to the armed forces.
SASRA YouTube Playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeLtfVhcCUFsZSr6cv3g3B9SySqs4EmIk
Chartridge Mission Church, a beacon of faith, was founded in 1844 and remains in the village of Chartridge, just outside Chesham, in the picturesque Chiltern Hills of Buckinghamshire, England, UK.
We are a warm and welcoming fellowship and would be delighted to have you visit us in person. Join us for our Sunday service at 6 pm, followed by refreshments.
Our Church is fully accessible, with wheelchair ramps and an accessible toilet, ensuring everyone can participate in our services.
Chartridge Mission Church, Chapel Lane, Chartridge, Chesham, Buckinghamshire, HP5 2TH
The village Church with an international audience.
Support our work at Chartridge Mission Church:
Donations via Stewardship.org.uk:
https://www.stewardship.org.uk/partners/20005300
Please make cheques payable to Chartridge Mission Church and send them to the address above, for the attention of Pastor Barry Kempson.
Recorded on Sunday, 1st November 2026.
Join us for our Sunday service at 6 pm.
www.Chartridge.UK
The Friendliest Fellowship.
Category
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LearningTranscript
00:021816 is a wonderful date for Sazra. It's a year after the Battle of Waterloo. You won't
00:07find it in history books. But in 1816, a sergeant, imagine being a sergeant in the British Army
00:16a year after the Battle of Waterloo. He walks to Woolwich Barracks. He goes through the
00:22gates. He goes to the main room. He puts a notice on the notice board. It says something
00:28like, if anyone would like to borrow a Bible, please see me, Sergeant Rudd. And on account
00:36of that very small, tiny step of faith, the Sazra story begins. He got into terrible trouble
00:45because the commandant at Woolwich Barracks, he hadn't asked permission to put this note
00:49on the board, and the commandant didn't want Bibles. They ended up with a bit of a tug of
00:55a war. And about a year later, through the work of some Christians, some senior Christians
01:02in the military, there was a horse and cart arrived outside the barracks with crates on
01:09the back, enough Bibles for every room in the barracks. And a few years later, Sergeant Rudd's
01:15tiny act of faith, note on the notice board, led to the rules being written for when you
01:21joined the British Army. And in there it stated, every soldier joined the British Army must,
01:28must be offered a Bible. Amazing. You never know, do you, when a small step of faith, how
01:37God answers it. And you'll know the story. Christians rejoiced in that. What a blessing
01:42for the nation. What a blessing. But they soon realised a lot of the soldiers they simply couldn't
01:48read. And so they said, a group of Christian officers got together and said, right, let's
01:53get ex-servicemen, ex-soldiers, to go on to the barracks. They're retired, but go on to
01:59the barracks, sit down with soldiers, and read the soldiers' own Bibles to them. And they
02:04called them scripture readers. And that's how the story began. Anyone read the diaries of
02:10Florence Nightingale? That's good, because I think they're quite long, they're dull, there's
02:15very little spiritual content. But, but, in the middle of them, she mentioned scripture
02:21readers in the Crimean War in the 1850s. And she noted what a blessing it was to soldiers
02:28in the Crimea to have the Bible read to them. She even made a donation to Sazerah. And I think
02:36it's an amazing thing that there are still scripture readers today. Many, many scriptures in World
02:42War I and World War II, but there are still scripture readers today. So these are men and
02:48women. All our scripture readers are men who have permission to wear uniform. They wear
02:54military uniform, though they've retired from the military. They wear military uniform. It's
02:58a scripture reader on the rack slide. They have permission to go where you and I can't go
03:03to share the gospel with the men and women of our armed forces. And that is the Sazerah
03:11mission. That's what we do. Our soldiers go behind the wire to share their faith. And their
03:18aim is that all military personnel will hear the gospel whilst they are in uniform. And
03:24the reason that Sazerah exists is just that local churches can't go on the basis for obvious
03:30reasons. You can't go behind the wire. I can't just wander onto the wire if I want to, for obvious
03:37reasons, our scripture readers go where the local church can't go. And what do they do when they're
03:42there? Well, if they're seeking to give encouragement to Christians on the basis and really encourage
03:48them to be involved and embedded in a local church, either in the area where they're serving
03:54or when they go home. A lot of soldiers go home at weekends, of course. And if they're meeting those
04:02who are seeking, obviously to help them with that, but also to ensure that they know of
04:07Bible-believing churches that they can go to in the area. Some of you knew that all very,
04:14very well. How can you pray for us? So I just thought I'd briefly just share about three scripture
04:20readers today. And then just a few general Sazerah prayer requests. And the first one is Jim Henderson.
