September 2021

Herald

Bispham

The Rector’s Letter

What does a cup of tea (or coffee or other appealing beverage) mean to you? I must admit I am something of a tea addict (white, no sugar, and preferably Yorkshire Tea – don’t worry I fully support Lancashire in every other way!) and to put the kettle on is something of a reflex.

Katrina and I have really enjoyed beginning get to know many from the All Hallows church family and others here in Bispham over a brew. But we are very aware that there are still lots of people who haven’t yet made it over the threshold of the Rectory. You don’t need an excuse to knock on the door and say hi. So long as something else isn’t going on, you can expect to be invited in and the kettle put on.

I don’t know about you, but during the restrictions of the

pandemic, one thing I hugely missed was tea and coffee time at church. That chance to catch up or reconnect with someone, to welcome someone new, to have a quick laugh, to share a burden, to talk about God’s work in your week, and more. So much ‘one another’ ministry can happen in that short time after/before a church service.

With our new service patterns, tea and coffee is very deliberately in between our two morning services: 9am formal service, tea and coffee from c9.45am to 10.25am, 10.30am informal service. The hope is that if you come to our BCP services at 9am you might stay around afterwards and if you come to our informal service with Young Church you might come early and in that cross-over we get to mix as one church family at All Hallows.

All Hallows: Your Parish Church

Sunday Services at All Hallows

Online

As we build and strengthen relationships across the church family we all benefit and the uniting power of the good news about Jesus is displayed for people to see. God has brought us together and we each have a part to play, we each need one another. Staying / coming early for tea and coffee time is just one really small but significant way we can enrich our fellowship as one church in Christ.

Fancy a brew?

Jonny Lee

Get in touch:

Church Office 88a All Hallows Road

Bispham, Blackpool, FY2 0AY Church Office: 01253 274172

Email: secbah@googlemail.com

Services Sunday

9:00—BCP Traditional service

10:30am—Modern / Family Service with ‘Young Church

Thurs—11am Holy Communion

www.facebook.com/bahchurch

Please keep an eye on our social media And website for services changing and

our Covid-19 guidelines.

Website www.bahchurch.com

Find us on Facebook:

@bahchurch

Evening Fellowship 7.30-9pm monthly from Thursday 9th September in the

Stable.

Fellowship with a brew and biscuits/cake, music, a Bible

reading, prayers and a speaker.

Contact Janet Pendlebury janetbispham@gmail.com

for more information.

Dates for your diary

For details of weekly activities, please look towards the back of the Herald magazine.

For more information about any of these events, please telephone the Office: 01253 274 172

Craft & Chatter 2-4pm fortnightly from

Friday 3rd September in the Stable

Contact Jannis Nixon

nixon5@blueyonder.co.uk

for more information.

Afternoon Fellowship 12.30-3.30pm weekly from

Tuesday 14th September in the Stable Contact Sue Sager suesager@sky.com or Jane

Carter janecarter706@yahoo.co.uk for more information and to book lunch.

Hall Availability We have two halls at Church that may be available for use such as birthday parties or other events. Just make contact with the Parish Office for more information on: 274172 or secbah@googlemail.com

Jacaranda Café The Barn—OPEN 21ST MAY

* Thursdays * 10:30am—1.30pm

Mother and Toddler Group 0-5 year olds for parents,

guardians, child-minders, and grandparents’

Follow us on social media @bahchurch

*Tuesdays 9:30 — 11:00*

Little Lambs *Back soon*

10am - Church Stable Contact Jo: 07949 964809

Dear Lord, September – the month of new beginnings for many, as summer fades and school and college terms start.

After such a strange time of restrictions, hopes of freedom, with warnings to be cautious, it is hard to know what to expect this September.

We can’t know what lies ahead, Lord, but we can trust you to see us through whatever it turns out to be. Thank you for your promise, I will never leave you or forsake you… (Hebrews 13:5)

Help us to hold fast to that promise, to keep trusting you – and to be thankful for each September day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

By Daphne Kitching

September Prayer

Thanking God for our blessings

This comes from a blog by Alistair Birkett, director of Rural Ministries for Scotland and Northern England. You can read more at:

https://www.ruralministries.org.uk/blog/anticipatingtheharvest?

