Allow us to encourage you with a great story of connection, and then invite you to explore one avenue to do the same.
Recently we had a very nice message about a client who visited the Foodbank. The text expressed how grateful the client was with how much food and help they had received and has now shown an interest in joining the church! We have received messages of this nature a number of times already, one even came in today, so please know that people are joining our church community, even in this season of lockdown.
The Foodbank is a fantastic way of showing love and care to the local community, every parcel that leaves the Foodbank has a gospel focused booklet inside, giving clients the opportunity to meet Jesus for themselves.
So, here is our big ask... we are inviting you to send invitations to your neighbours. In order for us to ‘be’ the church of Jesus today, we must represent Him as best we can. So this weekend, we would like you to do the following:
Knock on your neighbours door. Introduce yourself or print off, fill out and post this invitation (click here to download).
Feel free to tell them where you live if they don’t already know. Tell them you go to church and you are asking all your neighbours if they have anything they would like you to pray for, or anyone. Let them know that we are here to help them or others in the town with practical support through the foodbank also.
When they respond with a request, write it down and assure them you will pray. If they respond with help for the foodbank, then show your thanks, collect the donation & deliver it to us at the foodbank.
Keep it simple. No need for special words. Just a way to love your neighbours.
When you pray their request, or remember who you have interacted with at home later, ask God if there is anything else He would like you to pray for them. Then pray that too.
One way to follow up on this, is to please please please send us your stories of how this went for you! Stories only help us learn from one another, or inspire us to try some things we haven’t before. Please email your stories, whether good or bad, to prayer@cheltenhamelim.org
ONLINE MINISTRY
GREAT NEWS! Thank you to everyone who has helped us hit our target of 100 subscribers on YouTube.
This will make us easier to find when you are watching us online. To make sure as many people as possible can benefit from our services, we would love to hit 1000 subscribers next - so if you still haven't, please SUBSCRIBE!
This Sunday's service will be packed with worship for the whole family, word from Rev Luke & more opportunities to press in and pray together. You can catch the service premiere at 10:30am by visiting cheltenhamelimchurch.org/media via the link below or heading over to our YouTube channel.
Can't wait until Sunday? Check out our channel at 10am tomorrow (Saturday) for a sneak preview of our latest All-Age Worship song!
Sunday morning at 9:30am
This is a precious time we spend together in order to pray. We seek God's plans for our church and call for the Holy Spirit to be with us as we venture into each of our days. We will be doing this via a video messaging app called Zoom, so make sure you’re connected to join in.
We're now using a new recurring meeting code for this, which will be sent out to our members via email later in the week. Once you've received it, you can save the code or go back to the email each time to log in. We'll also put reminders out in case you miss it. If you want to be involved and are not on our member's list, then please do drop us a message via our prayer page (link below).
We will also be live streaming this meeting to our Facebook community group. If you would like to join the group, head to https://www.facebook.com/groups/2069132983299913/ and send us a member request.
Check out our online prayer room here
GIVT
You can now give to us through your smartphone. Download the GIVT app, scan this QR code & give. It's simple, easy to use & effective in making sure we can continue to release ministry through this church.
REMINDER:
You may be in a position where you can help us. If you are not, we seek not to put any burden on you whatsoever. We do therefore have three ways you can help us:
1. Pray with us. Absolutely nothing will be as impactful as prayer in this season. Let us never lose sight of the hope we have in Jesus Christ.
2. Serve with us. You may be fit and healthy; in which case, in order to open more, we need more hands to help serve people in need. this could be through delivering to those in isolation, or helping us help those who are able to come to our site.
3. Give financially. We want to make sure our ministry and our foodbank work increases. This means we still need resourcing coming in. Would you consider giving via a standing order? If you don’t giftaid to us, please can we ask you to giftaid to us also. If you normally give by cash, can we ask you to put a cheque to us in the post instead?
We are indebted to all who already give and serve. From the bottom of our hearts, we say thank you for giving sacrificial, generously & consistently.
Foodbank open Wednesdays and Fridays to clients looking for food; Tuesday- Friday, 9:30-3pm for donations
We want to say a huge thank you to everyone who is giving their time, energy or finance to the cause right now. We are successfully feeding hundreds of people each week, whilst keeping donations coming in, and volunteers safe. It’s a big task right now, so your support, whether prayerfully or otherwise, is nothing other than encouraging.
Please keep supporting any way you can. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.
