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Are you interested in teaching in China?

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The Amity Summer English Teaching Programme in China for 2017 (9th July to 6th August) includes one week of orientation and three weeks of teaching working with Chinese English teachers in one of China’s rural provinces.

Amity Foundation, is a Chinese Christian Organisation created in 1985. Volunteers are needed for this summer. Teaching experience is helpful but not essential. Most volunteers are not teachers by profession. There is some funding to cover volunteers costs this summer.

This is a great way to experience the real China and the Chinese Church. For more information please speak with Jane Coates or text 0782 431 7650. You can also go on line www.short-term4china.org.uk

An environmental plan A – Caring for God’s Creation. Introducing an occasional series that takes a serious look at environmental issues

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At times, we slip into a view that God is only concerned with human beings. Actually, the Bible tells of God’s much wider concern. In Genesis, we learn that all the universe is created by God and all is seen by God as good. God forms humans out of the creation – the dust of the earth and commissions them to be carers of the earth and it’s flourishing. After the flood, God made a covenant with humans and every living creature. In the New Testament Jesus teaches us to pray for the Kingdom to come on earth as in heaven and later Jesus is seen not just as the saviour of humans but the one in whom all creation holds together… so this makes the environment a faith issue.Carbon dioxide and climate change has become the first thing that people think of when they consider our impact on our world. However, this is just one area of concern shared by environmental scientists and ecologists. About eight years ago, a group of scientists was convened under the chairmanship of Professor Johan Rockström of the Stockholm Resilience Centre to consider as far as possible, the totality of humanity’s impact upon planet Earth. They identified the following nine areas of concern:

  • Carbon dioxide and climate change
  • Reduction in biodiversity and species loss
  • Use and misuse of nitrogen
  • Land use and misuse
  • Fresh water supplies and the influence of water on climate
  • Release of toxic substances including plastic materials
  • Release of aerosol-sized particles into the atmosphere
  • Acidification of the oceans
  • Damage to the Ozone layer and its consequences

As we shall see, these topics are inter-related, and information on them will be put onto the Church website, month by month for a trial period, beginning with an item on plastics (shopping bags, etc.). In future we hope to touch on topics including food, transport, energy use and so on.

 

MBC helps Messy Church perfect an exciting new venture

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MBC is one of just thirty three UK churches chosen to trial a new, exciting outreach venture. Messy Church does Science is a project that builds on established programmes in order to bring a hands-on, 21st century approach to the link between a Christian understanding of Creation and science.

At Moortown our Children’s Worker, Cas Stoodley, and her Messy Church team set up five separate stations which in fifteen minute blocks each looked a different scientific activity.

As well as being asked to provide video and still images of the session volunteers and visitors were asked to fill in feedback forms which will soon be sent off to project organisers.

Our usual Messy Church takes place on the second Friday of each month (term term). To find out more about this brilliant, all age  activity speak to Cas or email her via this link cas.stoodley.mbc@btinternet.com

To view a larger version of any of our gallery images simply click on the picture or if you prefer you can follow this link to watch some video of the event. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMEVvffJ7tM

 

 

Half term treat – Friday 17th Feb

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On Friday 17 February, during half term, we thought it would be nice for the children, young people, team and parents of all our groups to get together outside of church. The plan is to meet at Roundhay Park (in the car park near the top playground) at 10.45am and spend a couple of hours having fun together.

Ooh! aren’t they lovely – a couple of rather unusual visitors check in at Lunch Club

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If you thought our Senior’s Lunch Club was little more than a bunch of people sitting round, drinking tea and playing bingo then you need to think again. Last week Laura Thompson lined up a couple of very unusual visitors in the form of a blue otugnued skink and what to me (although I’ll bet I’m wrong) looked like a giant tortoise.

I have to confess I’m much more of a dog or cat man but many thanks to John Hornby for passing these pictures on… I just hope they all washed their hands before they moved through to the Sports Hall for lunch!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some thoughts on Pastor Paula White’s prayer for President Trump

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Paula White, is pastor of the New Destiny Christian Center, she is also President Donald Trump’s spiritual adviser. Here is the text of her prayer at his inauguration.

We come to you, heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus with grateful hearts, thanking you for this great country that you have decreed to your people. We acknowledge we are a blessed nation with a rich history of faith and fortitude, with a future that is filled with promise and purpose.

 We recognize that every good and every perfect gift comes from you and the United States of America is your gift, for which we proclaim our gratitude.

As a nation, we now pray for our president, Donald John Trump, vice president, Michael Richard Pence, and their families. We ask that you would bestow upon our president the wisdom necessary to lead this great nation, the grace to unify us, and the strength to stand for what is honorable and right in your sight.

In Proverbs 21:1, you instruct us that our leader’s heart is in your hands. Gracious God, reveal unto our president the ability to know the will, your will, the confidence to lead us in justice and righteousness, and the compassion to yield to our better angels.

While we know there are many challenges before us, in every generation you have provided the strength and power to become that blessed nation. Guide us in discernment, Lord, and give us that strength to persevere and thrive.

Now bind and heal our wounds and divisions, and join our nation to your purpose. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, the psalmists declared.

Let your favor be upon this one nation under God. Let these United States of America be that beacon of hope to all people and nations under your dominion, a true hope for humankind.

Glory to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Haddon Willmer writes: There is much in this prayer which disquiets me. It is a complacent ‘America first’ prayer. Not being an American nor a Trump-fan, I find it hard to get past its nationalism to find a Christian prayer I can join in with.

Confession of sin is a key component of Christian prayer: there is not a hint of it here. The USA is simply ‘the gift of God’. It is called to be, and is confidently proud that it will be, a ‘beacon of hope to all people and nations… a true hope for humankind’. Without qualification, we ask God to give Donald Trump ‘the wisdom necessary to lead this great nation, the grace to unify us, and the strength to stand for what is honourable and right in your sight’. We have no sense, it seems, that if this prayer is real, we are here asking God for a massive miracle, bringing about a painful uprooting and an unimaginable remaking, a radical conversion for the Donald Trump we have come to know and have to live with for the next four years, at least. Could Donald Trump accept such a miracle? There is little evidence that he would. He certainly does not imagine it is necessary.

This prayer is made ‘in the name of Jesus Christ’. If those words mean anything at all, they remind us that our prayer goes through the filter of Jesus Christ, so that it fits faithfully with Jesus Christ. In his words and actions, in his self-giving and dying, Jesus calls us to repentance, humility, and truthfulness. He saw through the self-assured illusions of the Pharisee at prayer in the public glare and stood with the broken tax-collector, who could do only pray, God be merciful to me, a sinner (Luke 18.9-14).

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