Welcome to our online worship service. Today we have a guest speaker all the way from Derbyshire, Rev Brian Nicholls and it is great to have him join us today. Brian is a member at Swanwick Baptist Church and amongst many other things is also Claire's Dad.
Don't forget to join us for after church coffee on zoom at 12.15pm. The link is here
During this week we have a number of things still happening - mostly electronically - in particular our Crafty Needles group is still running on Tuesday mornings via WhatsApp and facebook. Please get in touch if you want to connect. Evolve is running every other Wednesday evening - you can find their news here. We are also trying to keep in contact with one another during the week. If you need one of us to get in touch please contact us. We also continue to receive our Fareshare order on Monday and we're grateful for all those who are helping sort and deliver the food each Monday.
Coming up - this week we have our Leaders meeting via Zoom on Wednesday at 6.30pm. Please pray for us as we meet. Next week on Tuesday 28th at 6.30pm we will be holding a whole church zoom prayer meeting. We would love for you to join us - the link will be the same as our coffee link above.
If anyone is interested in an evening zoom Bible Study please message Claire as we hope to start one up soon.
Before we gather for worship at 11am you might want to start the morning listening to our youtube playlist
"Do you not know, Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understand no-one can fathom
He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint"
Easter Week was a strange week for many of us - I heard someone say that its easy to be in lockdown during lent, but when Easter comes? How do we celebrate?
The lock down has worn us all out and as we have come to many of our favourite seasons of the year, many of us have felt great feelings of disappointment.
The thing we have to remember though - the thing we have to celebrate - is that Easter tells us that the hope is always here. The hope never leaves us - that however we feel right now, the Lord will renew our strength.
As another three weeks of lockdown was announced I was reflecting on Psalm 23 - a familiar Psalm - a Psalm that keeps us going in the best and the worst of times. Use this as your prayer as we join together in worship. We will feast together again, because this will end.... but as we wait, the Lord, our Shepherd continues to never leave us forsake us on our journey.
Playlist for the service today (you might want to listen to the first three now and save the last two for before and after the sermon and prayers)
Our passage today is the Road to Emmaus. Here is an alternative telling of it:
You might want to think about how you'd tell your favourite stories of Jesus. If you are feeling creative why don't you do a story board of pictures of the different things that Jesus did. It would be great if you could share it with the rest of the church family when you've done it.
Here is Camille with todays reading from Luke 24:13-35
And here is Brian reflecting on that reading all the way from Derbyshire
Prayers
You might want to use this prayer as a framework of your prayers today. Pause as you pray to lift up those who are mentioned in prayer. This prayer is taken from Nick Fawcett's new book "For Such a Time as This" - you can find more details and the original post here
Thank you, Lord, for family at this time;
for loved ones, there to support us,
to demonstrate love and care in action,
to do what they can for us in time of need.
Thank you for friends;
those to whom our welfare really matters,
who seek to help us in whatever ways they can,
showing their concern,
compassion
and friendship,
not just through words
but through deeds.
Hear our prayer for those who do not have such support,
who are truly alone –
those for whom long days of isolation were already an all too frequent reality,
and who now feel cut off from all:
frightened,
helpless,
hopeless.
Reach out to them,
assuring them that you are by their side,
and help us too, in whatever ways we can,
to reach out likewise,
and show them they are not abandoned or forgotten.
Amen.
May the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all, now and for evermore. Amen.
Don't forget to join us on zoom!
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