cotets - eston...cotets 2 first & foremost4 @churchlive 6 star wars & the lord’s prayer 8...

C O N T E N T S

2 First & Foremost

4 @ChurchLive

6 Star Wars & The Lord’s Prayer

8 Top Bible Stories: The Ten Commandments

10 Another Wrong Train

12 Puzzle Corner

14 Laughter Lines

16 Evangelism Research

18 The Holocaust

20 The King’s Seal

22 Waiting on God

24 2016

25 Agatha Christie

AMBASSADOR MAGAZINE - THE PARISH OF ESTON WITH NORMANBY - CHRIST CHURCH AND ST GEORGE AMBASSADOR MAGAZINE - THE PARISH OF ESTON WITH NORMANBY - CHRIST CHURCH AND ST GEORGE 1b

rebuilds us bit by bit, or brick by brick so to speak, and we begin to resemble the person God intended us to be.

Do you want to reach your intended potential?

We are all God’s children and all have a purpose. We just have to be willing to allow God to take the pieces of our lives and assemble them to His design.

Allow Him to work in you and begin to fulfil your potential and purpose.

BlessingsWe held a service in the

church at Beamish to celebrate its opening and we heard from Beamish staff about the process of the rebuild, including the installation of Georgian pews from a church in Somerset.

Beamish told us that they hoped we would find it as much of a home at the museum as we did when it was in Eston and for those with a faith their wish was that we

Just before Christmas we had a special invite from Beamish

museum to help celebrate the opening of their new exhibit: the newly rebuilt St Helen’s Church, formerly of Eston cemetery.

The day was quite special and it was extremely heart-warming to see this local building restored. I would say restored to its former glory but it is far better than I ever remembered it.

St Helen’s had fallen into disuse and, in the late 1990’s, was attacked by arsonists leaving only the building shell. This was then repeatedly vandalised and looted for its stonework (probably for local rockery gardens).

B e a m i s h m u s e u m t h e n stepped in and the church was dismantled brick by brick, after being carefully numbered, and spent most of the next ten years on pallets in a car park. It was then reassembled with meticulous precision, even positioning the chancel arch slightly off centre as it was originally.

continue to see it as a spiritual centre whenever we choose to visit.

This whole moment got me thinking. The Bible tells us that each of us has gone our own way. We have all strayed from God’s original design for our lives. Our lives are broken, dismantled and destroyed even if we do not at first realise it.

When we surrender to God He works with us and, just as St Helen’s was moved from Eston to Beamish, we are transported from a world of sin and destruction into the Kingdom of the Son He loves. Our Heavenly Father does not wait for us to be perfect. God then

AMBASSADOR MAGAZINE - THE PARISH OF ESTON WITH NORMANBY - CHRIST CHURCH AND ST GEORGE AMBASSADOR MAGAZINE - THE PARISH OF ESTON WITH NORMANBY - CHRIST CHURCH AND ST GEORGE 32

St Helen’s Church as it was in Eston

St Helen’s Church now at Beamish

museum

Th e C h u r c h o f E n g l a n d i s par tnering with

Twitter UK to broadcast services across the world, using mobile technology.

ChurchLive, was created in conjunction with Twitter UK as a way of showcasing a broad range of live church services to global audiences, simply and accessibly, through use of a smartphone. ChurchLive could be the first taste of Church for those unfamiliar with church services and an introduction to the best of worship, preaching and prayer. ChurchLive will also enable other people to rediscover church in a new way or, for those in other countriesto learn more about Church of England services.

T h e R e v A r u n A r o r a , Director of Communications for the Archbishops’ Council said: “This is a project designed to bring Church of England services from Malton to Miami, Middlesbrough to Milan and M a n c h e s t e r t o M u m b a i . Those who may not make it to church on a Sunday for all sorts of reasons will have the opportunity to be part of a service. The ability to join in worship shouldn’t be restricted to geographical constraint.