04:29Jim served in order shop for many years. He's a very tall, gentle Scotsman. Now, you might
04:37be puzzled for that description. You may not feel those words go together, but actually he's
04:42a tall man. He's a lovely Christian. He's a very gracious, gentle man. And he served in
04:47order shop for a number of years as a scripture. And he became increasingly ill and infirm.
04:54He had serious medical issues, spent a lot of time in and out of hospital. And to such
04:59an extent that he felt he had to stop. He couldn't continue. And so he moved with his wife,
05:04Shirley, who also worked for Sazerah at the time, in the office. They moved up north to
05:09where they had a daughter and a granddaughter. And then Jim was so ill, he was put on the major
05:14organ transplant list. And to his surprise, he had a major organ transplant, which he hadn't
05:21anticipated or expected. And he made such a remarkable recovery from that that he contacted
05:27Sazerah again and said, you know, I'm feeling so much better. Can I come back in a part-time
05:32capacity? Is there anywhere near me where I'm living, where I could go? And as it happens,
05:38the Defence Medical Command Centre in Whittington, it was up the road from Jim. So Jim had spent
05:49time in and out of hospital the last couple of years of his life with Sazerah. He now finds
05:55himself going a couple of times a week into the centre where Army, Navy, RAF, medics are
06:03trained. Paramedics, medics, and so on. Young people, often very young people, being trained
06:08for the military. So it's quite a privilege for him. What I love about Jim, two things
06:13I love about him. One is when he meets new people, he very often says, I'm Jim, I'm a
06:20scripture reader. Of course, often they don't know what that means. He says, I'm the person
06:24that two people have died to save. Now that's a little bit of an interesting introduction,
06:31isn't it? And he goes on to explain he was seriously ill. He had a major organ transplant.
06:37Somebody died for that to happen. But then he says, but I'm here to tell you about somebody
06:42who died to save me from my sin. And he then speaks about the Lord Jesus and that he's died
06:53for him. The other thing I love about Jim is that in the morning, now if you know Jim, if
06:58you've ever met him, you've got a huge imagination here. He's a very tall guy. He's quite senior
07:03in years now. He says, in the morning when he wakes up, he jumps, leaps out of bed. Anyone
07:13do that this morning? Here. He leaps out of bed. When he lands upright on the carpet, hopefully,
07:20he does a little Scottish jig. Now, I'd love him, his wife, to video that. But he does a little
07:31Scottish jig. And he then praises God that he's given him one more day. One more day of life.
07:42One may more day to serve and praise him. So remember Jim. There's a second scripture
07:53reader I'm going to share about. It's Dave. Dave Hossack. He's up in Catterick. He's well
08:00known in Sazerah as Pebble in the Shoe Dave. Pebble in the Shoe Dave. Because it's his phrase.
08:08Because when he meets soldiers, he makes it his aim to put a pebble in their shoe, metaphorically
08:16speaking. Just to say something that will just be at the back of their minds. Just something
08:23that will can nag away at them a little bit. Just something that will irritate them maybe
08:27even sometimes. Something about, he'll ask them a question about God, faith, belief, life.
08:33That's something. Something that will just, just kind of nag away at them like a pebble
08:41in the shoe. Dave often in his report says, oh, I had a wonderful week. I was able to put
08:48lots of pebbles in soldier's shoes last week. Now, a little while ago, Dave was cycling home
08:54on an A-road. It's going quite fast. He got hit by a deer. He found himself sprawled in the
09:02middle
09:03of an A-road. Very dangerous situation near the Browver Hill with five broken ribs and a punctured bone.
09:15What do we hope for when we have really difficult trials as we all have from time to time? What
09:23do we
09:23hope for? The Christian surely hopes that the bottom line is God is there in my trouble. God is there
09:33in my
09:33trial. The first person who arrived on the scene was a nurse. The nurse knew what to do, stopped traffic
09:41and so on. Began to attend to Dave. The second person arrived on the scene was a paramedic.
