Category: Other News

Christian Aid Week

by Alan Mathew, posted in Other News, Weekly Church News

Christian Aid Week 10th – 16th May 2020

Love never fails. Coronavirus impacts all of us.
But love unites us all.

“Let us love, not in word or speech but in truth and action.” (1 John 3:18).

As this coronavirus spreads across the world, love rises up in response. You’ve already shown incredible kindness to your neighbours. Now is the time to reach out to your neighbours both near and far. Your love protects. From storms, from drought, and now from coronavirus; your love protects our global neighbours battling the spread of this illness. Your love protects with soap, clean water and medical supplies. By supporting us this Christian Aid Week, you can reach out and protect more of your neighbours today.

Christian Aid Week is moving online! We would love you to join in to show love for our neighbours near and far, as a global family.
Unfortunately under the current circumstances regarding Covid-19, there is a delay to processing donations by post.

Please give via the Christian Aid website where possible or call 020 7523 2269 to donate by telephone.
Paying directly into their bank account
For details on how to pay money directly into their bank account please call 020 7523 2226.

The coronavirus outbreak threatens the health of our neighbours near and far. Together we must respond quickly to help the most vulnerable.
Coronavirus has shown us that our futures are bound more tightly together than ever before and now it is spreading across the world’s poorest countries, putting people living in poverty at great risk.
These people are already facing a lack of water, food and healthcare. Some are homeless. Some are living with underlying health issues such as HIV. As coronavirus infection rates speed up, they will feel the impacts of the virus deeply. We must respond now.

Christian Aid is responding to the coronavirus outbreak in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean.
We’re working together with partners and faith leaders to inform people about the risks, offering hygiene and hand washing sessions, equipping health facilities with supplies and providing training to frontline aid workers.
We’re providing food packages to some of the most marginalised families and ensuring protection for women affected by domestic violence.

Together with our local partners, we are working quickly to limit the impact of coronavirus in some of the most vulnerable communities around the world.
We are drawing on our experience from the Ebola crisis and helping communities to prevent and delay infection.

We are providing essential soap, water and hand-washing training.
We are ensuring urgent health messages get through to help keep people safe. We are working through our networks of church partners and faith-based organisations to reach the most vulnerable at this critical time.
Life-changing transformation is possible when we come together in faith and action!
With your help we can do even more.
Christian Aid believes in life before death!

Please give via the Christian Aid website where possible or call 020 7523 2269 to donate by telephone.
Paying directly into their bank account
For details on how to pay money directly into their bank account please call 020 7523 2226.

Take time to be holy

by Bellshill Central, posted in Other News, What we're singing
Listen to the choir of Bellshill Central Parish Church

Take time to be holy,
speak oft with thy Lord;
abide in him always,
and feed on his word.
Make friends of God’s children,
help those who are weak,
forgetting in nothing
his blessing to seek.

This beloved devotional hymn comes to us from British layman William Dunn Longstaff (1822-1894). Since his father was a wealthy ship owner, Longstaff was a person of independent financial means. Due to his generous philanthropy, he was influential in evangelical circles. The Rev. Carlton Young, editor of The United Methodist Hymnal, notes that he followed his friend and persuasive Welsh preacher Arthur A. Rees when he left the Anglican priesthood in 1842 after disagreements with his rector and bishop. As a result, Rees established the Bethesda Free Chapel in Sunderland, where Longstaff served as his church treasurer. He married Joyce Burlinson in 1853 and together they had seven children.

Longstaff befriended a number of well-known evangelists such as William Booth (1829-1912), founder of the Salvation Army. Some of Longstaff’s hymns were published in the official magazine of the Salvation Army magazine, The War Cry, during the 1880s. In 1873 the famous American preacher Dwight L. Moody (1837-1899) and his chief musician Ira D. Sankey (1840-1908) arrived in England to hold a series of evangelistic meetings. The financial sponsor for their revivals died, leaving them with meager means to continue. They were desperately seeking funds, and Longstaff came to their rescue, helping to establish a donor base that allowed Moody to hold revivals in London and Scotland.

Methodist hymnologist Robert Guy McCutchan notes that Longstaff was inspired by the words of Griffith John, a missionary to China, repeated in a meeting in Keswick, England in the early 1880s. John cited I Peter 1:16, “Be ye holy; for I am holy” (KJV), a reference to Leviticus 11:44. The hymn text appeared in Hymns of Consecration, the collection of hymns used during the Keswick event.

Longstaff showed the hymn to Ira Sankey, who in turn passed it on to American songwriter George C. Stebbins (1846-1945) to set in 1882. Stebbins laid it aside and did not recall it until an evangelistic meeting in India, during which the theme of holiness was explored. Stebbins recalled Longstaff’s hymn and set it to music for the revival. He sent his tune HOLINESS to Sankey, who published the hymn in New Songs and Sacred Solos (1888).

