Choices Pregnancy Counselling Centre

A number of folk from our church are involved in Choices Pregnancy counselling centre and this Thursday 28th January at 8PM they are holding their AGM at St Mary’s Church South Ealing, Speaker is Nuala Leach from CARE. Come and find out more about the work which you are supporting. Refreshments will be provided

20s & 30s

There's another 20s and 30s ish gathering at Penny Chew's after the service on Sunday night

Food collection for those in need

We are commencing a small food bank of store cupboard items to be able to distribute to those in need. The food will be collected each Sunday morning in a basket at TVU and stored at the South Ealing Mission building. Please consider adding something to your shopping list occasionally to place in this basket to remember those who are less fortunate than yourself. Examples are tins of soup, beans, pasta, pasta sauce, and anything with a long expiry date eg. 6 months or more. Toiletries are also helpful eg. Toilet paper, soap etc. Please avoid buying the value products as they are used to eating value items and it is nice to be able to really bless people with the best available! If you have any questions please speak to Hazel Mangasser or Nicky Rae. If you know of anyone who would benefit from receiving these items please also speak to us.

Sunday's confession of sin

I've found the following confession of sin written by Richard Baxter very helpful in the last few weeks, we'll be saying it together on Sunday morning.

O most great, most just and gracious God; you are of purer eyes than to behold iniquity; but you have promised mercy through Jesus Christ to all who repent and believe in him. Therefore we confess that we are sinful by nature and that we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. We have neglected and abused your holy worship and your holy name. We have dealt unjustly and uncharitably with our neighbours. We have not sought first your kingdom and righteousness. We have not been content with our daily bread.

You have revealed your wonderful love to us in Christ and offered us pardon and salvation in him; but we have turned away. We have run into temptation; and the sin that we should have hated, we have committed.

Have mercy upon us, most merciful Father! We confess you alone are our hope. Make us your children and give us the Spirit of your Son, our only Saviour. Amen

(from a 1661 prayer of Richard Baxter, The Savoy Liturgy)

Pot Luck Tea

This Sunday is Pot Luck Tea beginning at 4pm, the plan is bring sandwiches and cakes or anything else cold you fancy and we eat and share together.

Gerrard Hemmings

This Sunday night our preacher will be Gerrard Hemmings from Amyand Park Chapel (APC!!)in Twickenham. Gerrard is a West London boy and is always worth listening to and has seen what is in some ways remarkable blessing at the church.

You can listen to his sermons here.

I'm preaching all day at APC so would value your prayers

ELT - Don't be ignorant about God

Ealing Lunchtime Talks starts up again tomorrow with Iain beginning a new series

Acts 17 "Don't Be Ignorant About God"

5 Jan - Where does God live? (Vs 16-24)

12 Jan - What does God need? (Vs 25)

19 Jan - What is God doing? (Vs 26-28)

26 Jan - What does God command? (Vs 29-34)

I've been reading Francis Schaeffer and the shaping of Evangelical America by Barry Hankins and found the following thought provoking particularly how heresy enters the church..

Commenting on Schaeffers 1972 booklet the new super spirituality and addressing pentecostalism 'that it paralleled liberalism by placing an emphasis on experience over doctrinal content.'....

'Schaeffer tied this to an explanation for how heresy entered the church. He told his readers to imagine that the whole of orthodoxy consisted of 100 points of doctrine. Heresy happens when the church stops teachng, for example, points forty through fifty. Then, someone begins to overemphasize those very points, and because the church has ignored them, people are hungry for them and begin to buy into the overemphasis. The overemphasis is heresy. when another group sees the heretical overemphasis, it starts preaching those points even less than before, even ignoring or attempting to refute them. The proper response, Schaeffer pointed out,is not for the church to ignore points forty through fifty, but to attempt to bring them back into their proper place in the doctrinal system.' (page 152)