We know that Per iscope users are a global audience and we expect that there will be as many watching services broadcast via Periscope as are physically present at the services themselves.” The Periscope app is available on android and iphone and broadcasts live video to the world.

Earlier this year parishioners at one v i l lage church, St R a d e g u n d ’ s C h u r c h i n Grayingham, in the Diocese of Lincoln, were joined by another 350 people around the world for their regular traditional Sunday service after becoming the first to experiment with Periscope.

Julia White from Twitter UK, said: “Periscope gives people and communities the opportunity to live broadcast everything from on-the-spot

breaking news through to individual ref lections. It ’s great to see the Church of England taking the best of what they have to offer and using Periscope to show it live across the world.”

Tallie Proud, Digital Officer for The Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England said: “It could be someone too ill to attend, a family who want to ‘attend’ even when on holiday or someone who just wants to know what the church is l ike before they make the sometimes scary step of walking into the building for the first time.”

“@ChurchLive” will see a different church in the Church of England broadcast a live weekly service to global audiences via the Periscope app over the course of a year.


England is absolutely full of people like me who make mistakes, but who have a change of heart or who are led to repentance and forgiveness. I hope the next step would be for the people who run DCM: Odeon, Vue and Cineworld, to show the strength of leadership, to recognise they’ve made a mistake, have a change of heart and reconsider their decision”.

Unknown opponents then attempted to bring down the website and f ill it with spam messages. They failed. So in spite of everything, people who want to pray can still learn the ‘Our Father’ by visiting www.justpray.co.uk. Star Wars movies,

from 1977 to the present, dramatise

the conf lict between good and evil. Drawing on themes from various religions and locating fictional events in an imaginary galaxy ‘long ago and far away’, Star W a r s f e a t u r e a l i e n creatures, robots and the now famous Jedi, who represent good, versus the Sith who are evil. An omnipresent energy, known as the ‘Force’ is said to bind the galaxy together.

Some people are so hooked on Star Wars that a number actually declare their religion to be ‘Jedi’. 176,632 people in England and Wales did that on their 2011 Census forms.

So, when the latest in the Star Wars pop-culture series was scheduled for screening just before Christmas last year, it offered an ideal opportunity to remind cinema audiences of the importance of prayer in the real world, by drawing their attention to a brand new website www.justpray.co.uk.

A one-minute advertisement was made by the Church of England, with a wide range of people simply saying or singing the words of the Lord’s Prayer, leading to the website. The video was paid for by the Allchurches Trust and approved by the British

Board of Film Classif ication. The company selling the cinema advertising space, Digital Cinema Media, actually said they would give a discount of 55% on their standard advertising rate. Months later, with no explanation for their change of mind, they issued rules which would exclude religious advertising on the grounds that it might offend.

News of this extraordinary ban hit the UK headlines, then went round the world. Within days, more than a million people had seen the video on YouTube and the justpray and other websites.

Director of Communications for the Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England, the Revd Arun Arora, said: “the Church of


The computers that we use on a daily basis

have thousands of component parts which can go wrong. We need the Maker’s instructions to guide us when things go wrong and show us how to get the most out of them.

Human beings are also wonderfully complex, physically, psychologically and spiritually. We also have a Maker’s handbook to show us how God wants us to live. This is the 10 commandments, which God gave to Moses on Mt Sinai. ‘And God spoke all these words: ‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery’’. (Exodus 20:1,2).

If we want to grow to become

more like God, we have to take seriously the Commandments in our lives. The rest of the Bible could be described as God’s repair manual, spelling out the gospel of grace that restores sin-damaged human beings to relationship with God.

How should we approach the 10 Commandments today? You may say ‘I try to take them seriously, but every day I fail somewhere.’ We have to admit our weaknesses, but we can turn to God for pardon and forgiveness. In the power of the Spirit, Christ brings us a new kind of life, in which our heart’s deepest desire will be to go God’s way and obedience will no longer be a burden.

God says ‘I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.’ (Jeremiah 31:33). The word of command becomes a promise of obedience.


