15/9/24
Your weekly update from the Benwell & Scotswood Team.
Click below to read this week's information and latest news.
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Services this week
Sunday 1 September
9.30am - St John's Holy Communion
9.45am - St Margaret's Holy Communion 11am - Hub service at St James (Parish Eucharist)
Tuesday
4.30pm at St James'
Thursday
10.30am Venerable Bede - Holy Communion
Dates for your diary
Sunday 8th September
Generous Giving campaign begins
Thursday 19th September
7pm - PCC (with Archdeacon of Northumberland)
Sunday 29th September
11am Harvest festival at St Margaret's Scotswood, NE15 6AR (no other services this day)
News
Harvest Festival
Sunday 29th September
11am
St Margaret's Scotswood
NE15 6AR
If you can, please bring non-perishable food items to donate to local charities and a dish to share for lunch.
On the last Sunday of this month we will have a team service at St Margaret's in Scotswood for this year's harvest festival! We will give thanks for God's creation, offer what we can for those in need, and share in fellowship together with a meal after.
Please note: as this is a team service, it will be the only service that day.
Benwell and Scotswood Giving Generously
Beginning Sunday 8th September
Throughout September we will be carrying out a generous giving campaign.
The aim of this is to:
Say thank you for all that you do!
Help you understand how we use our funds to support the community and celebrate all that is going on in our churches.
Make it simpler to offer your time, money and talents to all of our churches through the Parish Giving Scheme (which you will hear more about!)
Keep our work sustainable and enable our churches to keep growing.
We are excited about making it easier to give financially, but remember, this is just a small piece of the puzzle! Your presence and participation in our churches are truly treasured, regardless of your ability to give. You are always welcome and appreciated!
Watch this space!
Embrace - Gaza appeal
The people of Gaza are living through an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Israel’s response has led to indiscriminate civilian suffering, with residents forced to move from place to place in search of safety. Food and medical supplies have all but run out; water, electricity, and fuel have been cut off.
The people of Gaza were already on their knees with 80% of residents reliant on humanitarian aid to survive. Please, can you make a donation into help in their hour of need?
You can donate online, by clicking below, or by calling 01494 897950. Your gift will support Embrace’s Christian partners in the immediate aftermath of this humanitarian crisis and to help to heal the wounds it’s caused across Israel – Palestine.
Sunday Worship
Trinity 16
Green
Readings
James 3.1–12
3Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. 2For all of us make many mistakes. Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle. 3If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we guide their whole bodies. 4Or look at ships: though they are so large that it takes strong winds to drive them, yet they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. 5So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits.
How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! 6And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell.7For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, 8but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. 10From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so. 11Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and brackish water? 12Can a fig tree, my brothers and sisters, yield olives, or a grapevine figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.
Mark 8.27–38
27 Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’ 28And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’ 29He asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Messiah.’30And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.
31 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’
34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’
Intercessions
Prayers for others:
Lawrence Okonkwo
John Nicholson
Malcolm Smith
Paulette Thompson
John Peterson
Maria Hawthorn
Herbert Agbeko
Ellis & Pauline Nelson
Michelle Wilson
Peter Wilson
Alan & Maureen Taylor
Irene Foskett
Pat Law
Moe and Mary
Hilary Dixon
Lynn Mosby
Irene Scaife
Baby Alice Rose, Jodie and family
Christina Wilson
Diane Humphrey
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.
Sermon
Revd Osaro Omobude
Jesus asked his disciples, "Who do you think I am?" It was a simple question but a declaration of faith and the foundation of everyone's journey with Christ.
At this time, Jesus began to have many followers around the regions, perhaps because Jesus had healed many people. Last week, in Mark's Gospel, Jesus cast the demon from the Gentile woman's daughter, and Jesus also carried out many more miracles.
Wherever Jesus went, a large crowd followed him. He knew many were drawn to him for what they could gain, whether physical healing or other miracles.
Then, he asked his closest friends, the disciples (Followers), this question: “Why are these people coming to me, and who do they think I am?” The disciples began to mention names. Maybe they think you are John the Baptist, Elijah, or other prophets we are unaware of. That’s fair enough.
Jesus now turned to the disciples, his best friends who were close to him and always together, and asked, “You, who do you think I am?”
I want to be personal now. Today, Christ is not talking to the disciples. He is talking to me and you. Who is Jesus Christ to you? This is a direct question from Jesus. You don’t need to say it to anyone but give your answer to Jesus Christ himself.
When we can answer this personal question, we are ready to follow Christ and suffer in his name. We are prepared to deny ourselves and carry the cross. It is no longer us or me; it is no longer about my feelings; it's about keeping Jesus' words and faithfully following God’s teachings. It’s by fellowshipping with Christ that we are fulfilled. He is the source of happiness. He alone is the source of Joy and comfort.
Depending on our answer today, following Christ means following his teaching and his way. But this will come with a cost. You cannot follow Christ without denying yourself and the world, just as Peter answered Jesus. You are the Messiah. (For the Jews, the word Messiah means the saviour, the redeemer.) In other words, My God and everything.
Here, Jesus was honest with the crowd and his disciples ( He is also honest today): “ If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me……………….” Carrying Christ's cross varies; it’s that thing we do that blocks God’s image in us and stops us from shining God’s love to the world.
How hard a Way it is! Jesus Christ is the True Way and Life. Knowing the Way to Life is very good, but what I am telling you today, my brothers and sisters, to follow the way is better.
As Christians, if we don’t follow the Way of Christ and his teachings, we would be like blind people who only follow the way and do not know the way. Blind people can be taught about colours, that the sky is blue, that the fields are green. But these colours have no meaning for them, for they have never experienced colours by seeing them. Likewise, if we only know the way to Jesus Christ and never follow it, we can’t experience the life of Jesus and all the blessings and promises that come with it.
Peter could profess Jesus Christ as the Messiah with a strong faith because of his contact and relationship with Jesus Christ.
We can only follow Christ with deep faith and be ready to give up everything to follow him when we know him and his serving powers and experience him personally. Faith in Christ is personal. You doubt him because you haven’t experienced his power or have no personal relationship with him. We are called today to know Jesus Christ more and develop a personal relationship through prayers, reading the scriptures, and being good to others.
It is like a married couple. The man and woman come together to live together as husband and wife because they love and trust each other enough to build a life together, have children together, and get a mortgage together; in most cases, the wife will leave her family and her hometown to follow her husband. This is trusting and knowing each other enough to do this.
What is the need to be called Christian? You don’t follow the teachings or keep to Christ's values. “James 2:14” asks, “What good is it to profess faith without practising it?”
And faith without good works has no power to save.
It’s only when we, as Christians, have faithful Faith in Christ that we have The Authority to speak with the tongue of a teacher. We can only preach what we believe and have faith in. You cannot give what you do not have.
As Christians, God has given us the authority to sustain the weary and to stand firm in this troubled world.
We don’t have power; all power belongs to God, but we have Authority, which can only manifest when we call on God’s name with Faith whenever we carry any authority.
As an ordained priest, I have the authority and faith in God. With this authority, I pray that when I lead my hands over this bread and wine, it will become his body and blood through his power. God can transform it. Through the combination of my faith and your faith, it becomes Holy Food.
To fellow Christ faithful, it is not always easy; we always need His help. We can only achieve this by praying and reading scripture.
Let us pray.