Ray Hall

On Tuesday we said farewell to Ray Hall, a member of the St Paul's congregation. Ray spent his early years in the Navy, hence the Rum! A much loved friend to many Ray will be sadly missed. Our prayers are with his family at this time.

Principal Services — January - March

Happy New Year! Welcome to the start of 2019.

2019 is going to be a year for us to focus on the whole area of Discipleship. As we meet week by week my hope is that we will grow in our discipleship and be equipped to live our lives as Every Day Disciples of Jesus.
The meeting place is the training place for the market place. In other words what we learn together in church on Sunday should equip us to live our lives for Jesus in our Monday to Saturday.
Each month we will focus on a different topic to give us opportunity to explore it in detail and also cover some practical application.
My prayer for each one of us is that we might grow in our own discipleship in order that we might grow new disciples as we reach out in loving service to our community.
Every blessing,
Steve

See Programme

Archbishop of York's Prayer for Parliament

God of eternal love and power,

Save our Parliamentary Democracy;

Protect the High Court of Parliament and all its members

From partiality and prejudice;

That they may walk humbly the path of kindness, justice and mercy.

Give them wisdom, insight and a concern for the common good.

The weight of their calling is too much to bear in their own strength,

Therefore we pray earnestly, Father,

send them help from your Holy Place, and be their tower of strength.

Lord, graciously hear us. Amen.

Discipleship

We have been thinking in church about being disciples of Jesus and living out and growing in our Every Day Faith. This morning one of our congregation, Mark, preached about the importance of guarding against complacency. As followers of Jesus we are all called to be bearing fruit in our lives. Through this year we will focus on different aspects of our discipleship and encourage one another in our faith. Our most recent sermons are available to listen to here.

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

Today marks the start of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 2019. The theme this year is Only Justice and the resource is produced by the church in Indonesia.
There are opportunities through the week in Oadby for us to meet together and pray. St Paul's is hosting a Prayer Breakfast on Saturday 19th January at 9.30am.
This Sunday Hugh is preaching at Oadby URC and on the 27th there will be other pulpit swaps locally and a joint service at Trinity Methodist church at 6.30pm.
Do join us for any of these events.

The Courage and the Cost - World Watch List 2019 Top 5

Community Film Night tonight!

Carols by Candlelight

A nearly full church enjoyed the 2018 carols by candlelight service. Although the format is similar year by year, details change. Many thanks to all who had rehearsed, took part or helped set up the event.

The service took the form of Bible texts relating to the promise of the coming of Christ, or the actual story, Congregational carols, choral carols and prose.

In a brief talk, Gillian Gamble spoke of the gift of Christ and urged everyone to receive this most precious gift.

Christmas Preparations

At this time of year an enormous amount of hard work is undertaken by many members of the church in getting ready for Christmas – and we would like to thank everyone of them. The pictures below are just examples of some of that work.

The pictures feature the magnificent dilapidated stable erected by Derek Bowering and Ant Johnson, the foyer decorated by the 10^th Oadby Brownies, and the tree with decorations by Brookside School pupils.
So thank you to all of them.

 

Carolling at Sainsbury’s

A sizeable group from St Paul’s met in the entrance hall of Oadby Sainsbury’s on Saturday (15^th). We feared that the group might be diminished in size by the horrendous weather (freezing cold, wind and rain) but there are a good group of hardy souls who gathered. For over an hour we sang almost all of the well-known carols. Christmas is a season of giving, and we also handed out sweets to all the passers-by who would like them.

A board indicated who we were, and gave details of our other activities over Christmas.