The best Present of all

Thanks to Nicola and Hamish who led us in a very creative service based on "Pass the Parcel".

We reflected on all the presents we received over Christmas and marvelled at the wonderful gift of Jesus our father God gave us.

And with that gift of Jesus we can all form a deep, meaningful and purposeful relationship with.

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and look forward to seeing you in the New year.

Scouts on Sunday

Following on from our theme of "Relationships" , this month we covered "Relationships within our Community" and who better to do this but the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts.

They created and lead the whole service from start to finish and even provided the BBQ (in the freezing cold). It was great to hear the testimony from a person who has been a scout leader for more than 30 years. The prayer time was also very interesting and interactive, we all had to make a knot and tie them together, until there was one long closed chain which symbolised our community in Winterslow

Over 100 people turned up of all ages and the service was well planned by Petra, Kay, Lesley and Jim...perhaps they would like to do another in the summer??

Friendship

FRIENDSHIP

Friendship is a priceless gift that cannot be bought nor sold.
But, its value is far greater than a mountain made of gold.
For gold is cold and lifeless, it can neither see nor hear.
In time of trouble its powerless to cheer.

Gold has no ears to listen, no heart to understand.
It cannot bring you comfort or reach out a helping hand.
So, when you ask God for a gift, be thankful if He sends,
not pearls, diamonds, or riches but, the love of real true friends.

By Muhammad Ali

As part of this semester we are looking into all types of relationships, at this service Tim lead us and we created a huge network map of all our friends in the village.



















It was interested to see how we are all connected....it should remind us all of Gods great purpose he has for us all.

Family Fortunes

This semester we are looking and learning about "Relationships", this weeks service we will look at "Relationships within our families".

NEW DATES

Please see below dates for Food For Thought

• 28/09/08
• 26/10/08
• 23/11/08
• 28/12/08
• 25/01/09
• 22/02/09

Hope to see you there!
God Bless

FFT BBQ date

Hello Everyone,

It's that time of year again, so dust off your BBQs, clean the ecoli from the grills and pray for good weather ;-)

6th August @ The Alibocus'
13th August: @ The McKeown's
20th August: @ The Barratt's
27th August: @ The Harwood's

Look forward to seeing you all

GB

Klynn

27th July: Picnic at Fordingbridge

27th July @ Fordingbridge Play Park

You can either swim in the River Avon or the small children can also use the paddling pool and play park.

We will set off from Winterslow Village Hall car park at Noon at aim to arrive at Fordingbridge at 1230pm.

Hopefully we'll see you there ;-)

If it rains we'll go to River Rivers Swimming Pool instead (admission should be free for children)

The Generation Game: Children v Adults.

25th May Walk and Picnic to Bentley woods

He still loves me

For all those that came on Sunday here's the song we sang

Up, up and away

Continuing from our theme of journeys we reflected on how much better a journey is with a good friend (especially one who knows where they are going). And with that we blessed Jonno on his journey to South Africa with the Oasis Trust's Project: Gateway where he will be working with the homeless and children suffering from HIV/AIDS.

What a journey and experience that will be , I'm sure he will enrich the lives he touches there, as he has here. We all wrote prayer on feet shaped paper , some with our hopes, fears and thanks.

These were then tied to helium balloons, and we all got together and on a count of three we let the balloons take our prayers together on a journey upwards

The remainder of the balloons were given to the children to play with or to the adults to make funny helium voices ;-)

FFT 24th Feb

More Food for Thought………

At the risk of being a month out of date I just want to say what a great time we all had at Food For Thoughts One Year Celebration at the end of January.

With 70 people or so, we’re still seeing new faces each time and everyone is really welcome. With the two Alans helping us out (Alan Dodds, retired vicar and original member of David Bowies band or as Alan said, ‘Actually he joined mine!’-(I think that was some serious time ago, well before the Spiders from Mars) and Alan Jeans, Archdeacon, and incidentally, always wears jeans (I wonder which came first, the jeans or the name) – we had a really special time..

We had a wild ten minutes of hat making with some really inventive creations (Nils got promoted to the Archbishop complete with mitre and others sported everything from the Titanic on their heads to chimneys on fire.)

But it was fun – and actually as the photos from the past year flipped over on the screen- it was special - To see just how much we had shared together in a few short meetings, to see the smiles on peoples faces.

Alan encouraged us to live thankful lives and for those of us who have seen so many come along each 4^th Sunday of the month, that’s just what we do. Perhaps it might be right for you. We’re meeting again on 30^th March, everyone welcome - single, families, old, young,- no pressure, just a place prepared, if you want it, see you there.

PS – Alpha is coming – we’ll give more details out soon but the summer term will see a new Alpha course for Winterslow – a chance to get together, eat, discuss the big questions and the not so big. A chance to see what makes this course, started in the City’s financial district and now spread world wide so special. Watch this space!