Taking Jesus to the community in Craigavon
"Taking Jesus to the community is the main work here at St Saviour's Craigavon," writes Myrtle Morrison, Church Army Evangelist-in-Charge. "As a mission base for Church Army we are blessed with the freedom to try new things and have the time and support to build Christian community.
Last year we stepped out and hosted our first Ladies night with the aim of encouraging, building relationships and sharing the good news of Jesus. We had over 70 women including church members from both the Catholic and Protestant communities and ladies who have no church connections. That is the impact of the gospel message! Bringing peace across the divide! On the success of the event in 2009 word spread, making this year's event even bigger. We welcomed over 80 guests, and nearly half of them were not church goers.So what went on?The evening started with a four course meal and the ladies get treated by being waiter served by some of the men from the church. After the meal the ladies enjoyed great entertainment including: Family Fortunes, The Price is Right, Karaoke, etc. hosted by Matt and Brian with prizes to be won. The evening is then wrapped up with a challenging and encouraging gospel message. This year the ladies were treated to our guest speaker Claire Holmes who as been serving as a missionary in Paraguay for 14 years.
The prizes are sponsored by all local shops and include Boots, Tesco, Sainsbury's, Thornton’s and many more. This year Starbucks joined in on the action and provided free fair-trade coffee.ResultsWe don’t always see the results straight away but this year as been especially pleasing and encouraging as a well known and influential lady from one of the local estates has been coming to church every Sunday since the Ladies night. She also has been confessing too many that she is following Jesus!
Overall it was a tremendous night of fun food and fellowship and many people in the community are eagerly awaiting next year’s event."
St Patrick's Night
[if gte mso 9]><xml> Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 </xml><![endif][if gte mso 9]><![endif] <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4;} @font-face { panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; font-:12.0pt;"Times New Roman","serif";} .MsoChpDefault { font-:10.0pt;} @page Section1 {:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> [if gte mso 10]><![endif]On the eve of St Patrick's Day we had 180 people for a interdenominational service, followed by stew and apple tart, followed by Irish music, dancing soloists an Irish Quiz and the Good Samaritan read from a Scottish translation of the Bible!!
Seagoe Church of Ireland, Craigavon Baptist, Craigavon Methodist and St Anthony's all attended.