The latest Relational Mission prayer letter is online here. Do please download and pray for what is going on in our sphere!
Last Sunday was great!
Dave Matthews spoke magnificently on our need for a PAT – To Proclaim Jesus, Admonish one another and Teach one another, so we get to be more like Jesus. There’s no mp3 this week, but I will put up the powerpoint on the website in a moment!
Do put it into practice – be open to proclaim Jesus and to be admonished and to admonish when necessary -we all want to be more like Jesus! The way he explained how to do it well was superb, so do take a look at the powepoint to refresh your memory.
Life is full of teaching moments, so don’t forget to use them too – yesterday we ended up discussing what is a Christian at the tea table, out of a comment one of the kids mad about a naughty kid at school!
Life is about being obedient to the Holy Spirit when He whispers. Go for it!
Christmas Clothes Giveaway
At the Tuesday marketplace was a lot of fun – well done Alison for organising it. We got to bless a lot of people, share God’s love, the Gospel and to pray for healing. It was one of those stepping out of the boat times. Out of my comfort zone and yet as you step out, God blesses what you are doing. We may well see some visitors on Sunday because of it.
This Sunday
The Christmas Carol service is one of the biggest evangelistic opportunities of the year. People say ”yes” far more often to an invite to a Christmas carol service. A free lunch helps too. It is a bring and share – but most of those we invited on the streets will be sharing more than they will be bringing. Please let’s make their second encounter with Christianity a great one! Bring lots of food! A way to a man’s heart is through his stomach and people’s eternal destiny could hang in the balance of our hospitality this Sunday. So please bring lots of food and let the guests go first (I really don’t want to have to do FHB – family hold back!!!)
I do pray that these next couple of weeks will be full of blessing for you as you spend time with your families and friends.
I was really inspired by Mike Bett’s video on Sunday about Kenyans praying for our upcoming Together at East of England Conference – details of that and the video are on the website www.togetherconference.com
There are a couple of people I would love to come to the Together Conference, who wouldn’t be able to afford it. If you would like to sponsor or part sponsor someone, then please pop a cheque payable to “The Gateway Church” in the offering box on Sunday with “Conference sponsorship” on the back please! A full-board adult ticket costs £127.50.
J.John shared a great story at the men’s day on Saturday of a guy on his own in airport lounge – who bought a latte and a bag of mini-doughnuts. He sat at a table where there was a guy reading his paper. He opened the bag of doughnuts and took one. The other guy looked, reached down and took one, to the astonishment of the first guy. He did it again and again and our guy finds himself getting increasingly annoyed, but not saying anything. How dare he take my doughnuts! The newspaper guy looks in the bag, sees one doughnut left, rips it in half, eats his half and pushes the bag towards our guy, before getting up and going to his flight. What a cheek! When our first guy gets up for his flight, he sees his own bag of doughnuts on top of his suitcase. Ooops!
Point is God owns all the doughnuts. God gives us all a bag of 10 doughnuts a month. Some are big doughnuts, some are small. But God gives them and really we are only looking after them. When we give back to God, through the local church, one of those doughnuts, somehow the other 9 stretch further! Perhaps largely because we are being more intentional with the other nine and because God blesses givers. The question isn’t “is God going to bless me” but rather, “how am I going to handle the blessings that God has already poured out all over me?”
Sometimes we can give an extra half or more from those 9 doughnuts because we are being blessed. There’s a great line in the film “Over the Hedge” where some cute cartoon animals are being introduced to the art of scavenging. They find a bag of doughnuts and the lead character, Ajay, points to a fat human in front of a TV and says “Ah, doughnuts – Humans use those for storing fat for the winter”. Jesus calls us to store treasure in heaven!
Image credit: Karola Riegler
Learning Scripture is about as popular as sausages in a synagogue, but is probably one of the most helpful things to grow in the Christian life.
