3/7/22
Your weekly update from the Benwell & Scotswood Team
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Dates for your diary
Sunday 3rd July 2022
11am, St Aidan's Billy Mill, NE29 8BZ
Pam Ingham's 25th Anniversary of ordination
Sunday 10th July 2022
11am, St James
Confirmation service
Services this week
Sunday 3rd
9.45am at St Margaret's - eucharist
11am at St James - hub service (eucharist with baptism)
Thursday 7th
11am at St John's - eucharist
Sunday 10th
11am at St James - Confirmation (celebration eucharist)
News
Confirmations next Sunday 11am at St James
Join us for this very special service when members of our community will be baptised and/or confirmed. The is a huge step when we declare that we want to follow Jesus Christ, to receive the Holy Spirit, and to be part of his church always finding ways to love God and one another. So please pray for the candidates as they prepare for this.
Bishop Stephen Platten Honorary Assistant Bishop, will be with us to lead the service.
If you feel inspired to baptised or confirmed in the future then just let us know!
New coffee morning at St James - Mondays 9.30am - 1pm
Join us from this Monday at St James for tea and coffee. Drop-in at any point and stay for a chat, meet your community, use our wifi, explore the church and our beautiful churchyard.
Speak to Chris Foskett if you would like any more info!
Revd Pam Ingham's 25th Anniversary of ordination - Sun 3rd July
11am at St Aidan's Billy Mill
Please join us as we celebrate the 25th Anniversary of Revd Pamela Ingham MBE at a service of Holy Communion on Sunday 3rd July 2022 at 11am.
St Aidan church, Billy Mill Lane, NE29 8BZ
Preacher Revd Canon Murray Haig
After the service refreshments will be served in the hall.
RSVP Shirley Irving.
Worship Texts
Slideshow
The Collect
Almighty and eternal God,
who, for the firmer foundation of our faith,
allowed your holy apostle Thomas
to doubt the resurrection of your Son
till word and sight convinced him:
grant to us, who have not seen, that we also may believe
and so confess Christ as our Lord and our God;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.
Reading
Ephesians 2.19–end So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling-place for God.
Gospel
John 20.24–29 But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.’ A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.’ Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’
Sermon
By Matt Dobson (ordinand)
Today, the church marks the life and example of the Apostle Thomas who we have just heard about in our reading from John’s Gospel. More widely we have moved out of the Easter Season where we celebrated the power of resurrection and contemplated what new life might mean for us and our world.
We have celebrated God’s gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, that life giving, life changing breath of God which sends us out into the world to share the Good News.
We have celebrated and shared in the life of the Trinity; how God is made known to us as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, in a constant relationship of creating, redeeming and sustaining all that we are. Now we find ourselves in a brief period known to some in the church as Petertide.
Petertide, is a time where we reflect particularly on the important role Peter played, as an apostle and in the development of the life of Jesus’ followers as the early forms of a christian community were being lived out. What we know about Peter from scripture is he was a complex and very real kindof guy, unsure at times, quick and decisive at others, he had insight and yet made mistakes, could get carried away or confused, made denials, yet professed his love and loyalty, a love and loyalty that would continue to his own sacrifice, his own cross. It is also a time the church asks us to remember and recall the lives of all of Jesus’ followers, and today we particularly focus on Thomas in all his (like Peter’s) very real complexity and courage.
It is also a time of ordination within the church. Deacons and priests were ordained at our cathedral yesterday. For Chris, Dominic, David, Anne and Derek it will be a time of recalling the moments they gave of themselves to a particular way of being, to be obedient to how God was moving in their lives, calling on them into serving others as deacons and priests. But, and I am acutely reminded of this as we gather before and around Michelle and her family, for all of us, this time, even these next few moments here in this place, are marked out for us to think about our own vocations, our particular callings to be a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation as scripture puts it. How is God asking us to best serve him, who are we called to be?
It is a time of discovering or rediscovering who we are, our own complexities, what makes us real, what makes us the real kind of God-made people who by his grace and forgiveness and compassion means that despite everything and yet because of everything we are and could become we are - as St Paul says in his letter to the Ephesians - being ‘built together’ how we, gathered together, sharing in fellowship, friendship and faith - even where fifteen minutes ago we might have been strangers - we become a community a dwelling for God, where in our actions, our voice, all that we do we share deep within us at our very core something of the nature of God.
