sunday 12th july 2020 - stpetersparish.info sheet 12th july... · sam wolstencroft (ap entre...
TRANSCRIPT
Parish Office, St. Peter’s Parish Centre, 347 Church Road, Bolton BL1 5RR
Prayer Chain: Ruth 492637 [email protected]
www.stpetersparish.info St Peter’s Halliwell stpetershalliwell HalliwellParish
Parish Office: Open Mon to Fri 9.30am-3pm 0800 954 0781 [email protected]
Revd. Canon Paul Hardingham 848567 [email protected]
Revd. Dave Brae 847038 [email protected]
Revd. Craig Watson 458682 [email protected]
Revd. Oli Preston 465481 [email protected]
Paul Gray and Elian Winstanley (Wardens) [email protected]
Sarah Saxon (Youth Minister) 07718 0330845 [email protected]
Amanda Blease (Parish Business Manager) 599901 [email protected]
Sam Wolstencroft (CAP Centre Manager) 599903 / 07934 716509 [email protected]
WE HAVE A HOPE. DON'T GIVE UP
PRAISE
As we pray begin with praise. A worship song that comes to mind. Sing it out loud.
Today I choose to sing Way Maker, with words to encourage. "Way Maker. Promise Keeper, Miracle Worker, Light in the Darkness. My God that is who you are”.
GIVE THANKS
This will be personal to you. For kindness. Hope from others. Organisations. Opportunities. Individuals. Good news stories. Love received. Lift these to God with thanks for all that so many are doing.
ASK
Things are not the same. It all seems too big, too hard, too much to pray for. Where to start?
Romans chapter 8v26 says:
"In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express".
As you pray words may come, it may remain quiet or tears may fall. All is prayer released. Amen
Prayer Contributed by Hilary Peake, St. Peter’s
Welcome to St. Peter’s. We are 4 churches:
St. Peter’s, St. Andrew’s, Barrow Bridge and Smithills Fellowship
One Parish—One Church—One Vision
Sunday 12th July 2020
Church Without Walls - Live streaming of services
You are warmly invited to join us for our service LIVE at 10.30am each Sunday on Zoom, Facebook and YouTube.
Today’s YouTube link is: https://youtu.be/Yta46YgsSB0 . Click on the ‘Church Live’ image at www.stpetersparish.info to go straight to this service or subscribe to our YouTube channel at https://
www.youtube.com/channel/UCzQWhvQ8JMs5Mw-Y5rEq5Vw
Our service today
We are looking at Nehemiah 4: 10-23 and welcome Steve Walsh from St. Andrew's as our speaker. The subject is ‘Dealing with Discouragement’, and this is the last in the series. Next week we start a new series looking at Acts, beginning with Acts 3: 1-20. To support our Nehemiah Series, go to www.stpetersparish.info to see a video clip of a Bible overview of Nehemiah/Ezra, a reflective prayer sheet and some comprehensive notes and questions on each week’s sermons. We encourage you to use these person-ally and in your Neighbourhood Church or Connect Group. In this way we can discuss and pray about how God wants to move us forward , both individually and as church in moving out of lockdown.
We will also be interviewing Diane O’Keeffe today, who is stepping down from leading the team at St. Peter’s Toddler Group. She will be sharing some of the amazing opportunities that the group provides of sharing God’s love. We thank God for her commitment to this role and the part she has played in this exciting ministry. We are looking to develop the Toddler Group leadership team for when we are able to re-start sessions—if you are interested in becoming part of this team, please contact Paul.
Save the date: LIGHThouse will be zooming into your house next
Sunday, 19th July at 4.30pm. We will e-mail you the zoom code soon! If you are not currently receiving LIGHThouse emails, to be included please e-mail [email protected]
Meet the clergy and staff team: Sam Wolstencroft
Hello! I am Sam and I'm the debt centre manager for our CAP centre (Christians Against Poverty) and I also co-lead LIGHThouse, our children's ministry. I've been married to Jez for 25 years (this month!) and we have two sons, Jamie (20) and Joshua (18).
In what ways has lockdown affected you? On the whole I have appreciated the changes that lock down brought. I remember a Saturday early on when I spent the afternoon watching the Phantom of the Opera and finally opening a dusty adult colouring book! It felt decadent but I got over that quickly! I rested.... certainly at the beginning.
