Spring Harvest

A small group of us from St Paul's have just returned from Spring Harvest. This 6 day event was held at Butlins in Skegness. The theme of the week was 'Church Actually – God's brilliant idea.'
There was an all age service each morning called Good Morning Big Top. Each day also had a Bible teaching session based on readings from John's Gospel. These were given by Ness Wilson who leads Open Heaven Church in Loughborough and were well received.
In the evening there was a celebration service in the Big Top with worship led by Geraldine Latty and a different speaker each evening. The whole event was very uplifting and encouraging and it is hoped to take a bigger group next year.

Proclaiming One's Faith.

The Resurrection on the first Easter was a proclamation by God the Father that the death of Jesus was no accident but had been part of his plan to save the world. So he raised Jesus to reign with him in glory.

In the early church Easter was the occasion when many were baptised to show their faith in this risen Christ. This year, there was a service of baptism, renewal of baptismal promises and confirmation at Leicester Cathedral, which took place at 6.0am to coincide with Sunrise. One of our younger members of the church, Katie Tincello took part and confirmed her faith as the Bishop of Leicester laid hands on her head.

About 15 people from St Paul's went to the service to support Katie. We wish her well in her future life in Christ.

What Comes Next?

Happy Easter!

The start of our new service card for April - June coincides with Holy Week and Easter. Easter is the biggest festival in the Christian calendar and we continue to celebrate the good news of the risen Christ for as long as we have journeyed through Lent – 40 days. After 40 days we come to the Ascension and then 10 days later celebrate Pentecost, when we remember the coming of
the Spirit.

After all our celebrating we come to Trinity Sunday. Please note that this service will be an hour earlier, at 9am, to allow folks to come to Church but then return home as soon as the services finishes to take part in your local Street Party for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. If nothing is happening where you live, why not get involved in making it happen?

As our journey continues into what the Church creatively calls 'Ordinary Time' we start a sermon series based on the Lord's Prayer. Over the next 8 weeks we will look at a
line of the prayer and explore its meaning. This is part of our 2012, Year of Prayer and will hopefully help us to engage with the very familiar words of this well used prayer.

Yours In Christ,

Steve

Revd. Steve Bailey

Run-up to Easter!

With this last Sunday being Palm Sunday, we are now into Holy Week when we remember the events that led up to Christ's death on the Friday, by which he forgave our sin, and Easter Day when God the Father raised Jesus from the dead, showing that the events on Good Friday were his will.

So there is a lot on this week:

On 4 April Lent Course 2012
The final session of our Lent course, considering the baptism promises, is "Do you submit to Christ as Lord?" with the response "I submit to Christ." It will take place at 2.00pm, repeated at 7.30pm, in the Barnabas Centre.

On 5 April (Maundy Thursday) we remember how Jesus instituted the Lord's Supper to commemorate his death as he celebrated the Passover with his disciples.
At 9.45am we have our regular "Coffee Pot" Holy Communion.
At 7.30pm we have a special service of Holy Communion to remember that first supper

On 6 April (Good Friday) we remember Christ's crucifixion as a sacrifice for our sin.
At 9.30am we join Churches Together in Oadby for a service at the Baptist Church.
At 10.30am - 12.00 noon many of us will be joining the Christ in the Centre reenactment of Christ's final hours, in Humberstone Gate in Leicester City Centre.
At 2.00pm there is a Meditation at St. Peter’s.
At 7.30pm we will be having our own Service of Meditation at St. Paul’s with music and readings.

On 8 April, Easter Day, we look forward to the joy of the Family Communion as we celebrate the presence of the risen Christ among us.

So, we have many special services during this very special week. I do hope that you will be able to join us at several of them as together we remember Christ's conquest over the powers of death and his gift of life to us.

The Way, the Truth and the Life

Yesterday, in the fourth of our Lent series on the promises that are made at Baptism, we were considering the promise which is made in response to the question: "Do you come to Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life?