It has happened again! Last night I received a call from our daughter who instead of

heading back to Nottingham where she is based, found herself London-bound. I would have thought such an error to be impossible given all the experience of travelling around the UK that Beth has accumulated over the last eighteen months. I would also have thought that the fact that Beth’s younger brother made an accidental eighty-mile, two-hour detour by rail less than a fortnight earlier would have been fresh in her mind, and that caution would have been exercised when boarding trains. Alas no!

Beth was on mission all last week working at schools in Lichfield with the Youth for Christ Nomad team. She then remained in the Lichfield area and spent the weekend as a leader at a residential event for girls aged 11-18. This is the second year Beth has been a leader at this event and somehow she spent most of the Saturday night talking with old friends instead of sleeping. The lack of sleep combined with the excitement that comes after a successful seven days deployed by God on mission was Beth’s excuse for not noticing that the train she had boarded was going the wrong way.

The first thing I noticed about the second recent wrong train experience in our family is that when something goes wrong the first thing our children do is

phone home. While fully aware that it is their mistake and that they have to sort it out, they immediately seek help from their parents who they naturally expect to have more experience. They do not need criticism from us, only encouragement, support and guidance. We have all made mistakes and we will all continue to make mistakes of varying magnitudes and consequences. Getting things wrong is a very human trait. The challenge is not in the making of the mistake but in how we handle it. It is also in who we turn to in each moment of need, and whether we learn from each mistake. While John and Beth both turned instinctively to their human parents, I would like to think that they also turned to God. I know that I was praying and Googling simultaneously as I tried to find how out they could best get where they needed to be.

Beth was a bit late arriving back in Nottingham last night, but she took

it all in her stride. Having made it safely home, I hope that she took the opportunity to rest after a busy seven days devoted to serving God with children and young people in Lichfield. That’s another thing wrong train experiences have to teach us. There is always a time that we need to rest. God does not expect us to work 24/7, He expects us to rest, and He expects us to take time with Him to allow Him to recharge our batteries – as modelled by Jesus who never boarded the wrong train (or the then equivalent).


CROSSWORD

LAST MONTH’S SOLUTIONS

SUDOKU

PUZZLE CORNER

ACROSS1 Paul said the wrath of God ‘is being revealed from heaven’ against this (Romans 1:18) (11)9 Go smite (anag.) (7) 10 ‘But — I have risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee’(Matthew 26:32) (5) 11 ‘Take and —; this is my body’ (Matthew 26:26) (3) 13 Type (2 Thessalonians 2:10) (4) 16 ‘Woe to those who — iniquity’ (Micah 2:1) (4) 17 ‘How shall we — if we ignore such a great salvation?’ (Hebrews 2:3) (6) 18 Opposite of evens (4) 20 Previously cited (Latin) (4)21 ‘There is surely — — of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife’ (Genesis 20:11) (2,4)22 The Thessalonians were warned to keep away from every brother who was this (2 Thessalonians 3:6) (4)

23 Beat (anag.) (4) 25 To trouble or afflict (Job 16:3) (3) 28 Part of a roof (1 Kings 7:9) (5) 29 Attain (Job 5:12) (7) 30 Insect noted for its gymnastic ability (Psalm 78:46) (11)

DOWN2 Smell (John 11:39) (5) 3 Lion’s home (Jeremiah 25:38) (4) 4 ‘Jesus Christ is the — yesterday and today and for ever’ (Hebrews 13:8) (4) 5 Tidy (4)6 Made their home (Genesis 47:27) (7) 7 Their task was to carry the

curtains of the tabernacle (Numbers 4:25–26) (11) 8 Timothy’s was called Lois (2 Timothy 1:5) (11) 12 The Lover likened the fragrance of the Beloved’s breath to these (Song of Songs 7:8) (6) 14 Times Educational Supplement (1,1,1) 15 Eight-tentacled sea creatures (6) 19 ‘And lead us not into temptation, but — us from the evil one’(Matthew 6:13) (7) 20 D.L. Moody’s legendary song leader, — D. Sankey (3) 24 Rarely used musical note (5) 25 ‘Your will be done on earth — it — in heaven’ (Matthew 6:10) (2,2) 26 and 27 ‘The Lord Almighty will — them with a — , as when he struck down Midian at the rock of Oreb’ (Isaiah 10:26) (4,4) 27 See 26 Down


“Are you light-headed?” my colleague asked.“No,” the caller answered, “I’m a brunette.”

