September 2015 Newsletter
Hello,may you be aware of God’s presence. Blessings,Susanne
Climate change prayer and fast on 1st day of every month
Tuesday, 1st September: “Creator God, what a complex tapestry your creative fingers havewoven; We delight at the daily reminders of your creative power. This tapestry is closelyinterwoven, fragile, changing; changing too fast... Politicians bend and bow to meet national priorities while greenhouse gases build, oceans acidify and air streams shift. Forgive us for our lack of response; for seeing the scale of this crisis as reason not to engage. Grant that through our prayers your Holy Spirit may give wisdom, inspiration and resolve to our politicians, leaders and negotiators, enabling them to make the tough decisions necessary for all people to live, to hope and to shape a greener world. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.”
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PACT prayer for Petersfield
Thursday, 3rdSeptember from 2pm to 3.30pm (28 Moggs Mead): Every 1st Thursdayin the month.
Contact
Historic churches sponsored ride and stride
Saturday, 12th September from 10am-6pm: Travel on foot, by bicycle, car or scooter, or even use your bus pass. It is a great day out for a good cause. Last year, in the County enough was raised to enable grants of £49,000 to be allocated to 14 Hampshire churches, and this was after half of the sponsorship moneys had been returned for the use of the contributing churches! Perhaps we can do even better this year.
Cafe Church
Sunday, 13th September from 5-7pm (Costa Cafe)
Egypt – prayer request
Monday, 14th – Wednesday, 16th September: The Egyptian church will pray and fast for positive changes in their country and the region and have asked us to do the same. Egypt adopted a new constitution in 2014, which offers more rights for Christians and other minorities. However, individual Christians are still denied justice. Release plan to hand a petition to the Egyptian ambassador in London in autumn. The petition can be signed online:
CWR National Prayer Weekend
25th-27th September:The vision is to encourage church communities across the UK to form a national prayer grid. For more details, see
Changes in the management of the PACT Food Bank
Responding to the retirement of Brian Edwards as organiser of the Food bank after nearly five years of dedicated service, a small steering group has met to begin to put in place a modified system for running the Food Bank for the next stage of its development. The long-term plan is for stores to be housed in a new space to be created behind the Salvation Army premises. As an interim arrangement for the months before that is in place, goods will now be stored in the Methodist Church. However, distribution will continue via the Salvation Army building.
Things will inevitably be modified in the light of experience, but initially the proposal is to be open for the distribution of food on Tuesday and Friday mornings between 9.30am and 11.30am and to have a session for taking in and organising donated food on Monday afternoons between 2pm and 4pm. To run these sessions therefore we need two people three times a week. A team of 30 volunteers will mean that people will have to do, on average, just one session a month, though there can be flexibility around this. About 20 people signed up as volunteers at our open meeting in June, so there is still room for a few more. A couple more people for the steering group would also be a great help.If you would like to volunteer, please contact me on 01428 642787 or preferably on . All volunteers will receive some initial training and then be put on a rota for the various duties.
Please pray for the Food Bank in this period of changeover, for a resolution of the issues which remain to be settled, for those who volunteer to continue this valuable work as well as for those whose circumstances make this a necessary service to provide.
See:
Spiritual food for thought
“It’s easy for the gospel to be heard as though it is simply a ‘rescue’ package, rather than a recruitment for a new cause. A cause with a new Lord, a new mission and a new hope, only made possible through salvation.” (Neil Hudson in “Imagine church – Releasing whole-life discipleship”)