Happy Easter
The Leadership Team at Emmanuel met virtually by Zoom again this week, where we discussed the previous week in the life of Emmanuel and what was coming up for Holy Week. Please find below some of the things that have happened this week or that you might want to be involved in over the next 7 days:-
· Please find attached a letter from Cameron and Ben “NWC Week 4 Letter Corona”.
· Please find attached the “2020 Easter Pastoral Letter” from Sheffield District Circuit.
· Please join us again this Sunday at 10am in our Emmanuel Family group where we will be sharing together in a time of worship live. This will be like the last few weeks, post after post in real time to follow a full service that takes around an hour. You can join us live or enjoy it later in the day – the choice is yours. We’ll be singing, praying, reflecting and listening to the Easter message. There’ll be activities too! Why not join us? Any problems finding the group email us and we will happily help.
· Attached is “Emmanuel Corona Prayers Week 4” – prayers for the week ahead.
· Attached are “Vine at Home Good Friday” & “Vine at Home Easter Day” – these are short order of services for Good Friday & Easter Sunday.
· A plea from Caron our Treasurer - the recent decision to close and suspend all activities due Covid-19 at Emmanuel has had an immediate impact on our financial position. We have lost our rental income entirely which is so important to us and our collections will be much reduced. However although there will be savings on utilities we still have the ongoing cost of the circuit assessment which is £17908 per quarter. So it is more important than ever for all our members to continue their giving during this time. Due to the government restrictions it is not possible for me to collect any cash offertory from members. So can I ask members who do not currently give by standing order to arrange this with their bank. I attach a standing order form for this purpose.
· A “Review of what has been happening this week on social media 9.4.20” is attached from Joan Booth.
· If you are not on social media please feel free to tell your pastoral leaders what you have been up to each week, including any stories of hope and good news. If the pastoral leaders contact Joan Booth or Alison Padgett, we can share together both on social media and in this newsletter. Also if you have a neighbour or someone near either Emmanuel or not, you could always print off this letter and our other resources including the Home Service and pop it through their door to keep them connected and cared for too.
· Message from Cameron - because this Sunday is Easter Sunday, I am proposing to put our normal large cross out at the exit opening on the driveway at Emmanuel from 9.00am in the morning through until the end of Monday. If you live close to Emmanuel and as part of your exercise want to come and place some flowers into the chicken wire on the cross, then slowly I hope it will be transformed through Easter Day. As rainbows are the order of the day I am suggesting you can put any colour of flowers that you want to, so that we will create together a rainbow flower covered cross! I will leave a sign by the cross to invite others in the community to come also and place flowers in our cross as we transform it – and we shall put it on social media – please encourage friends, neighbours, anyone you know who lives locally, to do the same. If you are not within walking distance of Emmanuel, maybe I can suggest instead you make a cross out of flowers and hang it on your door or on your gate, as a symbol of the power of God’s healing and transforming love.
· For those who haven’t joined our Emmanuel Family Facebook group – there are now 114 members in our Family - please join us (it is by invitation or request). There has been a lot going on again this week that includes Reflections for the Day, songs, prayers, pictures, Challenges (from the Emmanuel Youth Facebook page) to crafts. We encourage you to join, if you haven’t already, and add some positive comments or posts to let us know what you are doing so we can encourage everyone throughout the week.
· Does any have a birthday, an anniversary or any good news you want to share with the Emmanuel Family – why not post it on the above Facebook pages (please remember the Emmanuel Methodist Church Facebook is a public page so only share what you want to share, and the Emmanuel Family Facebook page is more private and only viewed by our members).
· Foodbank at Tesco’s – please remember the Foodbank as Emmanuel Church have teamed up with the Tesco’s (just down from Church) to help support the local Foodbank. If you shop at this Tesco (or anywhere where they are collecting) please put something in the trolley for people who rely on this service and put in what you can.
Please feel free to forward this email (and any of our future emails) so we can all support and help each other at this stressful and anxious time.
Many thanks
The Leadership Team