Sunday Service

Category: Sunday Service

10th October 2021

By Kevin Montgomery in Sunday Service on 10 October 2021

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Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another Saturday email.I am pleased to say that the Montgomery household is returning to normal after Ciaran’s 10 days of Covid isolation, shared by Kate and Kevin as a precaution. We look forward to Kevin preaching at our service tomorrow, in a service led by Rosie and featuring prayers by Sheila and a Bible Reading from Louisa, all of which can be viewed online, read here or in person at St Columba’s on Sunday morning at 10.30am. NEXT SUNDAY ‘s SERVICES On Sunday 17th October, for one week only at the moment, we are going to have services at 10.30am and 5pm. These will be identical services but the 5pm is designed for those who find it difficult to attend at 10.30 or who want to avoid being with too many people. Having said that there is plenty of room so if you enjoyed coming to church at 5pm, or just fancy a change, why not join us at that time next week. 

HOPE INTO ACTION (HIA) 

The 5pm service does flow into the HIA Prayer Meeting at 6pm in church. As I mentioned last week, now we have completed the purchase of the HIA house we need to prepare a Friendship and Support Group ready for when the tenants move in. With this in mind Matt Morton from HIA will be joining our Prayer Meeting on Sunday 24th October at 6pm – so if you are at all interested, or just want to find out more do come along that evening. There will also be a TRAINING DAY on Saturday 4th December for those who would like to pursue this further.Our usual PRAYER MEETING will be happening this Sunday, 10th October, at 6pm in church. 

PCC NEWS

Our PCC met in person for the first time since March 2020 this week, although some people were still able to join the meeting by Zoom. We heard of plans for a weekend visit by Bishop John sometime after Easter next year and also began to think how we might celebrate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee in June. We heard encouraging reports from our Churchwardens, Treasurer, Safeguarding Officer, and about Hope into Action. The most significant item on the agenda was the allocation of most of St Columba’s charitable giving for the year, with significant amounts being given to HOPE FROM ABOVE where Tim & Carol Derbyshire work in Australia and to CHURCH MISSION SOCIETY. We are on the look out for someone to be our church contact with our new CMS mission partners in North Africa, and if you think that might interest you, please do speak with me (it would be helpful if our contact was comfortable using Zoom). There were smaller donations to a number of different causes, some local and some overseas. The full list is:Toilet Twinning, Christians Against Poverty, Tearfund, Word for Today, Waverley Abbey, World Vision, Corby Deanery Youth Project, Rooted in Jesus, Hope into Action, Penn Green, Home Start, Children’s Society, Safe Spaces, Barnabas Fund, Operation Christmas Child, and Scripture Union for “It’s Your Move” books for children moving to secondary school. 

Finally we pencilled in some dates for social events later this year and early next:

Saturday 20th November – Tearfund’s BIG QUIZ NIGHT

Saturday 27th November – CHRISTMAS FAYRE

28th and 29th January 2022 – PANTO: “Robin Hood and the Babes in the Wood” 

Do ask if you would like to know more about any of these, especially if you can help at the FAYRE. They are, of course, all dependent on there being no change in the COVID rules. When they have been prepared the PCC minutes will be displayed on the Notice Board at the back of church, or you can ask me for a copy by email. 

PUZZLES

Please find here the latest Puzzles from Steve (sorry about not attaching them last week).

On page 4 there is a list of the other groups that meet at St Columba’s. There are a couple of changes I will pass on to Steve for the next edition, but just to clarify the Romanian and Zimbabwean churches have not yet started meeting again (although I did see Pastor Gabriel in the week so the latter may start again soon). 

ENERGIZE

The latest ENERGIZE resources for children are available here. 

May God bless you all in the week ahead. 

Ian 

01536 400225

07903 644609

3rd October 2021

By Kevin Montgomery in Sunday Service on 9 October 2021

Harvest greetings to you all. This harvest time we should be especially mindful not just of farmers who grow our food, but also haulage drivers who move it from farm to shop. We have all seen the effect of not having enough drivers with the empty petrol forecourts, so let us be sure to give thanks to God for all those who are involved in our increasingly complex supply chains. HARVEST SERVICEOur service tomorrow is at 10.30am and everyone is welcome. Don’t forget that we will be collecting for FOOD BANK, especially donations of tinned fish, fruit, custard and rice pudding, as well as coffee, squash and long life fruit juice.Kevin has prepared the service, but unfortunately Ciarán has tested positive for Covid (although he is “not too bad” according to Kevin) so Kevin is isolating at home and William will lead the service in church using Kevin’s material. Online you can watch Kevin leading the service as planned from his home. There is a PDF of the service available here.
 PRAYER REQUESTSIn addition to praying for Ciarán, and that the rest of the Montgomery family do not get infected, please could you pray for the following:

• the family and friends of Martin Steed who died this week from Covid, especially his mum Jackie and aunt Val Berridge.
• the Tafuma family because Patience’s husband Derrick now has Covid although Angel has recovered.
• Joan Dyche who is still in pain with her arm in a sling following her fall last Saturday.
• and also pray for the PCC as they meet on Wednesday to decide where we should give our Charitable Giving for the year.