What have you learned about yourself during this time? That I love people and like to stay connected. It was a privilege to help set up the Neighbourhood churches. I feel fairly strongly that 'church life' after lockdown should be different. Neighbourhood Church is church on the move...active disciples is God's plan!
That I am opinionated (see above ha, ha). Sometimes it is 'holy discontent' but sometimes I am just bolshy and I am TRYING to be more gentle! Zoom doesn't help!
Tell us about a film, book or song that has encouraged you during lockdown: I'm not a film fan but have loved watching the box set of The Bridge! The book has to be Philippians - I have loved spending 15 Monday evenings studying this book with Tom Wright, Steph and 10 other people on Zoom. We have shared a lot, laughed a lot and learnt a lot. The song... Paul Saxon's 'Author of my Life' ... just beautiful and reminds me of the church family and singing in church.
Leaving gift for Oli, Joanne, Betty and Cayden If you would like to bless them,
please send contributions to St. Peter’s Parish Centre, 347 Church Road, Bolton, BL1 5RR (cheques payable to ‘St. Peter’s Halliwell’) Alternatively, you can make a BACS payment to:
A/C number 00030623, sort code 40-52-40. Please ensure you use ‘Oli Preston’ as the payment reference. Thank you.
Lahore Link Pandemic Appeal Christians in Lahore face real
challenges and require our help. Following a plague of locusts and the impact of coronavirus, the Christian community are suffering from food shortages as well as illness. Often they find that they do not receive aid from the government and rely on the support of other Christians in time of need. Children are seeing their education curtailed, and Christian schools are on the verge of collapse due to the lack of finance because all Christian schools in Pakistan are fee paying, so in lockdown they receive no funding at all. Manchester Diocese is supporting us in raising
funds to help our brothers and sisters who are in need in Lahore Diocese. Is God asking you to help? Go to the homepage of www.stpetersparish.info and scroll down to ‘Manchester - Lahore - Pandemic Appeal’ for more info, and an opportunity to support this cause.
‘Cuppa with the Curate’ - Starts this week!
Oli Preston’s last day with us here at St Peter’s Parish will be Sunday 26th July. The family hope to move to Bridlington in
mid-late August ready for starting his new post, school etc in early September.
It is sad not to be able to gather to celebrate Oli and the family’s time with us, but Oli and Joanne are extending an invitation for people to join them for a socially distanced cup of tea to say goodbye. Being outside, it will obviously be weather dependent, but hopefully we will have a few dry days! Oli says:
‘Join us for a careful cuppa, outside 29 Tattersall Avenue (next to St Andrew’s Church on
Johnson Fold), BL1 5TE at 2:30-4:30pm on Tues 14th, Thurs 16th, Sat 18th, Tues 21st, Thurs 23rd and Sat 25th July. We don’t plan to book time slots, so please be ready to wait or try a different time if there are already some people with us (we will need to keep to the government guidance on 2 metres social distancing and a maximum of 6 people from different households).
If none of these time slots works for you please feel free to phone/e-mail Oli to see if we can arrange something. It would be lovely to be able to see people in person to say our goodbyes!’
Re-opening of church for individual private prayer and Sunday services
St. Peter’s Church is open to members of all our 4 churches and the community for
individual private prayer on Wednesday evenings, 7.30—9pm. The seating in church has been re-organised in line with social distancing guidelines and systems put in place to ensure that the building is COVID-19 secure. All are welcome to come.
We are also opening up church for Sunday services, whilst maintaining our parish live streamed service on Sunday mornings at 10.30am. A copy of the Risk Assessment for Sunday services (approved by PCC) is available on the website. Only a very limited number of people are allowed in the building due to social distancing regulations and ensuring that
the building is COVID-19 secure. We are starting to hold a said service of Evening Prayer (with organ music, no singing) at 4pm in St. Peter’s Church from today. If you want to attend next Sunday’s service (19th), you must book your place in advance by e-mailing [email protected] or telephoning the office (0800 954 0781) so that we know the numbers of people wanting to attend.
Prayers for our local care homes Praise God! We are delighted to report that there
have not been any cases of coronavirus in Glenbank and Glenhome. They are still closed to visitors but have asked for our prayers that they remain virus-free. Please continue to keep them, and all the care homes in our parish and communities, in your prayers.