26 September 2004

We give the assurance of our thoughts and prayers to all who are unwell, awaiting or undergoing treatment, or anxious or grieving for the loss of loved ones.

“Come as You Are”

A 10-week series to “help people think about their faith and what it means in their daily lives to be a follower of Jesus”. Meetings on Thursday evenings from 21st October to 23rd December inclusive, in Marketgait, from 7.15 pm to 9.15 pm. The course explores issues of faith and what it meansto belong to the Methodist Church in particular. Invitations are being distributed today – please consider the contents prayerfully and respond as indicated.

“Quiet Room”

The downstairs back room is prepared as a place for quiet reflection & personal prayer before worship on Sundays.

News-sheet

The News-sheet published next week will be for the following “holiday” weeks. Please let the editors (Jenny & David) have intimations or news via the red “Notices” tray in the upstairs office, email or phone message for dates to 24th October. Thanks.

Meetings this week

Support other Organisations

NCH

• This year’s NCH Christmas cards cost £2 for a pack of 10, with free postage and packing if 5 or more packs are ordered. See the flyer on the Vestibule table and contact Margaret if you wish to join a bulk order.
• You may also be interested in a CD of old Sunday School Hymns, or the 2005 diary.

Trade Justice

Postcards are on the Vestibule table, concerning this campaign. If you wish to indicate support, please sign the postcard and return it, as indicated, to World Development Movement for forwarding ‘en masse’ to the Government.

Link Club – Enable Bowling Challenge

Thursday 7 October from 7 pm

The Link Club is delighted that a team from the church, calling itself The Flying Fish, has agreed to take part in the Enable fund-raising bowling challenge. They need to raise at least £50 sponsorship and would be grateful for your help. A sponsor form is on the table at the top of the stairs. Attached to the sponsor form are more details about the challenge. (If anyone else would like to form a team, Lorna can give more information.)

Scottish Bible Society News

The current SBS Appeal is to support work in the Arabian Peninsula, through the “Megavoice Project” which uses “a hand-held digital audio player able to store speech … about the same size or smaller than a mobile phone … less than 1” thick and ….. only 4 ozs, …. rugged, water-resistant and powered by the sun. The New Testament, Gospels and other parts of the Bible can be stored on the microchip and, when played, the message comes over clearly in the listener’s own language.”

The range of languages includes:

• Yar – its speakers prefer to listen to stories
• Somali – over 90% “have not heard clearly the God News of Jesus Christ”
• Afar – literacy rate less than 3% - Megavoice would be ideal.

Each Megavoice costs £13; it is estimated that every unit will provide contact for 10 people.

The Arabian Peninsula is a land of stark contrasts, with vast oil reserves lying under vast uninhabited deserts; enormous wealth displayed in modern cities, while nomadic tribes cling to their way of life in the desert.

Migrant workers from 100 nationalities make up 30% of the population - of these an estimated 8 million are illiterate.

See letter in library area for more information.

Our prayerful attention is drawn this week to

• the work of the South Africa Regional Centre, facing challenges of HIV/AIDS, economic instability, illiteracy and leadership issues
• distribution in Ukraine to street children, orphans, and juvenile delinquents
• Conference of the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelism, meeting in Thailand from Wednesday.

Training courses (run by ‘Rowan’)

See library area.

Forthcoming events

Prayer Points for this week

• Methodist Publishing House Board meeting on Tuesday;
• European Methodist Youth Council meeting in Aylesbury, Thursday - Tuesday;
• Rev Jim Jones at the Malaysian Methodist Conference & visiting Training Institutions;
• business & fellowship at the Circuit Meeting;
• partners and projects in Tajikistan, where 83% of the population live below the poverty line (Christian Aid);
• library resources in the Nairobi Evangelical Graduate School of Theology (NGEST), Kenya (Feed The Minds);
• The Leprosy Mission’s promotional work in Singapore, Korea, India, Australia, Hong Kong, Zimbabwe, and New Zealand;
• Bible Society work in Uganda and in Iraq;
• we pray with and for the peoples of Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger;
• we remember fellow Methodists in the Sheffield (North-east) Circuit (Sheffield District), and in Wishaw (Lanarkshire Circuit).

• 19 September 2004
• 03 October 2004

© 2002—2003 Dundee Methodist Church.