St Peter's Anglican Church, Mossel Bay

Sunday, 15 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Weekly Theme: *ACT WITH THE SPIRIT* 🕊️
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The Fruits of the Spirit...
If, as Jesus said trees and people are both known by the fruit they bear...
What fruit are we bearing?
Love for our neighbor?
Love for creation?
Joy when we witness the splendour of creation and do we share that joy with others?
Peace perfect peace...Can we live life to the fullest in harmony with others and creation?Can we experience peace that passes all understanding?
Patience...can we be as patient as Jesus when the multitudes pressed around Him?
Kindness...can we look beyond our own needs and instead focus on the needs of our neighbour and fellow creatures?
Goodness...can we actively choose to be kind, generous and understanding towards others?
Faithfulness...can we submit our ways to God and trust in Him?
Gentleness...can we possess the quality of being kind and gentle towards creation?
Self-control...how can we make an effort to resist temptation and to conform to the ways of the world?

Acting with the Spirit! For such there is no law!

Saturday, 14 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Isaiah 58: 7-10
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When we care for the earth, we care for the beautiful gift from God that radiates His love and wisdom. But integral ecology is so much more than that. By caring for the earth, we are caring for those impacted by the climate crisis, pollution and unjust distribution of resources. We are loving the younger generation and the children to come! We are caring for the world, for creation, and want to protect it for future generations.
Isaiah 58 leads us to action and connection. Connection to the Lord, to communities and to creation.

Laudato Si Movement

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, 8 September 2024
Lesson theme: Safeguarding Creation - Water
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Our Sunday School had so much fun, while learning how precious water is! Our Youth also got involved to assist our Sunday School teacher.

Both in the Bible and in our current society, water is deeply life-giving. We need to protect our wetlands and our water resources.

What will your contribution be to protect this resource that God has blessed us with?

Monday, 9 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Psalm 8
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The Psalm opens and closes with the same expression: "Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!" This powerful bookend not only makes a bold declaration but also provides the lens or the focus of the Psalm itself. The psalmist continues to detail the wonderful, beautiful and powerful parts of creation.

What parts of creation help you see the fullness of Gods beauty?

When we take the time to look at creation and see all its wonders, we can see a glimpse of Gods beauty. Just like when we study a powerful piece of art, we see the hint of capacity and skill of the artist who made it. But sometimes, we get distracted by the pollution or the infrastructure and are unable to notice the wonder and beauty of God.

What stops you from seeing the fullness of who God is?

The bookend in this Psalm reminds us that sometimes we need encouragement to focus on God. As we give our attention to God, it can help us to turn our appreciation into praise for God. We can praise God with our attitudes, words and actions.

How might you praise God today?

Prayer: Magnificent Creator God, how wonderful is Your handiwork. Open our eyes to see the depth of Your beauty. Open our minds to learn from Your wisdom. Open our hands to care for Your creation. May we take great care of Your beautiful gifts, to bring You honour and praise.
Amen 🙏🏽

Friday, 6 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Genesis 28: 10-19
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Imagine yourself taking a walk along the Point. It is the very last light of a cold winters day, with a gentle breeze coming in over the water.

You had planned to go for a short walk before dinner. What you had not planned was the most transformative encounter of awe and wonder ever known.

You can't say for sure when precisely it happened, but in an instant, it was as if suddenly you were experiencing the depth and beauty of life in an entirely new fashion.

The world around you did not suddenly change in any sudden, dramatic way to suddenly become worthy of this kind of reverence. It was largely the same as it had been on the many occasions that you took a walk at the Point.

This change, this transformative change is entirely from our side. Our eyes open to seeing things as they actually always had been. This happens when we walk in gratefulness and start paying real attention to our surroundings.

How many times do we find ourselves wandering through a seemingly monotonous life, busy with the usual dramas and agendas, only to be stopped in our tracks by a renewed awareness and gratefulness.

In these moments, it is as if the scales fall from our eyes and we see the truth of things once again and all the beauty that surrounds us.

The question God asks then is a simple one...

Are we ready to wake up again?

Prayer: Spirit of wonder sometimes without even sensing it, we stumble our way into the fullness of life again. It is sometimes as simple as a new day. And sometimes as vast as a new love. Whatever the case, it is as if the world is suddenly alive once more. And our souls have rejoined the divine dance. Let the world be re-enchanted for us today and help us to re-enchant the world for others. So we can come to see everything as a gift from You Lord and experience the fullness of joy for our creation.
Amen 🙏🏽

Every small action makes a difference. What will your contribution be?