SoftlyA churchwarden went to the Police Station wishing to see the burglar who had slipped in and out of the church during evensong. “You’ll get your chance in court,” said the Desk

Sergeant.“I don’t want revenge,” said the man. “I want to know how he got out of the service early without the vicar noticing. I’ve been trying to do that for years!”

The puppyA clergyman was walking down the street when he came upon a group of about a dozen boys, surrounding a small puppy. Concerned lest the boys were hurting it, he went to investigate. One boy explained, “We just found this puppy, and we all want him. So we’ve decided that whichever one of us can tell the biggest lie will get to take him home.”The minister was taken aback. “Don’t you boys know it’s a sin to lie? Why, when I was your age, I never told a lie.” There was dead silence for a moment. The minister thought he had got through to them. Then the smallest boy gave a deep sigh and said, “All right, give him the dog.”

Are you taking a mid-winter break? If you are preparing to take off for foreign climes, do keep an eye out for signs that have English words… but perhaps not an English meaning! In hotels and train stations and airports all over the world there are polite little signs that will bring a smile to the lips of even an exhausted traveller. For instance, how about these:Switzerland: We have nice bath and are very good in bed.Romania: The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret you will be unbearable.Russia: If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to it.Italy: If service is required, give two strokes to the maid and three to the waiter.Spain: Our wine list leaves you with nothing to hope for.Denmark: In the event of fire, open a window and announce your presence in a seemly manner.Canary Islands: If you telephone for room service you will get the answer you deserve.

Up and downA psychiatrist was training some young clergy who were interested in doing counselling. Deciding to test them,

she asked: “How would you diagnose someone who visits your church, walks back and forth, screaming at the top of his lungs one minute, and then collapsing in a pew to weep uncontrollably the next?” A young man at the back of the room raised his hand and ventured: “a football coach?”

Light A fellow nurse at my hospital received a call from an anxious woman. “I’m diabetic and I’m afraid I’ve had too much sugar today,” she said.


‘Facts are friends!’ That was the message from

Rt Rev Mike Hill, Bishop of Bristol, when presenting the ‘Talking Jesus’ report to the Church of England’s recent session of General Synod. (www.talkingjesus.org)

He said we need to change the flow. Instead of asking how to get people to come to church, ‘we need to go out sensitively and willingly talking about our faith’.

The report, which explores people’s percept ions of Jesus, Christians and evangelism in England, showed that 40% of people do not even realise that Jesus was a real person. However, more than half of non-Christians have had a conversation with a practicing Christian about faith in Jesus (57%). Having had that conversation, of those who had not become a Christian, one in five (19%) still wants to know more about Jesus Christ.

Bishop Mike said, ‘The best kind of communication that we do person to person is with those people with whom we are in relationship. We are not talking about insensitive

not talking to others about their faith. And we found that more people are interested than I ever imagined. The survey shows that followers of Jesus are good friends and they are fun. We can take confidence from this.”

She drew Synod’s attention to the statistics which show that only one per cent of the population knows a church leader. “The task of evangelism has to be enabling all the people in our congregations – who are in touch with 67% of the population – to talk about Jesus.”

And she added that already more under-34-year-old non-Christians know a practising Christian (who is their peer, not their grandma) than any other age group. Also, 18-34 year olds are more active in sharing their faith.

