IF a week is a long time in politics, as Mr Harold Wilson is said first to have observed at the time of the 1964 sterling crisis, then what of nine years in the same Methodist manse? Until recently it would have been a world record.

Doubtless remembering what is said about stone and moss - sterling moss, as old Wilson might have put it - the Methodists used to move their ministers around every three years, regular as frockwork.

They call it stationing, and a delayed train might wait almost as long on platform six as a minister would have to get to know his congregational fellow travellers.

Things have changed, stays extended. The Rev Andrew Champley had been superintendent minister of the Richmond district for nine years - the longest serving minister in that part of North Yorkshire since records began in 1843 - when on Sunday he said his farewells.

Physically and spiritually, the church has been transformed under his leadership. The little market town has become a central station, its minister the people's Champley.

"It's always been quite a strong church, I can't claim it was falling to pieces when I arrived," he insists. "In many ways I've been spoiled, so many people have been willing to do so many different things."

In truth the valedictions had begun on Saturday night with a concert which included everything from Oh No John to Calamity Jane, from How Are Things in Glocca Morra to the Green Eyed Yellow God.

Perhaps inevitably, they sang Sweet Lass of Richmond Hill, too, though the bachelor minister has had little time for such distractions. "Oh there've been a few possibilities, but I don't think it would have worked out," he says. "In a way I'm married to the job, there wouldn't be much time for a wife as well."

The job looks good on it, never more so than last Sunday morning - the church full, seats taken upstairs, and by no means only by the old and the grey, the fuddy and the duddy.

Congregations have increased substantially in his nine years, by ten per cent last year alone. The creche is enjoying a baby boom, the junior church fast growing, a worship group called Oxygen proving a breath of fresh air and the bible groups - well - going forth and multiplying.

The place is vibrant, welcoming, dynamic and quite possibly could be self-sufficient for a while, though they welcome a new minister at the end of August. The Methodists, unlike the Church of England, don't believe in letting clerical beds grow cold.

Only the pew sheet request to "help create a quiet atmosphere" goes largely unheeded. It takes more than nine years to stop folk blethering before the service.

We'd been there a couple of times previously, once for the New Year's Eve "Watch night" service to welcome 1996 - "Cold Richmond may have been, stone cold it wasn't" - and again in March 2001 for the service of rededication after a £250,000 refurbishment opened up the church and anciliary buildings to much wider community use.

"It'll never be an architectural gem, but it was a bit dark and gloomy before," the superintendent had said at the time. This time they remembered a myopic face, at once offering a large print hymn book.

Andrew had spent eight years as an archivist in Newcastle, became a Methodist local preacher in 1971 - "I remember my first sermon was on suffering, I'm not sure who suffered the most" - and after deciding upon the ordained ministry took a Cambridge tripos.

After serving in Devon, he was superintendent minister for six years in Bishop Auckland before moving 20 miles down the road to Richmond. "It was so different it could have been 200 miles," he said.

Physically much changed, the church has been spiritually enlightened, too - the minister particularly keen on healing services and on teaching in small groups.

"There's not much point in learning all that stuff if you can't pass it on," he argues.

Save for a reference to some new glazing - "I just wish I could be here to see it" - Sunday's service passes without mention of his departure.

Afterwards, however, presentations include a watercolour of upper Swaledale and a collage of photographs of just about everyone in the church. "You may want to put that at the back of the broom cupboard," someone says.

Janet Leahy, the senior steward, talks of his dedication, his caring and his approachability, of how he will be missed both as minister and friend. "There was already a lot going on, but Andrew has enlivened things in so many ways," she says.

The minister in turn tells them that he is greatly proud of Richmond church. "It's the envy of many in the district. There's so much new life around here, it's tremendous."

That evening there was to be another farewell service for the whole of the Swaledale district. At the end of August he becomes superintendent minister in Morecambe, his home town, where his 87-year-old mother still lives.

No-one's yet suggested how long he might be beside the seaside, but for Morecambe, at least, it's likely to be a very good move.

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