Monday Morning Mail, 17th December 2012

By -

Loving God | Loving Each Other | Loving our Community

Good Morning!


We are well and truly getting near Christmas now! Several groups have already had their Christmas dinners, and last night we had our first Carol Service of the year in the Duke of Cambridge pub. A great time was had by all – I know I had several really good conversations with folk who are thinking of coming to (or back to!) St Jude's. So be encouraged as we invite folk along to the Christmas services!


Yesterday morning, Philip began our new series in Luke reminding us of the story of the angel Gabriel appearing to Zechariah and then to Mary, the fact of the Virgin Conception and the way that it all points forwards to Jesus. What really struck me was how spiritually dry Zechariah must have felt. He kept on praying and holding on, but he didn't really expect God to do anything any more. All that was left for him was retirement and childless obscurity. And yet God remembered (that's what Zech's name means). God remembered him; God remembered his people Israel, and God sent an angel to tell Zech that the waiting was nearly over. So when we feel dry – when we feel like we have been waiting for so long for God to answer our prayers for those close to us, then be encouraged, because God remembers; he does not forget his people. Hold on! Christmas is coming!


Christmas services @ St Jude's:


Sunday 23rd December:

9:15am Traditional Communion

11am Morning Worship

6:30pm Community Carol Service


Monday 24th December

3pm Nativity Service

11:15pm Midnight Communion


Tuesday 25th December

10:30am Christmas Family Communion


Have a great last week before Christmas!

John

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mapperley Monday Morning Mail, 18th March 2013

By -
Image
Loving God | Loving Each Other | Loving our Community Good Morning! It's been another busy week at St Jude's. Many thanks to all who came along to the men's breakfast on Saturday, and even more thanks to those who brought friends! One of the things I'm really passionate about for the life of St Jude's is that we get better at building friendships and inviting folk along to events where they can meet other Christians and hear more about Jesus. But more of that anon... If you'd like to hear the talk I did on "Does Jesus fit with science?", there's a link here or listen via the church website . Yesterday morning we finished our morning series on Leviticus 1-7 with a look at the instructions for the priests in Lev 6-7. If we ever have the privilege of meeting the Queen, she has the right to say how we should dress, bow and so on. And in the same way, when we come to worship God, he has the absolute right to say how we s...
Read more

Mapperley Monday Morning Mail, 4th August 2014

By -
Good Morning! Yesterday, all three services in different ways pointed to the way that we can trust God to provide for us. In both morning services, we were looking at the feeding of the 5000. Jesus is exhausted and wanting to grieve after the murder of his friend and cousin; his disciples are tired out after having just been on a mission trip, and the crowd are hungry and tired having been following Jesus all day and found themselves in the wilderness late in the day. In all three cases, they give what they have to God and seek to serve him even when tired, and he provides more than abundantly for them. That's also similar to what we saw in Psalm 11 last night. David was facing an uncertain situation, with secret plots against him, and his friends were "encouraging" him to run for the hills. When we are in difficult situations, we always face a choice between faith and fear. Faith for David meant looking to God, remembering that God is on...
Read more

Resources for Daily Bible Reading

By -
Image
Here are some of the best online resources for daily Bible reading... Explore do a free app for iPhone / Android. The King's English works through famous phrases from the King James Bible Robert Murray M'Cheyne's Bible reading plan is a good way of working through the Bible in a year (New Testament twice). Or you can do it at half speed and cover the NT once a year and the OT once every 2 years. For the Love of God is a brilliant series of books which provide helpful devotional thoughts on one of the passages from M'Cheyne's plan as a blog. It lets you do the plan at either full speed or half speed. You version is a Bible reading app for mobile phones with built in Bible reading plans. I don't use any of those. Personally, I find internet-enabled devices too much of a distraction when trying to read the Bible. But I know some people might find them helpful...
Read more