Dr Jordan is part of the team that commissioned the research on behalf of churches across the spectrum of Christian denominations. Roy Crowne, executive director of HOPE, Steve Clifford, general director of the Evangelical All iance, and Yemi Adedeji, associate director for HOPE and director of the Evangelical Alliance’s One People Commission, also attended the Synod presentation.

Roy Crowne said: “The results are a game-changer for churches wanting to share the good news of Jesus. We often hear reports of declining church numbers, but this survey shows that Christianity in England is full of life, and many people are passionate about sharing their faith. Yes, there are some big challenges for

approaches. We are talking about the right time and in the right way. The antidote to poor witness is not no witness, but good witnessing.

“Facts are friends. Even if we don’t like the facts, what we need to do is to define reality before we can make any impact on that reality. There is evidence here that we can go out, sensitively and willingly to live and speak our faith, and that this might be a game-changer for some people.”

The report, commissioned by the Church of England, HOPE, and the Evangelical Alliance, has surprised church leaders. I t showed that most non-Christians already know a practising Christian (67%); a friend (40%) or family member (34%) who they would describe with words like: friendly, caring, good humoured, generous, encouraging and hopeful.

W h e n p e o p l e d o b e c o m e Christians, 41% say that they were influenced by growing up in a Christian family, 36% by a conversation with a Christian, 28% by attending a church service, and 27% by reading the Bible.

Commenting on the report, Dr Rachel Jordan, national adviser for mission and evangelism for the Church of England, said “We did this research because we thought Christians were

churches to face, but the report has given us insights which we can use to help Christians to talk about Jesus relevantly and effectively.”

Steve Cl i fford said: “ There are challenges for our schools as well as for our churches. There is overwhelming evidence in the New Testament and from independent, non-biblical sources indicating Jesus was a historical figure. That nearly 40% of people in this country are unsure of this or think Jesus was a mythical character paints a worrying picture of our education system. While it’s great to see that non-Christians think positively of Jesus, it would be even better if they realised the significance of His life, death and resurrection for their own lives today.”

Yemi Adedeji said: “This invaluable research will give confidence to churches from across denominations, regions and ethnicities and the insight it provides will enable us to answer the questions people are asking of us, not the ones we think they are.”


International Holocaust Remembrance Day is observed every 27th

January – the day on which Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp, was liberated in 1945.

This annual commemoration was established by a resolution of the United Nations General Assembly in 2005, but the first Holocaust Remembrance Day was actually observed 20 years ago this month, in Germany. It has been observed in Britain since 2001.

T h e U n i t e d N a t i o n s resolution, which was promoted by the state of Israel, aims to

honour the memory of Holocaust victims, and encourages the development of educational programmes about Holocaust history to help prevent future acts of genocide. It condemns all religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against individuals or communities based on ethnic origin or religious belief.

Despite this, anti-Semitism has not died, and many Jewish people have fears about their future in Europe. Often attacks against Jews stem from both far-right extremists and from Muslims: a recent poll by the Anti-Defamation League revealed that an average of 55 per cent of Western European Muslims harboured anti-Semitic attitudes.

There are approaching 300,000 Jews in Britain, and according to the Community Secur i ty Trust , 2014 saw the highest number of anti-Semitic incidents here since its monitoring began in 1984. It recorded 1168, more than double the number in 2013.

But while there may be fear in some areas on the streets, in France, Belgium and Germany leaders have recently been outspoken against anti-Semitism, with notable emotional speeches from German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel and the French

leaders President Hollande and Prime Minister Manuel Valls.

In Britain Prime Minister David Cameron made a pledge to protect Jewish communities in a video message to mark the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, in September last year. Remarking on “the tragic loss of life that we have seen following a number of horrific and abhorrent anti-Semitic attacks”, he added: “Jewish communities will not be left to live in fear. I will do everything I can to stamp out such hatred now and in the future.”


I find it interesting how different people deal with the same thing in

a different way to make a living. Take rubbish for instance, some dump it, some recycle it and others build a career and an international reputation by trawling through it piece by piece. We call the dumpers Refuse Collectors, the recyclers Guardians of the Planet and the others Archaeologists.

