All Saints Church, Childwall
READ Matthew 16:21/28: 21 From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. 22 Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” 23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save their life[f] will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? 27 For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done. 28 “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”
REFLECT: Don’t you just love Simon Peter? Doesn’t the Gospel record of his various ‘faux pas’ give you hope given our own frequent failures to understand and truly follow Jesus? Today’s passage is one of those ‘faux pas’ moments. Immediately prior to today’s reading, Peter had been commended as being a man of great spiritual insight for proclaiming Jesus as Messiah. In today’s reading Jesus has been speaking of his forthcoming death and resurrection, but Peter feels that this must not be allowed to happen! That is when Jesus rebukes Peter, accusing him of being an agent of Satan, for trying to tempt Jesus from the path He knows He must tread. Jesus tells him that he has moved from being a man with God given insight into who Jesus is [Messiah] to a man totally lacking godly insight as to the role of the Messiah in God’s purposes; a man whose judgement is clouded by human expectations. Peter goes from ‘Hero to Zero’!
But the lesson doesn’t end there; Jesus explains that just as He must walk the way of the Cross, so also must His followers, although in a different way. Jesus must physically die on the Cross in order to defeat death’s ultimate power and be raised to new life on the third day, whereas His followers must learn to ‘die to self’ – to die to selfishness in all its forms; in other words they must die to their old worldly desires, attitudes and mind-set in order to know new life in the here and now and in eternity. Peter seems only to have heard Jesus speaking about His death; he failed to hear and understand Jesus reference to His death being followed by rising to new life. Peter could only see the negative whereas Jesus wants him/us to see the positives in this dying to self, positives for ourselves and for those around us.
According to Jesus, it’s not enough to know who He is and to declare who He is, we must also understand His role in God’s purposes and follow Him – follow His example, His commands, His teaching and His leading which, over time, will enable that dying to self which is necessary if we are to experience new life in Him and progressively become more like Him. As the imagery Jesus uses suggests this is no easy thing! This is not something we can do just once; we need to develop what has been called ‘the art of dying daily’.
RESPOND: What does Jesus statement, ‘“Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.’ mean for you at this point in your life?
Are there things [attitudes, behaviour, resentments, bitterness, ways of speaking, pride, vanity, wrong desires etc.] which need to be ‘denied’ and put to death in order for new life in Christ to grow, develop and bear fruit?
PRAY: Heavenly Father, so often our faith is weak and self-centred, but the faith you offer is strong, risky-and compelling; it’s the faith that carries the cross and lays itself down for the sake of others; it’s the only faith that can lead us to resurrection, to life re-newed and overflowing. We praise you for this faith, and open our hearts to receive it. Father, please help us to identify anything which hinders such faith and spoils our relationship with You and others. Help us deal with it in the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Rev Bill Forster (Associate Minster at All Saints, Childwall)+
Youth & Children’s Worker –Gypsey-Leigh Tait has now arrived and is settling into her new home. Please pray for Gypsey as she adapts to life in a new city where she has never lived or worked. Gypsey will be starting work on the 1st September and will be working full time for the church.
Services in Church – On Monday 7th September at 8pm we will be having a joint Staff, PCC and Readers meeting when we will be discussing the further re-opening of our church building. We have had a weekly Staff and Wardens meeting to review services. The services have gone well so far with about 35 people attending on 9th Aug and about 50 people on the 16th Aug. We have decided that the 10am weekly service will continue through August but also on Sunday 6th September there will be one service at 10am. The services will be no longer than 40 minutes and you will need to wear a face mask, gel hands and sign in. Once you are in church you will need to stay in your pew and if you have children with you they need to be fully supervised at all times. The creche room will not be open and the pew bags have had to be removed. After the service has finished you will be directed to leave from the front of church. Once outside please keep 2m apart. I am sorry that this is necessary, but it ensures the safety of everyone attending.
We have also decided that the Thursday Communion service will restart on Thursday 10th September at the usual time of 10.45am and again everyone will need to wear face masks and gel hands and sign in.
Church hall – We have decided as well that the Church hall will reopen in September for All Saints Playgroup only initially. We feel that it is wise to let the schools go back first and be open for a few weeks before we open the hall more fully. We will review this decision at the end of September with the view to opening the hall more after the autumn half-term.
Church rotas – Currently many areas of church life are all on hold as we plan and review everything week by week. I am very conscious that many of you would normally be involved as sidespersons, musicians, leading and preaching at services, cleaning teams, tea & coffee and many other areas of church life. We are in exceptional times and as we are able to open up more fully, we will be trying to reinstate some of these regular areas of service. In addition to the normal offering of hymns, the daily office, reflections and prayers over this summer month there is a new offering of Holiday at Home. This offers an opportunity for those who rarely leave their houses a chance to be ‘transported’ on a holiday – with prayers of thanks for times past, a poem recollecting holidays and even a soundscape to evoke those memories of past holidays.”
Here is a link to a taster of Holiday at Home- Holiday at Home Taster
Weekly Prayer requests – If you would like other members of our church family to pray for you or a family member, please send me their names for this sheet, please ask permission from the person.
We pray for all those who are unwell at this time particularly for Alan McClelland.
WEEKLY PRAYER MEETING – Weekly prayer meeting Thursday 6.30pm on Zoom. Why not join a group of us at All Saints that pray regularly. It lasts 40 minutes, you can pray, sit and listen or just contemplate.
Zoom Meeting: https://us04web.zoom.us/j/79853782379?pwd=NEloclhRVEJST3RFeUdUVEowSWJRUT09
Meeting ID: 798 5378 2379 Password: 7VUQh6 Aidan Holmes
Zoom coffee – Please note change of time to 11.15am for 40 mins – remember to bring your own coffee! Details for Zoom coffee are as follows:
Zoom Coffee – every Sunday at 11.15am Meeting ID: 842 767 1496 Password: 4allsaints
https://us04web.zoom.us/j/8427671496?pwd=K2dMMnlvTHpwTkxDNEV6bDYwQXBDQT09
With our prayers for you all at this time
Andrew Colmer – Vicar – Tel: 07305 842257 – vicar.allsaintschildwall@gmail.com
Helen Deegan – Curate – Tel: 07984 933467 – curate.allsaintschildwall@gmail.com