Join us this September in celebrating the Season of Creation with 30 days of plastic-free ideas! 🌍✨ Let's take action to protect our common home by embracing sustainable choices every day. Together, we can make a difference for our planet and future generations.

Wednesday, 4 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Psalm 19: 1-14
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Our culture and western Christianity both have a very strong human focus. They also tend to approach the world as if it is a set of binaries. Binaries set us up to "other", anything that is not "us" or "me". As a result, we have come to think of nature as something separate from us. We also see nature as the benign backdrop against which the drama of our lives and of our salvation are played out.

Instead of seeing the things of nature as "other", St Francis of Assisi understood them to be kin, members of the same family, as beings with which we have a relationship. He preached to the birds as well as to people. He acknowledged their role in offering praise to God.

The writer of Psalm 19, had the same understanding of nature as St Francis of Assisi. "The heavens and the earth proclaim Gods goodness and love." They are creatures of praise as much as we are. In worship we join with them.

The "other" becomes one with us through our shared relationship in God and through our common acts of praise.

Prayer: God whose loving presence transforms us, we give thanks for the praise that is offered by all creatures with whom we share this beautiful planet. Give us the grace we need to attend to their voices and to hear the messages they offer us on Your behalf. So that we can join with them in praise and to honour them as members of Your family.
Amen 🙏🏽

Tuesday, 3 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻
Psalm 63
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In Psalm 63, we join with David the psalmist in expressing our deepest desire for God our Creator. "My soul is thirsting for You" he proclaims. A thirst that can only be quenched by God's living water.

Sometimes it is easy to feel awe and wonder at Gods creation. The yellow filled trousers on a bee's legs, the exquisite colours and songs of birds, the symbiotic relationship between a cocoa plant and its pollinator, the myriad of sparkling stars in the night sky or the first gasp of life of a newborn. It is in such moments that we begin to understand that everything is connected.

At other times, like in the Psalm, we run the risk of feeling parched, weary and waterless as our common home becomes more degraded and destroyed. It is in such times that we must seek out in prayer our God in whom we take shelter and rest.

The Psalmist personifies God in an image from nature that speaks to our hearts: God as a mother bird gathering her chick's under her wings. "I sing for joy in the shadow of Your wings". If we allow our hearts to connect with Gods creation, we will feel called to live in the right relationship with it and with each other. To become stewards and not exploiters of this wonderful gift.

Prayer: God of all creation, You poured out Yourself with such love for us and our world. You sent Your son Jesus to walk beside us, to share with us our every distress but also our joys. In a world that seems to be increasingly falling apart, yearning for peace and healing...We pray sing to our hearts, call us to take shelter under Your wing. Draw near so we too can go out singing with joy to work for a better world.
Amen 🙏🏽

Laudato Si Movement

Monday, 2 September 2024
*SEASON OF CREATION*
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Genesis 1:1-5
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In the beginning, cosmetologists tell us, there was nothing but plasma. A condensed sea of matter and energy that 13.8 billion years ago erupted with an inflationary rush.
A universe was born, and soon after the first light, the first stars - the cosmic dawn.

In every age humankind has been transfixed by the stars. Every culture on earth has looked up and asked "What's out there? Is that where we come from? What is the source of all this?"

And the answer is simple. Our Heavenly Father created the shared wonders of this world. And He made us as humans according to His image.

Our explorations have taught us that light makes life possible on earth. That the stuff of stars is also the stuff of our bodies. We've learned that the light of a single candle can hold our most heartfelt prayers or hold off the dark. And on our good days, we remember we are also called by God to be a light for each other - to be stewards of all that lights this fragile, cherished world.

So...let there be light...
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Prayer: As we lift our gaze to the heavens, we give thanks for the light that bathes our earth with life and lights our dreams with hope. May the dawning of each new day call us afresh to the work of wonder. Cherishing all that our light touches and tending to all that lights this world.
Amen 🙏🏽

Season of Creation App to download for daily devotionals. How wonderful!

Season of Creation - Apps on Google Play

Sunday, 1 September 2024
SPRING DAY ☀️🌺🌻🌹🌈
*START OF SEASON OF CREATION* 🪻🪻🪻

The Season of Creation, which runs from 1 September to 4 October, is an annual celebration of prayer and action for creation that Christians on 6 continents have commemorated for years. This years theme is: *TO HOPE AND ACT WITH CREATION* .