09:49The paramedic had their kit in their car. The third person who arrived on the scene was a senior medical
09:57doctor who is also a SASRA trustee. I've asked Dave so many times, I said, if I say this to
10:04people,
10:04they won't believe. He said this is absolutely how it happens. So despite the trauma and the difficult
10:13experience, Dave knew this. God was there. It hadn't taken the Lord by surprise. He was there. He was
10:23present. And Dave is very thankful for God's goodness to him. He's made a good recovery. He's back on base,
10:31putting pebbles in soldiers' shoes. I did tell this story one church and somebody, a slightly younger
10:37person came up to me after, slightly embarrassed, and they sort of whispered to me, what happened to
10:44the deer? So if you're an animal lover here and you're a bit worried about it, apparently the deer
10:48was absolutely fine. So that's Jim Henderson, that's Dave Posack. And the third person I want to share with
10:54is Lee McDade. Lee McDade was a scripture reader in Colchester. He was in British Army for many
11:00years. Sort of person who can speak to anybody, really. Lee then was asked by his church in
11:06Colchester to run a ministry amongst the homeless, addicts on the streets. So a really tough,
11:12challenging ministry, which he did for a number of years. And the funding, I think, has dried up. And so
11:20Lee asked if he could come back to Sazor. When he left, a lot of the script readers said,
11:24we'll see in a bit, Lee. We'll see in a few years' time. And that was right, because he loves
11:28to be part of Sazor. And so Lee has come back. He's now just started at Perbright in Woking,
11:35literally started a couple of weeks ago. It's a tremendous opportunity. Sazor hasn't had anybody at
11:40Perbright for probably a decade, something like that. But it's a large training camp.
11:49Do remember Lee, though. He's had some real challenges. His father's just died. His father's
11:53a Christian, but he's just died. Lee's taking the funeral. His mother-in-law died not long ago.
11:58He himself has had kidney stones, which are not very pleasant. So he's got pattern challenges.
12:04His wife also hasn't been all that well. So do remember Lee. He's back on base now. He's very
12:11encouraged on base. So Jim, Dave and Lee, do remember them. You can find more information
12:19about them on the table below as well. And then just some general prayer requests. Just a couple
12:25of things really to mention. Sazor's great desire is to have more scripture readers. To be a scripture
12:31reader, you have to have served. You have to love to share your faith, but you also have to be
12:35very
12:35wise. We'd love to have 25 scripture readers by 2030, something like that. Currently we've got 18,
12:42but we have one or two people joining very soon. So we should be up to 20 soon. And then
12:47we'd like
12:48to have five more, if we can. That's a step of faith for Sazorah. Scripture readers are employed by
12:54Sazorah. They've paid, shall I say, a Christian salary. But often there's accommodation to deal with,
12:59and so on, which is quite challenging too. Quiet revival, do you make of that phrase,
13:04being banded about? All I would say about that is that amongst the scripture readers there's
13:09definitely a sense that, particularly amongst young men, though not exclusively,
13:14there is an interest on base in the gospel. There is a desire that perhaps wasn't there a few years
13:21ago
13:21to know a little bit more. So all the scripture is encouraged by numbers coming to Bible studies,
13:27numbers signing up for Christianity Explore type courses. One scripture reader said,
13:33he was so encouraged, he said, because he used to go on base and walk around and look and see
13:39if people he could engage with. He says he doesn't do that at the moment. He says because people are
13:45coming to him and asking him, which is really encouraging. So whatever you make of that phrase,
13:52there's definitely a sense amongst the scripture readers that there is a growing interest on base,
13:58which is encouraging. And then just to say next week is Remembrance Sunday, and this is the time
14:04of year when a lot of our scripture readers have wonderful opportunities to speak to large numbers
14:10of soldiers, also in churches. There are a lot of, I would say, probably evangelical anger in churches.
14:19Remembrance is quite a big deal. They'll meet in monuments and villages and a large number will turn
14:26out. And some of these will want to have a scripture reader there who's going to share the gospel
14:33with a large group that perhaps they don't see at any other time of the year. So thanks so much
14:43for
14:43your interest in Sandra. Do take some literature afterwards and it's all there for you. Most of it's free as
14:48well.