Alpha Courses

St John’s will be hosting their next Alpha Course at SJ’s in the New Year. However, if you are unable to commit to evening meetings, there is an opportunity coming up to attend a course that will be running over lunchtime.

 Starting on 4 October, St Francis Church will be giving people the chance to explore the Christian faith through Alpha. The sessions will start at 12:30pm and be done by 2:30pm, to allow for the school pick up. There will be also be facilities for accompanying children. The meetings will run on a Friday with the following dates currently planned:

 4, 18, 25 October                            8, 22, 29 November

6, 13 December

 To register your interest, speak to Jon or get in direct contact with Hazel at St Francis on hazelos58@gmail.com or 020 8777 5034.

Book Recommendation

If you view the Summer as a chance to catch up on some non-work-related reading, then can I add a ‘God book’ to your list of must reads. It’s ‘Dirty Glory’ by the author Pete Greig, champion of the 24-7 Prayer Movement.

 It’s a very accessible follow up to ‘Red Moon Rising’ and continues to chart the 24-7 story, as it has gained momentum across the globe. Full of personal and honest stories, it’s not only a testimony to God’s faithfulness, but an inspiring call to any Jesus follower not to settle for less and coast it in our Christian walk. It’s a big claim, but I am pretty sure that if everyone in the church read this and responded, it would change us dramatically – what we do, and how we do it.  As one of the chapter closes:

 May I have the courage today

To live the life that I would love

And waste my heart on fear no more.

(John O’Donohue)

'The Turning' Initiative

‘The Turning’, wait for it, is a simple street evangelism programme, which began in a Baptist church in Reading a few years ago. It has now been rolled out across the country among a variety of church traditions and this autumn it’s coming to London, with Bromley taking something of a lead.  It’s actually become a project of the ‘Transform Bromley Borough’ initiative, to bring together as many of the churches of the Borough to impact the community.

 Bromley is breaking down into 5 hubs and Churches Together in West Wickham have agreed to the hub for ‘Hayes & West Wickham’. The initiative will begin on Saturday 21 September, with more details to follow. Aware of the mixed feelings evangelism can evoke, I hope you are encouraged by the ethos behind this initiative: “At the heart of this is not some form of technique which will magically enable effective witness to happen. Rather it’s a shared opportunity for us to allow God to change our mind-set -  to look outwards, build our confidence in our faith and witness, and really see our local community as a mission field.” Please start praying about it.

Thy Kingdom Come

You may recall this global initiative from last year – a focused 9 days of prayer between Ascension and Pentecost. The emphasis of the prayer is that God’s Spirit would empower his church to greater works of evangelism. We want to join in with this movement, so here are some of the ways to key in:

 ·         Write down the names of 5 people you know who are not Christians and pray for them every day during this period;

·         Every day at 9:30am, between Thursday 30 May to Friday 7 June, there will be prayer meetings at Coney Hill Baptist Church for all the churches across town;

·         We will post daily prayer prompts on our Facebook page during this period.

For further ideas, go to https://www.thykingdomcome.global/

Mental Health Awareness Week

Team Refresh

If you were unable to make the APCM last week, it was mentioned that in the coming weeks we will engage in a process to renew our Teams. Some of the steps will include:

i)                    Asking individuals if they are willing to step into Team Leader roles;

ii)                   Putting together a clear explanation of what each Team aims to do and how people can be involved;

iii)                 Give everyone an opportunity to step away from / step up to involvement in a particular team.

Please commit this to prayer – both for us collectively as a church family and how it impacts our mission, but also the individual response that you might make.

Churcher Family Farewell

Hopefully, you have all registered the fact that Peter’s last working day in the parish is on Easter Sunday.

 To give him and the family the send-off they deserve, we’ll be having a big tea and cake party immediately following the service on that day. We recognise that Easter will mean commitments for many of you, so we will bring the shedding of tears to an end in plenty of time for you to make it to any lunch engagements.

 That’s about all we can give away publicly (wink, wink), but it’s also worth reminding you of the date of Peter’s installation at his new job in Ilfracombe – 13 May, 7pm. If you were thinking of making the trip, or hoping to but weren’t sure how you might get there, please can you let Jon know so we can think about travel arrangements.

Autumn Scheduling

We’ve got an exciting few weeks coming up, with a few changes to our usual schedule. So here you go:

 28 October          We begin a new series exploring hospitality called ‘Table People’. We hope to demystify hospitality and recognise that so many encounters Jesus had happened around a meal table.

 4 November       We will be meeting in the Assembly Rooms for our 10:00am service. We’ll let you know nearer the time what we’ll be thinking about together, but for now, please note the change of venue.

 18 November    George Verwer, the founder of Operation Mobilisation, will be preaching at our 10:00am service. George is known for his passion for Christ and will challenge us in what it means to be a follower of Jesus.

Welcome, Welcome, Welcome

The greeting extends to one and all as we gather this morning to celebrate Harvest together. We make a couple of special mentions though. One, to our Uniformed Groups as they help us celebrate this annual festival – as always, it’s great to have you with us, and thank you for all the contributions that you make towards our collections.

 Two, it’s great to have the Simpson family and their friends in our midst, as they give thanks for Aaron and mark that with baptism. We hope you’re able to jump on board with the celebrations today, and it’s our privilege to share this special occasion with you.

 All of that makes for a fairly full service, but we hope the unifying mood is one of giving thanks to God for all that’s good in our lives.

Possible Openings

This week we have a selection of possible mission/job opportunities. Firstly, OM (Operation Mobilisation) are putting out a plea for people to deploy their everyday work skills in the mission field. It could be as a career break, or those moving towards retirement, but their Africa director is looking for people in the following areas:

• Financial Developer
• Personnel Manger & Personnel Officer
• Administrator
• PA to Associate Area Leaders

The place of work would be either South Africa or Zambia. They’re also looking for a financial manager and administrator in OM Malawi and OM Mozambique. If you’re interested then speak to Jon.

Southwark Diocese are also advertising a number of jobs at Trinity House and Southwark Cathedral via the Church of England Pathways Jobsite:

 http://southwark.anglican.org/about-us/vacancies/ The jobs include:

• Property Administrator & Part-time Admin Assistant
• Finance Officer & Choir Chaperones