HOPE INTO ACTION (HIA)I am very pleased to say that the purchase of the house in Stevenson Way was completed last week. This house will become a home for people who would otherwise have nowhere to live. There now needs to be some work carried out to turn the house into a home – so look out for requests for help with this (but not second hand furniture of equipment as HIA insist on having new things to show the tenants they are loved. We also need to prepare a Friendship and Support Group ready for when the tenants move in. With this in mind Matt Morton from HIA will be joining our Prayer Meeting on Sunday 24th October at 6pm – so if you are at all interested, or just want to find out more do come along that evening. There will be a TRAINING DAY on Saturday 4th December for those who would like to pursue this further.Our usual PRAYER MEETING will be happening on Sunday evening this week at 6pm in church – and it should have a celebratory feel as our prayers for the house have now been answered. HOPE FROM ABOVE (HFA)There are two updates this week from HFA in Australia. The first is the usual monthly Prayer Update, the second is a letter setting out a change in leadership as Hans Kummer, who Miriam and I met in 2019, steps down as CEO and moves to a new ambassadorial role while handing over to Robert Lister, the new CEO. ENERGIZEAs it is Harvest we are re-issuing the resources we made available last year. These are in three age groups: 3-6, 7-11, 11-14. They make reference to the film “Joseph King of Dreams” which you can download, or the “good harvest” sequence can be watched here:

or there is a full film “Joseph: Beloved Son, Rejected Slave, Exalted Ruler” available here: 

SCANS and more There will be a full colour print edition of SCANS available in church from Sunday so do take a copy of that if you are there. Also available are the latest Puzzles and Other Stuff, which includes a Harvest Scavenger Hunt! And finally just to say that Miriam and I will be in London on Sunday, supporting Ruth who is running the London Marathon for Cancer Research. 

With best wishes to all, 

Ian 

01536 400225

07903 644609

26th September 2021

By Kevin Montgomery in Sunday Service on 26 September 2021

Good afternoon everyone, I hope most of you have had a good week. I say “most” because two of Patience Tafuma’s children, Angel and Ethan, have Covid, and Joan Dyche fell and dislocated her shoulder this morning. Fortunately Angel is feeling better, Ethan doesn’t seem to be suffering and Joan was able to get to hospital and home again before lunch. Please do remember them all in your prayers. You may also like to spare a thought for Alois on Sunday as he is running a half marathon in Northampton!

HARVEST NEXT WEEK

On Sunday 3rd October we look forward to celebrating Harvest with a service in church once again at 10.30am. As usual we will be collecting for the Corby FOOD BANK and they have advised that they are in need of the following items: tins of fish, fruit, rice pudding and custard as well as coffee, squash and long life fruit juice. They have plenty of the following items at the present time: cereal, rice, pasta and tea. Thank you in advance for your donations, and for those that have come in all through this most difficult of years.

SUNDAY’S SERVICE

This week’s service is Holy Communion. You are welcome to join us at 10.30am in church, where, as well as singing and hearing the sermon and prayers in person, we will receive bread dipped in non-alcoholic wine. Alternatively you can watch the online version of the service, in which case you will need to provide your own bread and wine (or fruit juice). There is also a PDF version of the service available.

After the service tomorrow we will have some cakes from Sheila’s MACMILLAN COFFEE MORNING. These will be freely available but if you like to bring a donation to this very worthy cause then Sheila will add it to the money she raised on Friday. We will be able to enjoy the cakes outside church in what may be the last of these lovely late summer days.

ATTACHMENTS

Thank you once again to Steve for producing this week’s puzzles. Steve says that he and Sue struggled to find 50 items beginning with C in the picture – why not have a go. Also available are this week’s ENERGIZE resources looking at the story of Saul meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus.

AND FINALLY

Do take a look at our new website, still with the same address: www.stcolumbascorby.org.uk This is in fact a temporary website, but is already better than the one we had before, with pictures of some of us and the ability to scroll down so it is much more user friendly on all devices. A big THANK YOU to Kevin for his work on this. Bearing in mind it is temporary, if you have any comments about the website please do speak to Kevin.

May God be with you in this coming week.

Ian

01536 400225

07903 644609