To everyone in Meltham – PLEASE SHARE. We are praying for you and your family and friends. Are you too looking for a simple way to pray for someone during these difficult times? Join the Meltham prayer campaign either online or at home which has been set up so that we can all pray for those we care about, love and miss.
You can make a simple prayer and encourage others to also join in by sharing on your social media and using the hashtag #melthamprays along with your prayer – e.g.
“I am praying for my Mum & Dad in isolation #melthamprays”
“I’d like to pray for the 84 year old widower I spoke to yesterday who told me how much he simply missed physical contact with anyone #melthamprays”
“I’m praying for the kids on our street who are missing playing out with each other #melthamprays”
You could also draw and colour-in a picture to display in your window – again to tell others you are praying and to encourage them to do also. Only use photos of people if you have their permission first.
Remember, anyone can pray…………for anyone!
Let’s pray for each other!
We will also have special day of prayer on Saturday 16th May where we can especially think about all those people in our #melthamprays prayers.
In a week when we have Celebrated the 100th Birthday of Captain Tom Moore and Donald Trump has entered into a Conspiracy battle with China, people are asking the question how will Coronavirus change the way we live? The weekly Clap for Carers, now in its sixth week, shows appreciation and care for Health professionals and other key workers and resounds across our village of Meltham.
Hearts were caught, cheered and warmed by the war veteran Tom raising £30m by the completing of laps in his garden. Monies raised for NHS charities. On his Birthday a fly past was organised and Tom was made Honorary Colonel and also became an honorary member of the England Cricket team.
Sadly we can also sense disquiet around which is understandable but we need to pray that we don’t allow our nation and ourselves to become part of a blame culture.
If nothing else, we will have been learning a little of how to live with uncertainty and deprivation of privilege – something that might bring us closer to the lived experience of a lot of people and a lot of Christians in this world.
We will be experiencing the reality of faith as we contemplate living and ministering in a changed world. So, we can either complain about what lies ahead or we can try to shape it for the sake of the kingdom of God.
Nick Fawcett in his book of prayers ‘For Such a Time as Now’ asks for lessons to be learned from this crisis
PRAYER
Lord, it’s hard to see any good coming from the crisis we’re facing, this time that is bringing such anxiety, such heartache, and such hardship to so many.
Yet if one useful thing might come out of it, let it be this: that we learn – as individuals, as a nation, as a world – from the experience, and so be better equipped in the future should similar or worse threats to our health arise.
May lessons from these dark days equip us, if need be, to respond more effectively, provide more meaningfully, and help more swiftly in times ahead. Open our eyes to the best and the worst in all that is happening now, and enable us truly to learn from both. Amen
You might also like to consider the following.
1.
There is a Prayer App which can be accessed on all devices
PRAY AS YOU GO
A daily prayer session lasting between ten and thirteen minutes, it combines music, scripture and some questions for reflection. It is produced by Jesuit Media Initiatives.
There aims are to : become more aware of God’s presence, listen to and reflect on God’s word and grow in relationship with God This App has been used in the past at Meltham Churches Together Wednesday Prayer Time and Christine and I both find it very helpful
2
The Church of England has launched a helpline called Daily Hope. This is aimed at those who do not have access to the internet and all the online resources. Using a freephone number (0800 8048044), it offers a hymn, reading and prayer. It is completely free for the caller. This has been advertised widely on the internet but will not have been seen by those without this facility. Do you know anyone, without internet access, who might be interested and who you could contact to let them have this number?
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Acts 2:42-45 (NIV)
Pentecost and the birth of the Church was undoubtedly an extremely exciting time for the disciples. However, it was surely a very disturbing time as well.
Things changed, and many of the changes were not ones that they may have chosen. There had always been three pillars to the way they lived out their faith; the law, sacrifices and the temple. As they read their scriptures (our Old Testament) they had to see how the law worked through the prism of the grace and mercy of Christ. On the cross Jesus had become, the one perfect sacrifice, meaning that sacrificial worship was no longer necessary in the old way of thinking. And through persecution many of them would soon lose access to temple worship altogether. The whole way that they lived out their faith changed almost overnight.
At the end of acts 2 we see how they began to deal with these changes. They knew what they had to keep, what had to be their priorities, The Apostles teachings, prayer, fellowship, and generosity.
As we live through uncertain times today, surely, we should ensure that whatever shape our Church community takes, it should be based around these same four pillars.
Reverend John (Vicar)
ONLINE SERVICES – via Parish website Our Parish Communion for Sunday 3rd May will be posted on our website www.melthamparish.co.uk This will be pre-recorded but Rev John will be repeating the service at 4:00pm so that it may be considered spiritually live. Please join in if you are able.