According to a recent press release (Dec 2015), a team of archaeologists have become very excited over a tiny piece of rubbish they found while working in an ancient dump, alongside the walls of old Jerusalem. It was an oval shaped ‘bulla’, an ancient

clay seal. This is not the only bulla that they have found there, so why the excitement? The back of this oval clay seal bore markings of thin cords that were used to tie a papyrus document. Interesting, but hardly what I would call exciting. However, the front imprint states in ancient Hebrew script: “Belonging to Hezekiah [son of ] Ahaz king of Judah.” Wow! This half-inch wide lump of clay whisks us back through more than 2700 years of history to

one of Israel’s greatest kings. This is part of how he is described in the Bible: “Hezekiah trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel. There was no-one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before him or after him. He held fast to the Lord and did not stop following him; he kept the commands the Lord had given Moses. And the Lord was with him; he was successful in whatever he undertook. He rebelled against the king of Assyria and did not serve him.” (2Ki 18:5-7)

It has to be said that this is not the only Hezekiah seal known to exist, but it is the first to have been found during a scientific, archaeological excavation, rather than at a car boot sale somewhere. So it definitely isn’t a fake. A king’s seal was never used lightly, so whatever this seal was attached to may well have been a matter of life or death. The mark was most likely made by a ring worn on a finger on the hand of the king himself. Nobody messes with something sealed by a king because the king’s seal signified ownership and/or authority.

That is still the case now and more importantly, that is still the case for us. The Apostle Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus and declared that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit (Eph 1:13). Yes, the Holy Spirit himself is the seal, not an inert lump of clay. Further, we

are sealed not on the outside but on the inside. The Holy Spirit in the soul of the believer is God’s seal, set on the heart to testify that we are God’s property. How wonderful is that?

The seal may be inside of us, but we can’t keep Him there, hidden away. God call us all to share what we have and to testify to His name in both words and actions. When we do that the seal becomes visible to others. Just as all those years ago, someone could look at a papyrus document and see that it belonged to the king, so it should be with us. When others look at us they should be able to see the mark and know we belong to the king. Let’s go a little further with this. It isn’t just a case of saying that they should be able to see that we belong to the king, but they must. The real question to ask is, “How could they not see?”

There’s more. We are sealed not just by the king, but by the King of kings, and not just for a mere 2700 years but for eternity. Now I think that is something well worth getting excited about.


wait is a long one, it can often instigate feelings of frustration, disappointment and sometimes even anger.

It has got me thinking though. Sometimes I feel the same way with issues of faith and in my relationship with God. Many times I have asked God for help and, even some times when I have received a promise from God, I feel like I am being kept in a waiting room because nothing happens.

The same feelings bubble to the surface: f rustrat ion, d isappointment and anger.

Over the New Year period, I developed an ulcer on the

cornea of my eye. It was extremely painful to begin with and, after spending three and a half hours in Eye Casualty at the hospital, I came away with a few weeks’ supply of antibiotic eye drops.

After seeing that initial doctor and being diagnosed I was asked to come back at half past eight, two days later on the Saturday morning. I arrived well in time for this follow up appointment but, despite making sure I made the appointment on time, I wasn’t seen until an hour later.

This is often the case with general GP appointments too. Sometimes when you are kept waiting, especially when that

Sometimes even doubt needles its way into my spiritual hang ups. God is ok w i th these feelings however and we can see examples of people being left waiting in the Bible too which we can learn from.

M a r y a n d M a r t h a , f o r example, thought Jesus had left them waiting and, in fact, left it too late. His friend, and their brother, had died. If Jesus hadn’t left them waiting He would have made it in time and none of this would have happened. If only He had answered their call for help straight away He may have been able to heal Lazarus before he died like He had healed others. Jesus left Martha’s family waiting and His close friend died as a result.

