The New Music Makers have a concert coming up on Friday 1st June at the Kings Community Church in Hedge End starting at 7.30 p.m. The concert is entitled “A World of Song”.
The New Music Makers practice their singing in Hedge End Methodist Church on a Thursday Evening.
More details about them and there concerts can be found at:-
https://en-gb.facebook.com/NewMusicMakers/
The New Chairs arrived on Wednesday. As you can see from the pictures they are colour co-ordinated with the walls. We think these should ensure a comfortable sitting experience for everyone. Some of the chairs have arms and some are fitted with “Nets” for the Hymn books, bibles, service books. As these chairs stack it will also be possible to move them around as appropriate for events such as the “Christmas Fayre”.
Our thanks to everyone who was involved in organising the New Chairs, and the refurbishment which has been taking place over the last few weeks such as the painting of the walls and the varnishing of the floors.
Our Christmas Fayre will take place on Saturday 3rd November from 10.am. to 2 p.m. We would be pleased if you could put this date in your diaries. We are finalising the stalls at the moment, It is likely they will include many of the stalls which we had a couple of weeks ago, some of the visiting stallholders have already asked to attend again.
It is intended to produce a Church recipe book for sale at this event. We are grateful to those of you who have already given us recipes but we would like some more please they can be starter, main course, dessert, cake, bread, snacks, BBQ, cooking tips etc etc. Children are also welcome to take part. More than one recipe is acceptable.
You may either send the recipes electronically using the form below or hand recipes to the Church Stewards. For more details please see the previous blog Church Recipe Book
Thank you for your help.
On Saturday 7th July Hedge End Carnival will be taking place. Our church family will be taking part in it. The Carnival has been running since 1921 and raises money for good causes local to Hedge End.
Last year the theme for our entry was “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, for which we received a first prize. The year before the theme was “Noah’s Ark”. In 2015 it was “All things bright and beautiful for which we were awarded a cup for our walking group.
This year the overall theme for the Carnival is “Winter Wonderland” we have decided to depict “The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe” which is a children’s story by C.S. Lewis who is well known for his Christian writing. We are looking into the possibility of having a float, rather than the Bus, as a float would make us more visible. If you happen to know anyone who has suitable transport please let us know.
If you wish to join us it would be great. This is not just for the children in the church; or only those people who attend Sunday morning worship, it is for everyone. People who attend any activity associated with the Church are welcome to take part.
If you wish to take part in the procession please let us know, so that we can get an idea of numbers (we need to give the carnival committee an idea of how many people we have) and work out the logistics, so all goes smoothly on the day.If you wish to help beforehand we will be making banners etc in the Hall during the evening of Monday 18th June.
We will be having a stall on the Show Ground where the carnival procession ends and hold a Children’s “Jammy type” event there as we did last year. This was appreciated by the public and good fun was had by all. If there are enough people available on the day we also hope to serve people tea and coffee outside the Church as we did in 2016, but this depends if we get enough volunteers as we do not wish to deplete the procession in order to do this.
The Carnival is an excellent opportunity to all have a good time, whilst telling the people of Hedge End and further afield that we are here, and that God is important to us, and for them. This is part of our continuing outreach into the Community.
As a replacement for the Women’s World Day of Prayer Service in March , which was cancelled because of the Snow, Churches together in Hedge End and Botley have organised a coffee morning. They say
We would like to invite you all to a coffee morning on Friday 18th May at the Underhill Centre, St John’s Church Hedge End from 10.30am-12.30pm.While enjoying homemade cakes and cookies, tea & coffee,we will use the opportunity to say ‘thank you’ to the women of Suriname who prepared the service,and to show our support for their efforts in protecting the rainforest which helps to protect us from the dire effects of climate change. Please come and bring friends and family members. There is no charge,but donations will be gratefully received for the charities supported by the WWDP.
The chosen country for the 2019 service is Slovenia”.
On Wednesday 23rd May at 6.30 p.m. the Boys and Girls Brigades will be holding their Display and Awards Evening. There will be a display which normally consists of various sketches, Music and Singing. This is followed by the presentation of Badges and Awards. The awarding is usually done by the respective district commisioners of the Brigades. Anyone who is interested in seeing what the Brigades do is invited to attend. It is possible that as part of the display we may see the “Bucket drumming” for which they won a cup earlier in the year.
The Theme for Jammy Church on Saturday 12th May is Ascension when we think about the body of Jesus being taken up to Heaven. According to the Bible this happened 40 days after the Resurrection. The Biblical references to this can be found in the book of Acts chapter 1.
Jammy Church takes place between 10.30 a.m and 12.30 p.m. and is our once monthly activity session for children, their families and the young at heart. All are welcome. There will be informal Worship, various activities and crafts to take part in and some food to eat. You do not need to attend all the session; you could just pop in to see what we are up to.
More information can be found on the Jammy Church Facebook page.
https://www.facebook.com/JammyChurch
The pictures above were taken at last months Jammy Church “Paul on the Road to Damascus”.
There will be a Global Prayer initiative taking place between Ascension and Pentecost (10th to 20th May). This initiative is supported by the Methodist Church. The aim of this initiative is that it “Prompts people to pray that more people might know Jesus”. Some Resources to support this have been produced by the Methodist Church. More details can be found at
and also in the Spring 2018 issue of the connexion magazine. Copies of this magazine can usually be found in the front vestibule of the church.
On Sunday 15th April we welcomed Kevin Crook to lead us in worship and to launch officially the partnership we are entering into. This Charity partnership will enable us as a church to find out more about the work that MAF are doing especially in our chosen country of Papua New Guinea. Kevin shared with us the type of items the planes fly as part of their work, some we guessed such as medicines, people to help as well as books and equipment, However there was also things like blood supplies and even cows and live stock. We heard about the challenges for the teams in landing and flying in this country and how it’s one of the most dangerous areas for MAF. Remember these pilots often go where no other pilots will go.
We were set a challenge, initially for a week, however I guess it’ll be good to keep it up… We were asked when we see a plane to say a prayer for the MAF team and especially those flying and working in Papua New Guinea. It was lovely to see the passion about this work from Kevin and hear about the great calling that these families have to take on the jobs in these often far flung places.
After the service there was the chance to sign up for more information and purchase MAF goodies, Noah spent his pocket money on a MAF lego plane which he has built and is enjoying. (see photo above).
Kevin was very pleased with the Church’s response and conversations had.
I am the MAF link person, so if you have any questions or want to find out more do come and talk to me. Remember to like and follow the Hedge End Methodist Facebook page to keep up to date with MAF work as well as the other church events.
Also watch this space as I will be working with Kevin to organise future events which may include visits to groups to learn more about the work MAF are doing, photo exhibition, a flight simulator as well as community events when we hope to have a real plane visit!
Maggie
We thank Maggie for these words and her work on our behalf with MAF
more about MAF can be found in the previous article
Preparations are underway for our Plant Sale and Spring Fayre which will be taking place on Saturday 5th May from 10 .30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Plants are being grown, Hampers being made up, Books, Jigsaws and many other goods being collected together, Jam Jars being filled and soon cakes will be baked.
For more details please see the previous blog on this event
The event will be going ahead even if it raining but we are hoping for a sunny day.
We hope to see you there.