Each of the four stanzas begins with the invitation, “Take time to be holy.” The first stanza begins with a devotional request, “speak oft with thy Lord.” The invitation to holiness extends to care for “God’s children” and “those who are weak,” echoing the twin commandments, Matthew 22:36-40, to love God and neighbor.

The second stanza seeks to be alone with Jesus while “the world rushes on.” Through time with Jesus, “like him we shall be,” and, as a result, others will witness this “likeness.” In Methodist theology, this might be seen as a journey toward Christian perfection.

In stanza three, Jesus becomes the “guide” that we follow and trust. The final stanza suggests that when we “Take time to be holy,” our souls become calm. This calmness leads to Jesus’ control in our lives. Control manifests itself in “fountains of love.” This love in turn “fit[s us] for service above.”

Carlton Young distinguishes between Longstaff’s use of holiness and the Wesleyan understanding of personal holiness that demands a “radical change of heart and the resulting release from the bonds of sin as embodied in the Wesleyan precepts of entire sanctification, perfecting grace, perfect love, and Christian perfection.” To illustrate the transforming nature of holiness, the Rev. Young cites a section of the opening stanza of Charles Wesley’s hymn, “Love divine, all loves excelling”:

Take away our bent to sinning;
Alpha and Omega be;
end of faith as its beginning,
set our hearts at liberty.
In addition, Longstaff’s sense of devotional holiness also does not embrace a Wesleyan sense of social justice.

Prayers for VE day 75th anniversary

by Bellshill Central, posted in Other News

JOIN IN AN ACT OF REMEMBRANCE AT 11AM TODAY AS WE REMEMBER. WE WILL NEVER FORGET.

For those who served and died in World War II

O God of truth and justice, we hold before you those men and women who have died in active service, particularly in the Second World War, whose sacrifice brought Victory in Europe. As we honour their courage and cherish their memory, may we put our faith in your future; for you are the source of life and hope, now and for ever. Amen.

For those who serve today

O Lord God of Hosts, stretch forth, we pray, your almighty arm to strengthen and protect our service men and women. Support them in times of conflict, and in their rest and training keep them safe from all evil; endue them with courage and loyalty; and grant that in all things they may serve without reproach; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

For the peace of the world

O God, who would fold both heaven and earth in a single peace; that the design of your great love lighten upon the waste of our wraths and sorrows and give peace to your church, peace among nations, peace in our dwellings and peace in our hearts; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Sir Francis Drake’s prayer

O Lord, when thou givest to thy servants to endeavour in any great matter, Grant us also to know that it is not the beginning but the continuing of the same until it be thoroughly finished that yieldeth the true glory, through him for the finishing of thy work laid down his life, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Communities Together

by Bellshill Central, posted in Other News, Weekly Church News

Communities Together is an initiative created as a response to the needs of the Bellshill, Mossend and Thorniewood Areas (we will do surrounding areas) in North Lanarkshire against the backdrop of Coronavirus. They are an umbrella group that pulls together the community response to COVID—19 to make sure all areas covered and supported where possible. Communities Together hopes to identify people who may need support now, and may be vulnerable for many reasons, and get help to them. 

Communities Together was launched on Monday 27th April 2020 at 8AM and will operate out of the Bellshill YMCA (294 Main Street, Bellshill, ML4 1AB).

Operating via a helpline 01698 74 74 83 or via email ContactUs@communitiestogether.scot – their friendly team will be on hand to prepare food parcels and other essentials for delivery to vulnerable people in the Bellshill, Mossend and Thorniewood communities during this difficult time.

The Group will also support the collection and delivery of key items including Prescriptions to vulnerable people and can facilitate the collection of Shopping for those who require a Shopper to get out and do this for them.

They will also signpost and give information via the helpline where people can be linked in to Befriending for a telephone call and given information on other services, through adding information packs to the deliveries. 

Communities Together are also aware that although people need help now, that they also need to prepare for after lock down, so with your help we can make sure all areas of our community are strong and supported – now and into the future.

The Communities Together initiative involves a number of community councils, the local community forum, community groups, NHS, North Lanarkshire Council Employees and Elected Members, and individuals who live in Bellshill, Mossend, Thorniewood and surrounding communities. 

At this time they are welcoming Volunteers – who can register their interest via this link: https://forms.gle/Sa8QSphLLKqpRQX49 – there was a Volunteer Information and Orientation Session on Thursday 23rd April 2020. Please get in touch if you still with to be involved.

In addition, they would be delighted if anyone wished to make donations of essential items such as tins, other non-perishables, baby products, gluten or allergen free produce etc. These can be notified via email and arrangements made for delivery or collection.