Our winter barley ripened quickly this year, and soon the combine harvesters were rolling here on the Northumberland / Scottish Border.

As the first trailer load of grain came into the shed, I ran my hands through the golden grains, offering a short prayer of thankfulness as I savoured the smell of fresh cut barley. It was a good harvest.

I’ve often reflected on the Old Testament festival of the Firstfruits, where the Israelites offered the very first sheaf of the spring harvest to God (Leviticus 23:9-14). I think this act required great faith, as they trusted God for a fruitful harvest to come, something that was far from certain, given their utter dependence on the weather.

I’m not sure about you, but I’m always up for giving thanks after the event. I’ll sing ‘Come ye thankful people come’ and rejoice that “all is safely gathered in”, but am I able to trust with anticipation for what is yet to come?

The festival of the Firstfruits reminded God’s people that everything they had came from Him. I am reminded that I must learn (and relearn) to trust in God, who has proven His faithfulness to me, over and over again.

Perhaps right now as a church community or an individual you’re waiting for a certain event, standing on the cusp of a new initiative, praying for a certain outcome or anticipating a long-held vision becoming reality. Let’s all keep trusting that whatever the challenge, however things turn out, irrespective of what we anticipate, God is going before us and has secured the Firstfruits of an even greater harvest through Jesus, as He rose from the dead.

Just as the grain offering to God in the Old Testament anticipated a harvest to come, Paul reminds us that Jesus’ victory anticipates an even greater bodily resurrection and eternal peace (1 Corinthians 15:20-22).

As we continue our journey with Jesus through the challenges of each day, let’s do so with a deepening faith and trust. In the meantime, bring on the harvest – I’ll see you on the other side!

Bispham Bear

The Parable of the Sower

Canon Paul Hardingham considers how various people respond to God.

This month we are looking at the Parable of the Sower (Mark 4:1-20). It’s the story of a farmer who sowed his seed in different type of soils. These represent the different responses of the heart to God’s Word (v15-20):

1) The hard heart: ‘like seed along the path…as soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them.’ (15). Some people, when they hear the message, get distracted eg social media, work or relationships. Personal priorities prevent them from hearing God.

2) The shallow heart: ‘like seed sown on rocky places…since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.’ (16,17). These are the people whose heart isn’t open to the message. When things become uncomfortable or discouraging, they are ready to quit.

3) The crowded heart: ‘like seed sown among thorns…but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful.’ (18,19). This soil is most relevant for us today. People crave status, comfort, security and personal desires alongside the things of God. It’s a heart that is worried about life getting out of control!

4) The open heart: ‘like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop – some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.’ (20). This represents the open heart that listens and accepts Jesus’s word, and is ready to follow Him however difficult things become.

What kind of soil is our heart? Are we hard, shallow, crowded or open? Do we have a heart of faith to follow Jesus in every aspect of our lives?

Prayer Corner

Thursday The Nation’s Health Loving Father, we pray that over the coming months, there may not be another “wave” of Covid infections. May the booster jabs, along with the yearly winter flu injections, result in the nation remaining healthy and free from severe medical problems. Thank You for those working in the NHS, and we pray that You will indeed strengthen them to cope day by day with the patients in their care.

“Summer and winter and springtime and harvest – sun, moon and stars in their courses above – join with all nature in manifold witness – to thy great faithfulness, mercy and love. )from the hymn

“Great is Thy Faithfulness” by Thomas O. Chisholm)

Tuesday Reaching Out Lord Jesus, You commissioned us “to make disciples” – this is our Christian harvest for You. We ask that under the leadership of Jonny and Katrina, and our Ministry Team, You will guide and help us to grow Your Church here in Bispham, and to bring in Your harvest.

Wednesday Our Schools Father God, we bring the schools in our area before You now, asking that as the staff and pupils return after the summer break, You will keep them safe and well during the winter months. We pray that the schools may not have to be closed due to Covid infections, and we thank You for the dedication of the teaching staff, combining both face-to-face and online learning, ensuring that young people’s education is disrupted as little as possible.

Monday Those in need Sustaining God, we remember those for whom the difficulties of these last eighteen months have resulted in problems, both financial and emotional. We think of the countless people who feel that life will “never be the same again”, and pray that during the coming winter months, they may be nourished physically, emotionally and spiritually in the warmth of our Saviour’s love.