People often see Jesus as good but possibly misguided. His claims for himself are so incredible that that position is not an option. As CS Lewis saw it, Jesus was either a bad man, a madman or the God man. If he was either of the first two, his teaching does not merit our attention. If he was God with us, his claims on our lives are absolute.

We looked at what Christ meant to each one of us and how we would share that with those who do not know Christ. We even tried to tell the story of our Christian journey to our neighbour during the very limited time that it took for a match to burn out!

At the end, we were asked to write down three words that summarised what Christ meant to each of us. These were fed into a computer and a "Wordle" was constructed. This is shown at the top of this blog, where the size of the words indicates how frequently they were used. To see the Wordle full-size, click on the picture or here. The commonest response was "Saviour," the one who rescues us from sin, guilt, fear and circumstances.

There is still time to join us on Wednesdays at 2.0pm or 7.30pm for the last two promises.

Celebrate - with Ida

As Christians, the Bible tells us that we should be involved in the emotions of those we find around us. St Paul tells the Christians at Rome: "Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep." Bereavement, sickness and disappointment are common and it's important that we share in these sufferings with those who are being affected.

But it's wonderful when we can join in with the rejoicing of those who rejoice. This weekend we celebrated with one of our congregation, Ida, (the mother-in-law of our previous vicar) who reached the milestone of her 80th birthday. Once a month we celebrate the birthdays of all the members of the congregation who have a birthday that month. So, yesterday, Ida too, received her chocolate as we sang to them all:
"Happy birthday to you,
To Jesus be true,
May he guide and bless you.
Happy birthday to you."

Over coffee and tea afterwards, we all enjoyed a piece of Ida's birthday cake.

Diamond Jubilee

I wish I had words to describe the feelings that filled my heart while I was at the Cathedral this morning. The atmosphere was similar to a time away at Spring Harvest when one is surrounded by men and women of faith.  It was a wonderful time of pageant and joy. The Royal party had begun the first official visit to celebrate 60 years of her Majesty’s reign. It brought a lump to my throat as Queen Elizabeth stood in the porch of St Martin’s Cathedral in full view of the congregation. Dressed in a magnificent pink and navy outfit she initiated a service which displayed the loving and caring nature of the multicultural society which is Leicester in the 21^st century. Faith was the keyword, but the presentations by people of many faiths showed that from a history of conflict and distrust our city has become a place of shared peace and understanding. 

QUIZ EVENING

A Welcome Return

A new Social team is beavering away to create events which will titillate the mind, heart and palate. They are launching the new era with a 

Quiz Evening 

and Fish and Chips Supper 

on Saturday 31st March at 7pm

 Tickets £5 waged and £3 unwaged 

So come along to St Paul's for a great evening of fun and food

Eat Together – and Help Others

As is customary, the Churches of Oadby are working together during Lent to raise money for Christian Aid through the "Lent Lunches." They take place each Saturday in a different church and this week, they came to St Paul's. A light lunch of (delicious) soup, bread rolls, butter and cheese with tea or coffee were provided and people gave a contribution to Christian Aid. Over £140 was raised which will help projects overseas that benefit the most needy in society, in the name of Christ.

It was also a great time of friendship and chatter. Sorry if you missed out!

Come to the Baptist Church at 12.0 mid-day on Saturday, next week, for the next one.

Praise God!

Some 50 people joined in our fifth quarterly Songs of Praise, last Sunday evening. We not only had the chance to sing some magnificent songs and hymns, but we learned more of each other as people explained their reasons for choosing them.

Some hymns brought memories of how people first came to faith. Some brought memories of how God had helped through periods of particular problems or suffering. Others were just felt to express people’s faith clearly, while yet others were associated with happy memories.

We were reminded that the Christian message is timeless as we sang songs ranging from Charles Wesley's "Jesus! the name high over all" of 1749 to Stuart Townend's "in Christ alone" of 2001.

People left feeling that they had come to know God and each other better. We hope to have another Songs of Praise in three months. So watch out for the advertising and come and join us!