Dear parishioners and friends of Knockbreda,
Faithful Delivery
As I write this email on Friday morning I hope you are looking forward to your ‘Faithful Delivery’. Keep an eye out for a small parcel which should be arriving at your door this afternoon, delivered by our faithful team of volunteers. Thank you to Linda for making the arrangements for this little treat during lockdown – and to all the bakers, deliverers, organisers and willing volunteers for making it happen.
Services in Church
We have not yet reached a decision on when services will return to the church building. The bishop met with diocesan clergy this week and described how churches would be gradually opening up again depending on local factors. With social distancing guidelines still in place, these factors include the size of a congregation and the physical size of the building.
I have asked the Select Vestry to meet this week and we will discuss a way forward for Knockbreda. I trust you will pray for us as we try to do what is best and safest for everyone. As churches reopen Sunday services will inevitably look quite different. For example, at this stage restrictions are still in place for singing.
I will of course inform you of any decisions made as we go forward but at the moment I cannot give a definite date for the resumption of services. Online services continue – and will most likely continue even after gatherings at Knockbreda resume. Thank you for your patience.
This Sunday
The morning service this Sunday is to be for Children’s Day. Children’s Day is usually a highlight in the church’s calendar and we are all disappointed not to be able to be with the boys and girls in person this year. Instead we will have our service online, on the Knockbreda YouTube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrvBYWQeGj2UjQ8TckCFbHQ
Go to the Knockbreda YouTube channel and look in Playlists, Sunday Services for the service dated 28th June.
I know that the Sunday School enjoyed socially distanced singing last Saturday outside the front of the church. You will see and hear them as part of the service this Sunday morning. Well done to all of them! Thank you to Ruth Thompson for coordinating the music and the choreography!
On Sunday evening I will be preaching on John 10.22-42 which I hope you will read before joining me on YouTube at 6.30pm.
Many believed in him
One verse from this Sunday evening’s reading has really struck me. John 10.41, ‘And many came to Jesus. And they said, “John did no sign, but everything John said about this man was true.” And many believed in him.’
This concludes a passage where it would appear that not many did believe in Jesus! He has been debating in the temple courts with the religious establishment of Jerusalem who are becoming harder and harder towards him. But just when we think that Jesus’ mission is at a standstill he moves beyond the Jordan and we discover that many do believe. Thanks to John the Baptist’s witness (his words, not miracles) many do follow Christ.
Let’s be encouraged as a church that many can and will come to Christ as we faithfully bear witness to him today.
With love and prayers,
Bill