Once He finally arrived, it seemed too late. A few days later, after they had been kept waiting, Jesus rolled away the stone of their disappointment, anger, doubt and grief. When Lazarus stepped out of his tomb, God received all the glory. Not for healing like before, but this time for raising the dead – something far greater than they had ever hoped for.

You may feel like you have been kept wai t ing and are struggling with some of the above feelings and emotions. If so, please try to be still and know that God is in control. Sit back, relax and let God be God. It’s not easy but you will learn a valuable lesson in trusting the God who is in control of the whole universe.

Peace.


A poll conducted last year of the top New Ye a r r e s o l u t i o n s

included: getting healthier (63%); drinking less alcohol (57%); losing weight (34%); getting out of debt (26%) and stopping smoking (22%). However, what are our resolutions for 2016?

Do we want to spend more time reading the Bible and praying? How can we do this? Do we want to be a better spouse? How might we express our love to our spouse? Do we want to be a better parent? How can we demonstrate our commitment to the children? Do we want to make more impact at work? How can we demonstrate an attractive faith to colleagues?

When the people of God stood on the banks of the Jordan ready to cross to the Promised Land they

were assured, ‘you have never been this way before’ (Joshua 3:4). At the beginning of a New Year, we don’t know the future and how we will keep our resolutions. What can we learn from their example?

Keep your focus on God: The people were told to follow the Ark, symbolising God’s presence, as they crossed the river. Let’s keep our focus on God and His Word throughout this year and keep in step with where He is leading.

Consecrate yourselves: Joshua said, ‘Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do amazing things among you.’ (3:5). God has exciting opportunities ahead for us in this coming year! Let us dedicate our lives afresh to Him, as we let go of known sin and keep our eyes open on seeing God at work in all of our lives.

Will 2016 be a good year for us? ‘In the end, it’s not the years in your

life that count. It’s the life in your years.’ (Abraham Lincoln)

Dame Agatha Christie, the crime novelist who is probably as widely

known as any modern writer in English, died 40 years ago, on 12 January 1976. Not least among her achievements is her play The Mousetrap, still in the West End after more than 26,000 performances. In its 64th year, it is the longest running show of any kind in the world.

But most people encounter Dame Agatha as author of one of her many detective novels, often featuring either Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple. She also wrote a series of six romance novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, and 19 plays. Thirty of her detective novels were turned into films, and she wrote over 80 books in all.

Her detective novels have been described as both moral and theological, in that guilt and justice

are at their core. It has also been pointed out that hers was a profoundly Christian world.

She was baptised into the Church of England and kept a copy of The Imitation of Christ at her bedside – as did her amateur sleuth, Jane Marple. Her outlook was conservative.

Born Agatha Miller in Devon in 1890, she lost her father at the age of 11 and went to finishing school in Paris. She married Archibald Christie, an aviator, in 1914, but by 1926 he wanted a divorce and Agatha disappeared, abandoning her car on a cliff. She was found 11 days later at a Harrogate hotel, registered under the name of her husband’s mistress.

The couple divorced in 1928 and Agatha took to travelling. She met her second husband, archaeologist Max Mallowan, a big fan of hers and considerably younger, at a dig site in Ur. She married him in 1930 and they remained happily married. His work inspired many of her subsequent plots.


Parish Office and AdministrationSpencer Road, Normanby, Middlesbrough. TS6 9BHEmail: [email protected]: 01642 281182

Parish Rector: Rev Julian G. Blakeley

Assistant Curate: Rev David Charlton

Parish Readers: Dianne Colbert / Jason Robinson / Keith Allison / Jane Robson

Parish Pastoral Worker: Joy Brunskill

Parish Secretary: Carol McIntosh

Parish Magazine Editor: Paul Wilson

A Warm Welcome awaits you should you wish to join us at any of our Services and if you require any further information then please do not hesitate to

contact the church office.

AMBASSADOR MAGAZINE - THE PARISH OF ESTON WITH NORMANBY - CHRIST CHURCH AND ST GEORGE26

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