Today’s ‘Guest Writer’ is Graham:
It's interesting to see how quickly we incorporate 'learned responses' as part of our normal lives. Due to Covid 19 we have become used to the idea of avoiding contact when meeting someone, e.g. not shaking their hand, or giving a close friend or relative a hug. I have also noticed how people automatically give others extra room when passing in the street.
In some ways attending church can also become like that - the thing we do on a Sunday morning. However, over the last few months, like many of us, it is something that I have found I missed.
Which made my Bible reading last Sunday very poignant, Psalm 122. In particular verse 1, I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the LORD's house.”
The Psalm goes on to reflect on the peace and sense of security that there is in meeting in God's presence. For the Psalmist that would have meant being in the temple in Jerusalem.
Over the last few weeks I have had the privilege of joining with Stephen and Helen in the church as we livestream on Sunday morning. As the Psalmist said it has been a great joy to be able to go to the church, meet others (following all of the government guidelines), and share a time of worship, prayer and teaching. For me it has provided that sense of peace and security, and something to look forward to in the previous week.
As we come to the end of lockdown 2.0 it is very likely that we will be able to meet again as we did in the summer months. While we are not able to interact as we did before, it will still be good to worship God together. – Graham Wilson
Stephen writes:
you may enjoy listening on YouTube to: ‘Psalm 122 Jason Silver’
Prayer Requests
1] asks for prayers regarding a family connected to the nursery where Natalie works. Their new-born baby who was successfully operation on for a hole in her heart, but then caught an infection on her lungs and sadly died. The baby was only 1 month old and leaves a 3-Year-old sister, mom and dad. They had the funeral this week. Pray for God to comfort them and enable them to cope in the coming weeks/months especially over Christmas.
2] We also had a request earlier in the week from Helen Winfield & Helen Hancox to pray for the family and friends of Lauren Bloomer who atttended Turves Green Girls school with them and was tragically murdered last Friday.
3] We can give thanks that Helen’s dad has come home from hospital.
Sunday: If you intend joining us for the live-stream at 10:30am, you will find it helpful to have your bible open at Isaiah chapter 9: 1-7. Although it contains a number of well-loved phrases, the message linking them together isn’t so easy to appreciate, but once we understand it, we will see what wonderful Good News Isaiah has for us.
Tier 3: Government rules regarding places of worship:
“Places of worship are allowed to open but people must only interact with others from their household.” (i.e. you should at all times keep 2-metres distance between yourself and others in the hall who are not part of your household/bubble). This means that on Sunday 6th December we can re-start holding two identical gatherings at 10:30am and 6:30pm – Stephen