On Sunday I shared with our church that shortly I will begin regular service in the Royal Army Chaplains’ Department. Here is what I said:
“For those of you that we’ve not had the pleasure of meeting personally I’m James and this is Robyn, Roman, and Jesse, and we’ve been part of the church since last summer when we moved home from Bahrain, in the Middle East, where we lived for 12 years and where both boys were born. I was on staff at our church there for about ten years and was the pastor for seven of those. Robyn was our Kids Church coordinator and is now a teacher at Bradford Christian School, and the boys attend, and we love being a part of this big church family.
This morning I wanted to share with you that in three weeks I will head off to the Armed Forces Chaplaincy Centre to begin my next season of service to God and His people as an Army Chaplain. It’s been a long journey to get us all to this point, about three years of discernment, interviews, visits, and assessments, but God is faithful, as we heard last week (during a baby dedication).
I understand the idea of ministry in a church context, and I understood the Army in a broad sense, but the Chaplains’ Department sits in a very particular space between the two. It is not simply “church in uniform,” and it is not simply another Army trade like an electrician or a chef. It is something more integrated and embedded, and in many ways much more demanding. The RAChD exists to provide pastoral care, spiritual support, and moral guidance to serving personnel and their families regardless of faith or belief. Chaplains are non-combatants under the Geneva Convention, which is significant as we do not carry weapons. Neither are we part of the chain of command in the same way as other officers, and yet we are fully commissioned officers that carry a real army rank, and we are fully embedded in the life of our units.
Chaplains go where soldiers go, live where they live, deploy when they deploy, and are there to, simply, look after the army’s greatest resource: its people. We share their routines, their pressures, and often their uncertainties. Army chaplaincy is a ministry of presence. It is about being available and approachable, confidential, reliable, credible in their eyes, and being a strong witness for the faith we have.
But I want to be honest and give some context to us all standing here sharing this with you today: joining the Army is not just a vocational and a ministry decision for me. It is a family decision as well.
The service may be mine, but the sacrifice is something we will all experience.
Because whilst I will wear the uniform and work behind the wire and deploy with my units, it’s easy to keep the focus on me but all of us will begin this journey in three weeks as we become a military family. That is one of the major realities of this ministry and the motivation to share today.
We have decided that we will start this next chapter of our lives with my status being married/unaccompanied, meaning that as I am, after training, initially based down in Wiltshire for two years, Robyn and the boys will stay here at home, at the school, and as embedded and contributing members of this church.
It’s really important to us that we start this next season with the church’s blessing, with the church’s support, and with the church’s understanding. There will be many Sundays when I’m not here – although when the choice is mine I will always choose church as per Hebrews 10.25, don’t forsake to meet… – but the family are, and we want people to know why. We’d love people to help and support us through the separation as I am doing the same for the soldiers and officers of the units to which I am posted.
For us, this next season will bring the need to navigate the unpredictability that comes with Army life: plans that change, notice that is short, and routines that are sometimes interrupted. For Robyn, the boys, and myself, we know we will be reliant on the community here to step in and step up when, undoubtedly, things get tough, as they do for forces families.
One of the privileges of being a chaplain is that I will be walking alongside people in some of the most demanding moments of their lives but I am also very aware that my own family will be walking alongside that reality in their own way and again, for this we are looking for the support and the help of our church. From experience, it is easy to speak about supporting others when you are involved in some sort of ministry, but harder to acknowledge the cost that doing so can carry in your own home life. And yet I think it is important to hold both truths at once: that this is a calling worth pursuing, and that it comes with weight that we will need help to carry.
If I were to summarise what I am stepping into, it would be this: a life of presence in the midst of movement. Present with soldiers in their training and operations. Present with families who are holding things together at home. Present with my own family as we navigate what it means to belong to something larger than ourselves. And so, we’re sure of God’s call in all of this and it would mean the world to us that we start this next chapter of ministry and life with the support of our church.”
James Travis 