In our prayers at St Petroc’s this week

For our Mission Community, for Tom our Team Rector, Gina our Team Vicar and Laura our Team Curate and especially the parishes of St. John the Baptist, Littlehempston and St. Mary, Rattery. For those people who live along Hillside, Harwell Lane, Harbourneford and Stidston and those living within our parish to the south of the A38 and for those people who live in Aish, Didworthy, Shipley, Zeal, Lutton and in the farms and small communities that border the moor. For all the activities that take place in the Village Hall

Our Offerings October 6th October 13th

Standing Orders

£528.00 *£556.00

Loose £117.10 £60.00Envelopes £124.00 £89.00Total £769.10 £705.00

*The average weekly Standing Order amount over the last 6 months has gone up from £528.00 to £ 556.00.Another Advance NoticeBig Breakfast café in aid of the

Bridge Youth Bus ProjectSunday November 3rd 2019

9.30 a.m. to 12 noonat the Old School Community

Centre.

Please support this valuable youth initiative in South Brent and join us for a cafe style breakfast with music

and silent auction.During the rest of this weekMonday 21st October10.00 PUFFS Church Room Jan Carter 7243710.30 New Way of Being Church, Time for Bible reflection, prayer and fellowship Andrew Ferguson 72164 or John Summers 7297610.30 South Brent and District Caring Coffee Morning Old School CentreTuesday 22nd October10.00-11.30 United Churches Coffee Morning Methodist Schoolroom Pat Prebble 724252.00 Art Group - Church Room

Frances Sparkes 72385Wednesday 23rd October9.00 MORNING PRAYER IN CHURCH – Gina 2.00 Memory Café in Old School Centre.2.30 Funeral Service for Nano Wood There will be no Bible Study on October 23rd5.00 Deadline for Weekly News Sheet this week only Sheila; pkfinch@hotmail.com or 73173

Thursday 24 th October 2.00 Embroidery Church Room6.00 Handbell Group Stella722657.00 Youth Bus – Palstone Park until 8.30 Friday 25 th October 7.00 Choir Rehearsal Richard 73585

Saturday 26 th October BAPTISM OF JACOB FRANCIS

Sunday 27 th October Trinity 1 9 8.00 Holy Communion (BCP) – Gina9.45 Village Communion - Gina

THE PARISH OF SOUTH BRENT WITHIN THE DART AND AVON

MISSION COMMUNITYWEEKLY NEWS SHEET

WELCOME TO YOU ALL!Sunday 20 th October 2019

Trinity 18

8.00 Holy Communion (BCP) - Tom 9.45 ALL-AGE COMMUNION – Gina Readings; 2Timothy 3.14-4.5 Liz Rider Luke 18.1-8 Intercessors; Sue Gaskin

2.30 BAPTISM OF ADELINE ROWNTREE

At St Mary’s Rattery11.15 HOLY COMMUNION– Gina

Children are always welcome at St. Petroc’s. PLUS, there’s Sunday Activity Club for 5’s-11’s in the Church Tower Room each

Sunday (except Family Service Sunday). For

parents with under 5’s, there are toys/games at the back of church.

The Ministry of Prayer is availablein the Lady Chapel on the 2nd,3rd & 4th Sundays

after the 9.45 service

Message from Gina ..Our readings today have a common theme, and that is our need to be persistent. The Old Testament reading is the story of Jacob wrestling with

God all night, and as a result being forever changed – physically by damaging a hip, and spiritually by being blessed by God, and realising that it was God Himself with whom he had struggled. The Epistle has Paul writing to Timothy telling him to persist in proclaiming the message of Jesus, regardless of the situation. The Gospel is the parable of the widow who persisted in petitioning an unjust judge until he gave in to her request for justice. Jesus unusually gave the meaning of this parable before He told it – it was about their need to pray and not lose heart, to persist.How easily we get distracted and forget our own prayer life. Daily prayers soon become “occasional and when we remember or are in trouble” prayers. Or they become routine and a bit of a shopping list. But Jesus is clear – our prayers, or conversations with God (this is what prayers are) should be ongoing, honest, passionate, and persistent. We should mean and feel what we pray for. Why should God grant our prayers if we don’t believe in them and are not sincere? Prayer is coming to God with our questions, our doubts, our hopes, our fears and sharing them with Him,

and in this way we can come closer to God, and grow in our understanding of Him.It’s easy to stop saying our daily prayers – Jesus knew this, and how easily we lose heart. But without prayer we lose a vital link with God. We need to make sure God is our priority, not an afterthought, and keep our prayer lives alive. Sometimes prayer is difficult and we have to wrestle with it, just as Jacob did. Yet persistence and willingness to yield to God’s authority and power will, in return, in some remarkable way yield a blessing – this is God’s nature. And we will find, just as this woman did, as the Psalmists did, as Jacob did, that our complaints can turn into unfettered praise.andYou will have noticed that one of the beautiful cedar trees has come down in the churchyard. Thankfully no one was hurt, and no major damage appears to have been done. So whist we are very sad at the loss of this beautiful old tree, we must thank God that no major damage has resulted – something of a miracle given the size of the tree. It will take a short while to deal with the fallen tree, and thanks to our wonderful churchwardens and Guy Pannell we have things in hand. We would just ask that people stay away from the tree until it has been removed for safety reasons. We will in due course be thinking about what, if anything, might replace it, but at present our priority is to manage the safe removal of the cedar. All Souls ServiceWe will be holding a special All Souls Service at 4pm on November 3rd at St Petroc’s. This will be a time of remembering and thanksgiving for anyone who has meant a lot to us, but has now died, whether that be recent or further in the past. All are very welcome, and

please do pass the message on to anyone who you think might want to come. New Way of Being ChurchThese times for Bible reflection, prayer and fellowship are held in various homes, 10.30 - noon, usually on 2nd and 4th Mondays. Contact Andrew Ferguson 72164 or Rev'd John Summers 72976 for details. You are very welcome to join this small group

Advanced noticesNew (2019) Church Roll Members’ Booklet

The new 2019 Directory Booklet which the Churchwardens asked me to co-ordinate has now been produced, based on the forms completed in April. There is a copy for all Roll members, and most of you have now picked up your named copy from St Petroc’s. However, some people have asked for additional details to be included, and some who did not originally say they wanted to appear in the Directory have now said they would like to. That’s fairly easily solved ... we can produce an update sheet to provide the extra information.So if any Roll Members want to appear in the Directory (or correct any details that already appear there), please fill in the short Contact Details form available from me (at the back of church or direct) to authorise what details you want shown, and return it to me by the end of October. In November I will produce, for all Roll members, an update sheet which can be added into the Directory. Peter Taylor P.S. Not a Roll member yet? Ask John Gaskin (Electoral Roll Officer) or me for a Roll Application Form, and fill that in as well!Any questions? – 01364 73427 or peterftaylor@lineone.net

'CAMBODIA WITH MISSION DIRECT' –

Saturday 2nd November, 7 - 9 p.m. at the Old School Community Centre, South BrentTalk by Liz Rider and Janet Madge about their time in February with Mission Direct, helping with building work and visiting other projects, in Cambodia.Raffle. Refreshments available. Tickets available from Liz or Janet, or from Artworks. £5 each.