It is a time to recognise ourselves within the very people who gathered in that locked room, to not be afraid to imagine ourselves standing beside Peter and Thomas and to see how their experiences of faith, of doubt, belief and denial touch our own very real feelings as followers of Jesus. This morning, Michelle is also invited through the waters of baptism, by the Holy Spirit to enter into that same space. She will become a fellow citizen with God’s people and a new member of his household. A household, we have heard this morning, which is built on the foundation of the Apostles - like Peter, like Thomas; with Jesus Christ himself as chief cornerstone.
As all things with and in God we are connected to him through each other, we share in our stories, in our lives, in our strengths and our weaknesses all that we are, all our woundedness, all our humanity. We will now be connected to Michelle, as she is connected to God and to us. As she is connected to Thomas who once stood in confusion, disbelief and doubt, now ready to truly know that Jesus was alive.
So what will he teach Michelle and us about following Jesus? What will these disciples who got it wrong, who tried again, who grew in faith, and laid down all that they were to serve others teach Michelle about her own potential, her own priestliness, her own calling?
What can the moment when God made himself known and stilled Thomas’ heart teach Michelle? How fears were calmed, where questions were allowed to be asked, where human, fleshy, realness with all its wounds were exposed to show us what it is to be alive?
Michelle, in the next few moments you will forever be changed, and for Michelle’s family and friends you too will forever be changed, and for us here in Benwell and Scotswood, we will forever be changed. For in being brought here for baptism there is an acceptance that something is going on that goes beyond perhaps what we can rationalize, totally understand or see. You might feel the water run over your head, you may feel the oil of baptism create the shape of the cross, but there may not be any clouds unfolding above us, there may not be a dove descending down or a great unearthly holy voice boom to remind us that you Michelle are a beloved child of God. There may be, but there may be not. But, what there will be, is that total sense of love for who you are, all that you are. It is a love built on the same things that Thomas and Peter and all the disciples would have felt and experienced within their hearts that day. A love so complex and deep. A love built on fear for the future, an unease about getting it right, of the sacrifice it takes to raise, to nurture, to teach all the things of the faith and life, a compulsion to protect others from harm, an unconditionally, unavoidable and totally beautiful compulsion, to be hopeful for life. This is the love made known in that room, between teacher and disciple. That is the feeling of that locked room, of the interaction between these disciples, ordinary people, like us and the one they knew as God among us. Jesus met them as Jesus meets us. Jesus is here. His spirit is with us. Thomas meets Jesus, a man so human, his fleshy wounds are showing. Thomas meets a God so willing to show us how to live that you can see right into his body, press it, touch it even. God meets a man so human, his own inner workings are showing, his doubts, his wanting to explore and to question, to deepen his understanding and faith.
In this meeting we can see so much of what it means to be alive. What it will mean for Michelle to be Michelle. For us to be who God has made us to be, longs for us to be, calls us to be.
My prayer, our prayer, Jesus’ prayer for you Michelle and all of us, is that you may be as open to God as Thomas was, if you are scared or fearful, call on him. If you have questions, ask them. If you are worried or confused, hold yourself with your family and friends together before God. Hold all of yourself, who you truly are, with openness and honesty and humility. Today God will breathe on you his Holy Spirit, which will move about you, ask things of you, may take you to places you don’t expect or to callings you can’t yet dream to imagine. We, your family and now your church family will be here, in our own fleshy humanness to hold you, to guide you and to prod and push you to have that same openness to be moved and changed and transformed as Thomas was. Amen.
Intercessions
If you would like to add someone to the prayer list please email church@benwellscotswood.com
The name will stay on the list for 1 month unless requested to be long-term.
Prayers for others:
Donna and family
Alison Campbell
John Taylor
Helen Wright
Irene Foskett
John Nicholson
Alan Robson
Peter Wilson
Michelle Wilson
Liz Holliman
Joan Finley
The Riches Family
George Snowden
Claire Mozaffari
Herbert Agbeko
Baptisms
Michelle Abhulchegbe
Rest in Peace
Stuart
Post Communion prayer
Almighty God,
who on the day of Pentecost
sent your Holy Spirit to the apostles
with the wind from heaven and in tongues of flame,
filling them with joy and boldness to preach the gospel:
by the power of the same Spirit
strengthen us to witness to your truth
and to draw everyone to the fire of your love;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.