About Us
The Building ...
The church is in the heart of Bricket Wood and our buildings are widely used by many groups in the community we serve. These include a play-school, senior citizen's lunch club, art club, Rainbows, Brownies, the local doctor's surgery, and more.
The church itself was built in 1937 to a Scandinavian design and looks like an upside down Noah's Ark.
Revd. Mike Rajkovic
Er ...that's me with the two legs! The Great Dane is Harley and now she is even bigger than the photo! I was born a long time ago in a galaxy far far away ... Oldham actually.
My surname
is Croat. My Dad, Mile, came over after WW2 as a displaced person and did various labouring jobs eventually ending up in Oldham. He was the youngest of seven children, 2 sisters and 5 brothers. He didn't know what happened to his parents or sisters/brothers during or after the war - he left home aged 12! He assumed they were all wiped out during the war or killed in the many reprisals after the war ended. Yugoslavia was and 'still is' even in its now many independent states a very complicated place with long memories, grudges, hubris and most potent of all, nationalism.
My Mum, Inge [nee Banowitsch], is Austrian, born in Salzburg, an only child. She lived most of her childhood and late in teens in Vienna. She came over in 1949 originally as a seamstress but ended up working in a cotton mill in Oldham. The two eventually met, courted, married and had three sons of which I am the eldest.
My mum continued to work in a cotton mill until she retired and my dad eventually ended in up in various collieries [coal mines] as a tunneller working for the NCB. He died aged 61 in 1984 during the great miners strike - don't ask me what I think of Maggie Thatcher 'cos I mght not give the anwser you want me to!
I graduated from Sheffield University it seems ages ago, just after the ice age. It was while at University that I made a decIsion for Christ. Up to that time I had been searching and searching hard and suddenly the scales were lifted from my eyes [Feb 10th 1974] and I literally understood, if only in part, Christ really is 'the way, the truth and the life.' Simples really!
During that time I got involved with The Navigators [student outreach] an American Christian organisation dedicated to evangelism and discipleship initially on student campuses founded by Dawson Trotman. I learnt an awful lot especially the right and wrong way to do evangelism and discipleship - I am still learning! I also appreciated the 'Nav' way on the spiritual disciplines which still form a large part of my daily living.
My biggest influence during those 'uni' years was the late Dirk van Zuylen the leader of the Sheffield Navigator Student ministry at the time. His love of God, discipleship and evangelism was infectious. I had the privilege of living in his house for a year and learned a lot about spiritual formation, friendship, and not to play Tangerine Dream too loudly!
Now I'm not saying the Navs were without their faults, nor rme either - I was very much a person who questioned everything and was troubled by an awful lot about the 'Nav way' and the impact it had on believers and unbelievers. Further, the way the Navs went about their business did mean there were some 'needless casualties of war' among our own so to speak. So, seriously, if there are any out there who read this and who are still suffering from what I call post traumatic Nav stress disorder then do please feel free to contact me. I've been there and got through it.
After uni I went to work in research for, as it was then, British Steel. During that time I got married to a drop dead gorgeous woman, Maggie, who after all these years is still drop dead gorgeous.
Jobwise I then moved into precious metals and then into logging [Mid-Wales] and eventually logistics [London area].
I went to 'vicar factory' in 1993, St John's College, Nottingham and left in 1995 with an MA in Theological Studies. I served my 'title' at All Saints Harrow Weald and then moved to All Saints' Woodford Wells for four years and now here at St Luke's since 2002. I gained an MPhil from London Bible College in 2003.
Outside of church my main main interests are films [The Matrix especially], reading [all sorts], keeping fit [it gets harder as I get older!], cooking and real ale.