Wednesday 1 July 2020

Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

This coming Sunday, 5th July, we look forward to celebrating communion and singing together for the first time for many months. Those of you who are hoping to join us, please remember to book your seat before midnight today. There will be singing in the church, but not in the hall, so please book in the appropriate place, either online or by ringing the office on 031 352 85 67 before 1pm today.

The bookings for future Sundays will be opened one week at a time.

Tomorrow, our lectio divina meeting is at 10.30am. This involves listening to a short passage of Scripture several times with periods of silence in between. At the end of the silence there is an opportunity to share our insights together. It is a wonderful opportunity to meditate on some words of Scripture and allow those words to feed our hearts and minds. If you would like to join us, please let me know and I can send you the link.

The Men's Bible Study Group will NOT be meeting this coming Sunday as most of the participants are now coming to church or away. We hope that the group will start up again in some form from mid-August. The Coffee Discussion will take place as usual on Sunday at 11.30am.

The Church Garden is looking particularly splendid at the moment due to the hard work of the Eco group and gardening team. However, it does need regularly watering especially during these hot days. If any of you are willing to join a team to help water the garden, please come along for a short meeting outside the church at 9.15am on Sunday. We are hoping that we can organise a team so that each person only has to water the garden one day a week.

David and I will be away from the evening of 12th July for 2 weeks holiday, and then I will take a few days retreat, and we will be back for Sunday 2nd August. I am very grateful to Adèle, our Archdeacon, who will be here while I am away and who will kindly take the Sunday services on 19th and 26th July. (She won't be leading any lectio or discussion groups however). Please do extend a very warm welcome to Adele and support her in any way you can.

I know that we have all had to live with many restrictions in our lives over many months and this has been very challenging. All of us may have had times when we've been anxious, stressed, or in low spirits. Perhaps, at such times, we can remind ourselves of the many blessings we enjoy, and be grateful for all that is good even in the midst of the constraints and difficulties we face.

Below is one of my favourite poems which expresses gratitude to God for the wonders of creation and indeed for life itself. E. E Cummings deliberately uses little punctuation and puts his words in an unusual order to jolt us into new awareness.

i thank You God for most this amazing

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings; and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any - lifted from the no
of all nothing - human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

e.e. cummings

May our ears and our eyes be opened and our spirits truly awake to the Spirit that we might be aware of God's presence and love all around us.

With love in Christ,
Helen