PRAYER CAMPAIGN #melthamprays
Many people are looking for a simple way to pray. I hope that this will offer an opportunity to do so. Please look at the magazine, facebook, or our website for more details.
Virtual Parish Choir We have formed a virtual Parish Choir, with the aim that individuals can record themselves at home, and then these will be joined together as one choir! Anyone can join in, but you will need 2 devices (i.e. phone, tablet or PC) and some earphones – this is so you can listen to the piano accompaniment with one device and record yourself with the other. If you are interested, then contact Simon via melthamparish@outlook.com We’ll be starting off with well known hymns, so that hopefully people find it easy to join in. The first recording by 15 virtual choristers was used in the Parish Communion on 3rd May – you can listen there to see what’s achievable – amazing!
Following recent guidelines from the Church of England and the government. All churches will be closed for public worship until further notice. This now includes private prayer and funerals. Funerals can still be held at the crematorium and at the grave side with a maximum of ten mourners. All weddings are postponed until further notice.
Hallelujah, Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed, Hallelujah!
Join us for our on-line Parish Communion at 4:00pm for the 4th Sunday of Easter – Sunday 3rd May. The service featuring our newly formed Virtual Parish Choir (who have recorded themselves individually at home) can be viewed at any time but Rev’d John will conduct the service at the vicarage at this time to make the worship spiritually live. The service words will appear on the video to enable you to join in easily.
Sunday 3rd May – Parish Communion delayed due to technical issues. We hope to have it available by 1pm – Rev John will conduct the service at 4pm. Apologies for the inconvenience.
Welcome to the May edition of the #Meltham Parish Magazine. We hope and pray that you are all keeping well. Speaking of which, this month, we’re launching a #melthamprays prayer campaign which you can join in both at home and on social media – (see page 15). Don’t forget VE day (pg 9) and find out how our Crossroads Centre and Foodbank has been getting on in these difficult times.
As ‘social distancing’ continues, we are still unable to get this edition distributed in hard copy so please feel free to share/forward this around to those who (under the current circumstances) may not receive this, obviously keeping to social distancing guidelines.
On Sunday 3rd May at 11.15am will be an All AGE Worship service & we have LOTS of fun planned for this one!
We will have active challenges (so please leave some space
around your computer as you will NOT be sitting down for the whole of this service!),
games, dancing and a talk from a BIG popstar!
We also have a CRAFT for you to do this week at home! The instructions can be found here:
Your task, should you choose to accept it, is to make the craft idea (in the next email) and take pictures of the finished ‘craft’ around your home! Then please email your pictures to me (jacqueline.france@interface.com) & I will show them during the service on Sunday. They may even appear in the next Parish magazine!!!!
EVERY-ONE can have at go at this (even if you don’t make it
to the service). BUT it would be lovely to have all the children and young
people join in & come & have a bit of fun on Sunday.
Christine and I went into voluntary isolation on the 16th March. This past weekend took us over 40 days and nights.
Jesus faced his 40 days and nights wilderness period alone and overcame by giving every trial he faced to his Father in Heaven.
We still can’t believe it, that our world turned on its head so quickly, so unexpectedly.
One moment, everything normal, proceeding much as it had always done before, and the next, chaos and confusion, everything overturned in an instant – institutions teetering on the brink, certainties crumbling into dust, lives descending into mayhem.
People have reached the stage where they are asking when will it end, when will this nightmare be over?
We were told things would get worse before they could get better; that the death toll would rise and the number of those infected continue to climb, despite every measure being taken to prevent it. We are promised also that, eventually, this disease will peak, and that we can then slowly start picking up the pieces of our lives again.
As Christians we have been praying and showing compassion both in word and deed for family, friends and neighbours. We give thanks to God for the support Christine and I have received.
We thank God for the number of you joining with us at 11.00am each day. (or anytime for those who find 11am not possible.) The temptation is to feel that our prayers are inadequate. So we share with you another prayer for the coming week. You might like to add this prayer to the others you received.
When our prayers feel so inadequate
They feel so inadequate, our prayers, Lord, so small a response to so great a crisis. Even if we could find the words we seek to sum up our concern, express our fears, articulate our needs and entrust into your care the many we know to be at risk, even then, our efforts would seem lacking.
But we can’t get anywhere near that, our entreaties to you being muddled, halting, confused, disjointed. We do not know what to say or how to say it; what to pray or how to pray it, and we are left feeling we have failed ourselves, you and others.
Do not let that deter us, Lord. Teach us that you heed not only the words of our lips but also the thoughts of the heart, prayer not being an exam we must pass but an opportunity to embrace.
Help us, then, simply to share with you, as best we can, what we are feeling, so committing ourselves, our loved ones, and the world beyond, sincerely into your keeping. Amen.
Keep Safe. Keep praying and like Jesus taking all your requests to God our Father.