Learning some verses for each of those headings will help. The power in Billy Graham’s preaching was in “The Bible says…”
Dallas Willard “Bible memorization is absolutely fundamental to spiritual formation. If I had to choose between all the disciplines of the spiritual life, I would choose Bible memorization, because it is a fundamental way of filling our minds with what it needs. This book of the law shall not depart out of your mouth. That’s where you need it! How does it get in your mouth? Memorization”
Chuck Swindoll “I know of no other single practice in the Christian life more rewarding, practically speaking, than memorizing Scripture… No other single exercise pays greater spiritual dividends! Your prayer life will be strengthened. Your witnessing will be sharper and much more effective. Your attitudes and outlook will begin to change. Your mind will become alert and observant. Your confidence and assurance will be enhanced. Your faith will be solidified”
We have short-term memory and long-term memory. In simple terms the more we review something, the more long-term the memory becomes.
Some of us are visual people, some are oral and some can remember writing best. I hate being put in a box – I’m a bit of all three, so to learn a verse I write it out while reading it out aloud and that covers the bases!
– a recommended pattern for getting a verse in the long term memory
For seven days write and read out loud the verse seven times
For the next seven weeks, review it once a week (while starting on the next verse daily!)
For the next seven months , review it once a month
Having the verses you are learning and reviewing on small cards in your wallet/purse will be helpful for stealing odd moments to press on. Some of you may have used Navigators Topical Memory System – I found a very helpful website that will create the cards for free if you give it the verses you want.
Here’s a pdf with some verses appropriate to our current sermon series in Romans – may they enrich your life, praying and witnessing…
Search The Web And Raise Funds From Our Homepage!
We’ve added a great new facility to our website so that you can help us raise funds whenever you visit our site.
You’ll now find a brand new easysearch search box on our homepage. It works just like our easysearch page – http://thegatewaychurch.easysearch.org.uk – so when you use it to search the Web, you’ll raise funds for us!
What’s more, because easysearch uses innovative search technology to combine the strengths of several major search providers together – Yahoo! Ask.com, Bing and more – it brings you the best, most accurate search results on the Web, in one ‘easy’ search.
So, if you want to find top quality search results AND raise funds for us, visit our easysearch page at http://thegatewaychurch.easysearch.org.uk or use the easysearch box on our homepage.
We recently sent £600 to Kev and Em Reilly who are planting a church in Gdansk, Poland. Here’s a reprint of their story so far, to stir your prayers…
The Story so FarIn August 2008, Kev and Emma Reilly and their four daughters moved to Gdansk, Poland in order to plant a church under the apostolic oversight of Mike Betts and his team. With no language, no contacts and not much of anything else, Grace Church (them and their good friend Tom who spent a year with them) began to pray and worship, and learn how on earth to do family, school, work and church in Poland.
Through a series of divine appointments, God began to connect us with students and teachers in the local university. Creative ideas and approaches to outreach began to flow and the Holy Spirit led us to start an English writing group, regularly gathering people into our home on a Sunday night. We began to fill our home at every opportunity – 30 friends and neighbours for Christmas parties, 20 or so for birthdays, BBQ’s and other gatherings. Any and every opportunity was taken to connect broadly and meaningfully with people.
We are hosting a Chinese Buffet and Charity Auction for help for heroes on Fri 14th May at Springwood School, Queenway, Kings Lynn at 7.30pm. Tickets are £7.50 for adults, £3.75 for under 12s. Bring a bottle! We’ll have a great fun evening – so please bring friends, family and neighbours. If you have something that can be auctioned or know someone who may be able to donate something, please get in touch asap!
There’s loads of great things for auction – cinema tickets, a children’s party, a gas boiler service, cakes, 3 course meal… and many more! There’s no pressure to buy anything and starting prices will be low.
Please buy tickets in advance here, on Sunday or give us a ring on 07905 913291.
We love a good fry up with the lads. Especially when we get to hear about “men behaving godly”!
Our first men’s breakfast with Maurice Nightingale is on Sat 8th May, 8.30am at The Globe Hotel on the Tuesday Market Place.
Spaces are limited, so get in quick – £7.50 book online or with Andy one Sunday soon!
10am at
Gaywood Primary School,
Field Lane
Kings Lynn
PE30 4AY
©2012 The Gateway Church