Today, we also celebrated Season of Creation at St Peters. We were blessed with a beautiful worship hymn sang by Peyton Lewis from Holy Nativity. As well as a beautiful poem read by Lindsay.

Thank you to everyone who wore a flower or something floral as part of their Sunday best 🤗👌🏼. You all looked beautiful, but Colleen Denyer definitely stole the show!

May you all have a beautiful Spring Day 🌻🌻🌻🌻

For Christians is a time to collectively celebrate globally through prayers and services!
Join us this Sunday, 1 September.
And remember to wear your Sunday best with a floral twist! 🌻🌺🌸🌼🌹🌷

For Christians is a time to collectively celebrate globaly through prayers and services!
Join us this Sunday, September 1 for opening prayer live on youtube/facebook:

09:00 New York
15:00 Geneva/Brussels
16:00 Instabul
21:00 Manila

www.seasonofcreation.org

Create in me a clean heart O God 🙏

Our last and 4th guest speaker as part of our Women's month initiative, was Ms Natalie Mentoor. She graced us with her presence and music this morning and we are absolutely in awe. She is such an inspiration! She spoke about Ruth and Naomi and that we should acknowledge that in each women there is a Ruth and Naomi. She also addressed the importance of how women should collaborate across religious and cultural boundaries in order do Gods work.

Good evening St Peters Family 👪

*Evening Prayer Scriptures:*
Psalm 42 & 43
2 Samuel 19: 1-23
John 6: 16-27

Prayer:
Heavenly Father, in the depths of my soul, I yearn for Your presence like a deer longs for streams of water. My heart thirsts for You, the Living God.
Amen 🙏

Continuing our Women's Month initiative, today we were hosts to Rev Andrew Phillips and his wife. Mrs Debbie Phillips also addressed the Congregation. She spoke about women as leaders in Church as well as ACSA. She also spoke about Jesus being the Bread of life and left the Congregation with the question: "What bread do you want to eat to be sustained and satisfied?" We thank Mrs Debbie Phillips for the encouraging ministry this morning.

Wednesday, 14 August 2024
Month of Compassion
Women's Month

_"Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bearing with one another and if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other. As the Lord has forgiven you, so you must also forgive."
Colossians 3:12-13_

Prayer:
God, grant me the desire and ability to love others well, even when they don't deserve my empathy and compassion. Even when I am tired and going through my own crises. Even when they have wronged me in such a hurtful way. No matter how uncomfortable or unfathomable it may seem to me, I ask that You make me more like You.
In Your Holy Name, I pray.
Amen 🙏

Our second eldest parishioner, Joan Graham celebrated her 95th birthday today. She is an example for young and old in Church. We offer her birthday wishes for continued joy, health, grace and happiness in the years that lie ahead. Here she is with her daughter Heather, son Robert and his partner Linda.

We can't heal the world today...but we can begin with a voice of compassion, a heart of love and an act of kindness.
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TikTok · Chris Garcia 64 likes, 3 comments. “What TRUE Compassion Looks Like! ”

Good day beloved children of God

In addition to August being the month we celebrate women, August is also referred to as the month of COMPASSION.
Time and time again in the Bible, Jesus' actions teach us that compassion should be a necessary aspect of our Christian journey. The world we live in so often seems devoid of compassion and we ask ourselves how did we get here...

Let us ask ourselves:
What will it mean to me and my community if I choose compassion this week in my prayers and in my daily actions?

Compassion prayer:
Oh gracious God, enlighten our minds and hearts with truth, love, mercy, gratitude and compassion. Give us the courage to follow You daily in faith, love and hope. In my busy day, help us to think of you now and then. Make us aware of the needs of the people around us.
We ask this in Your Mighty Name 🙏🏽
Amen

Are you an Esther or a Ruth? Or both?

Our Sunday School today were led by 2 of our Youth members, Leeroy and Lee. And it was a job well done! The lesson was about Samson and different methods were used to demonstrate physical strength 🏋🏼‍♀️🤼‍♀️🤸🏽‍♀️. But the emphasis were also placed on the strength that God gives us and how different this is from a physical strength. As a Church family we want to help the Youth become more involved in church activities and evolve as children of God.

Palm Sunday......