New, strikingly young lay preachers will soon be leading services after an enthusiastic recognition.

THERE are tricks to this trade, principal among them to emulate the Third Little Pig and bag a seat by the radiator before the rest arrive. "You're in exactly the same seat you were last year," says the Rev Graham Evans, Darlington's superintendent Methodist minister, before fleeing lest (he says) we quote him on it.

It's the manorial Elm Ridge church in the town's west end - usually described in print as the "leafy" west end, even in October - the occasion, like last year, a "recognition" service for new local preachers.

The church is crowded like the five o'clock train, the congregation - like most other congregations - is generally getting on a bit. The difference from last year's service is that, even if their ages were added together, three of the four newly to be admitted lay preachers would still barely qualify for the state pension.

Peter Everitt is just 20, one of the youngest ever Methodist local preachers. Philip Smith is 22, his father an ordained minister for 30 years and due to give the address; Brigitta Ilyes, a Hungarian, is 28.

It's the young being blooded; early recognition, as it were.

The fourth is Suzanne Wood, 57 this week, who lives in Barton, between Darlington and Richmond. "I've felt for several years that God was calling me into local preaching but I kept on making excuses like not being an academic, or possibly being too old," she says.

"I'm not really an up front person, I'm one of those you'd usually find in the kitchen, doing the washing up. I found some of the study quite hard, but the inspiration I got from it was amazing."

Pete, Darlington lad, is at Cliffe College, a Methodist study centre in Derbyshire. "If I'd gone to university at 18 I'd have lost my faith completely," he says, rather surprisingly.

"I think that university is a place of high temptation. I'm not condemning it, but for me it wouldn't have worked."

The order of service, in which promises are made and each symbolically receives a Bible - it's possible they have one already - borrows the biblical phrase about bringing the message of salvation to all, in season and out of season. For those unaware that salvation (like football, say) has a season, the Rev Paul Smith explains in his sermon that "out of season" might mean when a local preacher gets the quarterly circuit plan - the fixture list as a footballer might say - and thinks "Oh no, not them again."

Paul Smith began his own ministry in Esh Winning and surrounding County Durham villages, in 1974 - "Bearpark colliery was still going," he recalls afterwards - and now, much celebrated in Methodism, is superintendent minister at Central Hall in Plymouth.

It was in the Elm Ridge library, all those years ago, that he "endured" the probationers' committee. "They wanted me to continue, so I did."

His oratory is passionate, his delivery accomplished, his vocal acrobatics remarkable, his style reminiscent of that other adopted son of Plymouth, Mr Michael Foot.

"Preaching is not filling in 20 minutes before the last hymn, it's about the great eternal truths breaking in," he tells them, adding that in his days at Cliffe College, the most sophisticated piece of equipment had been a piano accordion.

"Power points hadn't been invented," he adds.

Hymns include Ye Servants of God Your Master Proclaim, one of the readings is the Parable of the Talents, there's a declaration that the four candidates' "knowledge, competence and conviction" has been examined and found where it probably should be, and a letter to each of them from the Rev Will Murray, this year's president of the Methodist Conference.

Since it's the same letter, Mr Evans follows the example of the gentleman in 'Allo 'Allo and says it only once.

"It is an exciting time to become a preacher," Mr Murray has written and in the Darlington circuit there are still plenty more local preachers "on trial", as Methodism judicially puts it. Convictions established, they're let loose.

Philip Smith, like Brigitta a stipendiary Elm Ridge lay worker, says he makes no big deal of becoming a local preacher. Though entirely courteous, he seems wary of speaking to the media, as if his dad had been bitten by our Esh Winning correspondent's dog.

"It just feels like God has given me something to say, especially about issues of justice about which I feel passionately," he says, over a celebratory lemonade.

Philip doesn't yet envisage following his father into the ordained ministry - "the kind of work a minister does isn't the kind of work I could do" - and in any case, ministers need different qualifications.

In the Darlington circuit, to judge by the clergy list in the plan, one of the main ones is to be called Graham.

Brigitta, however, hopes soon to be accepted for a ministry foundation course. "It's quite daunting at times, especially when I speak difficult English," she says, though her English is pretty near perfect.

The plan, the Masterplan perhaps, is that all four will at once begin leading services in the Darlington area. "It's very difficult for someone who is 20 to speak to a congregation which is very much older," admits Pete Everitt.

"I often wonder to myself what the heck I'm doing here. I think I'm about to find out."

A Law unto himself

VERY much longer before the massed, Philip Law was presented at the same service with a certificate to mark his 40 years as a Methodist local preacher.

Retired head tacher of Melsonby Methodist primary school, near Richmond, he recalls the incident when crossed wires and a faulty public address system meant that the prayers for the sick were picked up by the local taxi service who at once sent for an ambulance. Still something of an emergency, there was also the occasion when the organist at a village service suddenly stopped playing halfway through a hymn, grabbed his jacket and dashed from the church.

"Nothing was said and an old lady from the back of the church walked to the organ and carried on playing. The congregation seemed undisturbed, so the service continued."

Enquiring afterwards about the organist's health, he was told that he was also a part-time fireman, silently summoned and not a bleep out of him.

Philip also lives in Darlington. "I've had quite a few surprises over the years," he says. "One of the great qualities of a local preacher is being able to adapt."