These are the days of Elijah

by

THESE ARE THE DAYS OF ELIJAH                                                                                                                As I was sat social distancing, on the top of a hill recently, (my dog was much more than 2 metres away from me!!) there was a sense of warmth, beauty and calmness in this crazy time that we are living…….yet there were no sounds except the song of the birds; no aeroplanes in the sky; no sound of traffic, no people passing by. A quiet eeriness, and a feeling that although the world was at a standstill, God was still here.                              

Because the world was at a standstill, I could hear God more clearly. God was still God. He was still here even though nobody else was …….we are being stripped bare but God was still here and he was showing himself through his creation

And then the words came into my head: “Here on this earth these are the days of Corona” then straightaway, ‘These are the days of Elijah’  I took out my phone, the only link with human kind I had for an hour and a half, (my children say I should always carry it!) and found the song:

These are the days of Elijah                                                   
Declaring the word of the Lord,                                              
And these are the days of Your servant, Moses                      
Righteousness being restored                                                                                           

These are the days of great trials                                          
Of famine and darkness and sword                                          
Still we are the voice in the desert crying                              
Prepare ye the way of the Lord !

Behold He comes, riding on the clouds
Shining like the sun, at the trumpet’s call
Lift your voice, (it’s) the year of Jubilee
Out of Zion’s hill, salvation comes

And these are the days of Ezekiel
The dry bones becoming as flesh;
And these are the days of Your servant David
Rebuilding a temple of praise

And these are the days of the harvest
Oh, the fields are as white in Your world
And we are the labourers in Your vineyard
Declaring the word of the Lord!

This time now, more evidently than ever for me, is for Righteousness to be restored; for us as Christians to be those voices in the desert bringing a cry of hope and salvation and rebuilding a Temple of praise, not particularly in our churches, for we cannot do that at the moment but in peoples’ lives, in our communities and ultimately in the world.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Linda Dytham  March 2020

Palm Sunday – make a cross

by

This Sunday coming – 5th April – is Palm Sunday.

Usually on Palm Sunday as you enter the church you would be given a palm cross to wave. That’s not really possible this year, so instead, I’m going to ask you to be creative. If you want to join in, please follow the instructions on this page. You will need a suitably-coloured sheet of paper or card. I’ll also go through the instructions for you on Sunday in case anyone cannot work out what to do.

Then be ready to wave it joyfully on Sunday.

Looking forward to “seeing” you then.

Matt

29th March services

by

Services are now available via the “Online Services” page. However, if you prefer to download the video to watch offline, please use the links on this page.

This week I have two service options for you.

If you would like the full service of Holy Communion, please click here. There is also an order of service to download and print available here, but everything you need is also on the screen.

If you would like a shorter service with more modern songs, please click here.

If you struggle to hear my sermon, you can find a similar text here.

I hope you find something you can use.

With love, Matt

Online services

by

My intention is to upload a service for you to watch each week. There will always be a service of Holy Communion, but I hope to add some less formal or shorter services as well. Do come back to this site each week to download the latest service(s).

Because most of the services have copyrighted music and words in them, I have had to buy licences which permit the use of this material on a website. The copyright holders have been very generous, but their intention is to enable people who would or might otherwise attend our churches in person to do so online. Please respect these limits. If you wish to share the videos more widely, please use the version without the songs which are not subject to copyright.

Message from Matt

by

Dear Friends

As you are aware, we have now had to close our church buildings completely for the foreseeable future. These are sad times for all of us, not just those who attend church regularly.

But there are things we can do. So let me draw your attention to three of them:

1 Please stay at home as much as possible. This saves lives. It is the single most useful thing each of us can do.

2 Be proactive in offering or asking for help. There are some who will slip through the official system. If that is you, please ask for help. And if we keep in touch with our neighbours, they shouldn’t slip through the net either.

3 Join us in prayer and worship. We can no longer gather physically, but we are hoping to make a number of services available for you to read, listen to or watch. Keep coming back to this site for more information.

I am praying for you every day, as are many others around you. If there is anything specific for which we can pray, do please let me know.

With every blessing

Matt