Recruits for God's work

There will be an attempt to create seventy different people at the craft activity at the First Sunday thing at 10.30 a.m. on Sunday at St Nicolas'. The passage from the Gospel reading for the day is about Jesus sending out seventy disciples to spread his work.

The church will also be full of the displays being put up for the festival weekend there.

There will not be a said Communion service at 9.30 a.m. because the clergy and others will be on their way to Gainsborough where a new Curate for the parish is being ordained. Instead there will be a Parish Communion at 6.00 p.m. to welcome her to the parish.

One way and another, it should be a memorable First Sunday Thing and a memorable weekend.

Symbols of prayer

At our different First Sunday Things we've often had something to make our prayers for people visible. Lighting candles has been an obvious one. A picture of links in a paper chain appeared on this Blog not long ago. In June the craft activity was making a concertina man. The idea was people could put the names of those they will be praying for on the fold of the concertina, which is his body, and use the names as a prayer focus, linking themselves to those who care for them and who they care for.

An African view

One of the things highlighted at the most recent First Sunday Thing (which took place on Sunday in St Nicolas') was what the promise of 'life in all its fulness' might look like from places whith which the parish has a link. It was the seventy fifth birthday of the priest in Zimbabwe whose parish we support, so this was an obvious place at which to look. Alongside the Mission where he is based there are nine churches in the parish scattered across a wide District. Here, he says, you will find the poorest of the poor, who are subsistence farmers in the most unpromising situations. He has to travel to visit all these churches to enable the members to receive Holy Communion. For those nearest the Mission he uses a donkey cart. For those further way, he uses buses and then walks as many are several kilometres from the main road. Last year, the Bishop confirmed forty two candidates. The latest project we have supported has been to buy some chickens and goats so that the Mission can generate some money and move closer to being self financing.