Friday The World’s Needs Dear Lord, we remember those living in countries where the harvests so often fail year by year. We pray for a more equal sharing of the world’s harvests, and for a closing of the divide between rich and poor. May richer nations share vaccination supplies, medical equipment, and expertise with poorer countries, not for political and financial gain, but through a deep sense to meet humanitarian need.

Sunday Our Worship Loving Lord, we come to You in grateful thanks for all that You have provided – the many gifts You have showered upon us. You have commanded us to love one another, and so we ask that You will help us to follow that command and share what You have given us more widely and compassionately with those around us.

Saturday God’s love and care Lord, we ask that Your love and care may surround and rest upon those who are sick and troubled, grieving and hurting. In their dark moments, we pray that Your Holy Word will be a beacon of light to sustain them, and that they will find the hope and reassurance that they need from words of Scripture.

Lester Amann considers the lesson of the caterpillar and the butterfly

When a caterpillar changes into a butterfly, it’s hard to believe it’s the same creature. But at both stages of its life, it has a body that is perfectly suited to living in a particular environment.

This insect can help us understand the afterlife and the significance of the resurrected Jesus. Paul, on his journeys, discovered that some members of the church in Corinth were confused about life after death. So, Paul, wrote a lengthy letter to them to explain the importance of the resurrection of Jesus, and how it affects our future existence.

Paul doesn’t mention caterpillars and butterflies but describes a seed becoming a plant. By just looking at an individual seed there is no knowing what it is going to look like! But out of its death comes a beautiful new life form.

Paul points out that all living beings have a body that enables them to live in a particular environment. There are earthly bodies for living in a physical world and a spiritual body for living in the heavenly realms. And so God will give to us a new spiritual body to enable us to live with Him in heaven.

Of course, all butterflies eventually die, but in our resurrected body we will not be subject to decay or death. How do we know this? Jesus said: “Because I live, you also will live” (John 14:19). Jesus pioneered the way for us. He died on the cross, arose from the grave, and so opened up the way for all believers in Him to go to Heaven. Thanks be to God.

Becoming new

Mother and Toddler Group - 0-5 year olds for parents, guardians, child-

minders, and grandparents’ There is a cuppa and a friendly chat in the Barn. Lots of toys with action songs and nursery rhymes. Meets Tuesdays (except school holidays) in the Barn 9.30 to 10.45 am . £1 per family.

Tuesday Afternoon Fellowship . 12.30-3.30pm weekly from Tuesday 14th

September in the Stable .A simple lunch at 12.30pm with a programme starting at 1.30pm with praise and prayer followed by a speaker/entertainment, tea and cake, and a closing hymn and prayer by 3.30pm. £2 donation for lunch and programme or £1 without lunch. Contact Sue Sager <suesager@sky.com> or Jane Carter <janecarter706@yahoo.co.uk> for more information and to book lunch.

Craft ‘n Chatter Meeting every other Friday. 2-4pm in the Stable (1st church

hall as you come up the drive). Open to everyone, men & ladies, all ages. Just bring something to do knit, crochet or other craft/activity. Friendly atmosphere cost £1 including brews. If you want to learn something new someone may be able to help you. Just turn up or contact the Parish Office for details: 01253 274172 or secbah@googlemail.com

Evening Fellowship 7.30-9pm monthly from Thursday 9th September in the Stable. Fellowship with a brew and biscuits/cake, music, a Bible reading, prayers and a speaker. Contact Janet Pendlebury <janetbispham@gmail.com> for more information.

Regular Church Activities:

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Parish Registers for August 2021

Baptisms 1st Frankie ASHTON

8th Phoenix Lily BAKER

29th Halle Grace GILBERT

Funerals

23rd John MACDONALD, age 86 (Service & Cremation at Carleton)

23rd Grant John MACDONALD, age 53 (Service & Cremation at Carleton

Burial in Churchyard

18th Eileen MACLEAN, age 83 (Service at Cleveleys Park Methodist Church)

25th Roy THORNTON, age 96 (Service at St Paul’s Church Fleetwood)

Interment of Cremated Remains

3rd Jeremy Graham HUGHES, age 70

Parish Registers

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