26/9/21
News from the Benwell & Scotswood Team
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The Stonyhurst Salt Cellar, 1577
English reliquary repurposed as a reformation era salt cellar British Museum, London
Dates for your diary
Sunday 26th September - Sunday 3rd October
Newcastle Diocese Generosity Week
Sunday 3rd October
Harvest Festival
10.30am St James
Wednesday 6th October
PCC meeting
7.30pm on Zoom
News
Stewardship Sunday 26th September and Generosity week
This year we are excited to be supporting a new diocesan-wide Generosity Week from Sunday 26 September to Sunday 3 October.
This Sunday we will focus our service around generosity and finance. And the following week will celebrate with our Harvest festival (more about that below!)
The aim is to inspire, encourage and enable mission and ministry to flourish in our Diocese. Being generous with both the material and spiritual gifts God gives us is key on our journey of transformation, as we seek to put God's mission at the centre of all that we do.
Read some inspiring stories of generosity from around the diocese here >
Harvest festival Sunday 3rd October
During the Sunday service we will give thanks and pray for God's creation, for food and all that sustains us.
We will be taking donations for the Community Pantry at Cornerstone. Please bring some items from their list below.
We would love:
Long life milk
Tinned tomatoes
Tea bags
Coffee
Corned beef
Pek chopped pork
Pasta sauce
Tinned fruit
Tinned puddings
Cleaning products
Laundry products
Toiletries
Cereal
We would like:
Long life juice
Marrowfat peas
Sugar
Tinned potatoes
Meatballs in gravy
Beans and sausage
Chicken and veg stock cubes
Biscuits
Tuna
Lentils
Kids cereal
Rice
Squash
Hygiene products
We can always use:
Tins of soup
Tins of veg
Pasta
If you cannot attend the service would like to make a cash donation then please contact Cornerstone here >
Return of West End Voices community choir!
Mondays, 7-8.30pm, St James' Church Hall (term time only)
We are a free choir (donation only) No prior experience needed, but experienced singers are also welcomed.
We meet 7.00pm – 8.30pm in St. James Church hall Benwell Lane every Monday TERM TIME ONLY
Everyone is Welcome – all abilities Pay what you can, there’s no minimum. You can join our choir without fear of audition, voice test, etc. You don't need to have sung at all before and we welcome those who were told in the past that they couldn't sing.
Covid-19 update
No doubt you will have heard that covid restrictions are being relaxed. As case rates are still high in our area you won't see too much change just yet! But we do have plans to reintroduce activities.
Most importantly - please get your vaccine if you haven't yet! And stay at home if you develop covid symptoms. Find vaccine times and locations here >
Cornerstone Community Cafe open!
Wednesdays & Thursdays 10am - 2pm
62 Armstrong Road, NE4 7TU
Delicious affordable meals
Outdoor Seating
Dog Friendly
Kids Corner
Computer and Internet Access
Computer help
Food pantry and emergency foodbank
and a great pre-loved shop!
Worship texts for Stewardship Sunday
Introductory Sentence
God is able to provide us with every blessing in abundance,
so that by always having enough of everything,
we may share abundantly in every good work.
Prayers of Penitence
As those who know the generosity of God, let us confess our sins, especially the ways in which we take his good gifts for granted.
Father, in all things you are generous towards us,
yet we have sown sparingly;
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
Jesus, you show us the way of humility,
yet we have given reluctantly;
Christ, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Holy Spirit, you show us the gift of grace,
yet we have loved grudgingly;
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
Almighty God,
who in Jesus Christ has given us
a kingdom that cannot be destroyed,
forgive us our sins,
open our eyes to God’s truth,
strengthen us to do God’s will
and give us the joy of his kingdom,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Collect
God of grace, ever creating and restoring,
you breathe life into all things
and embrace us with an everlasting love;
help us to grow in wonder and awe,
to embody a spirit of gratitude,
and to dream generous dreams;
that, in gathering what we have,
we may graciously offer ourselves
to accomplish what you will,
in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Reading
James 5.13–20 Are any among you suffering? They should pray. Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise. Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up; and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective. Elijah was a human being like us, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain and the earth yielded its harvest. My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and is brought back by another, you should know that whoever brings back a sinner from wandering will save the sinner’s soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.
Gospel
Mark 9.38–50
John said to him, ‘Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.’ But Jesus said, ‘Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterwards to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us. For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward. ‘If any of you put a stumbling-block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched. ‘For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good; but if salt has lost its saltiness, how can you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.’
Sermon
The Revd David Kirkwood
In the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit Amen
This Sunday and the coming week have been suggested by the national church as a time for reflecting on ‘Generosity’, God’s generous love for humanity shown to us above all in Jesus, and the generous response that humanity can and ought to make to God, again shown to us above all in Jesus. It is suggested that the week should end, as ours will next Sunday, with the celebration of ‘Harvest Festival’, a giving thanks to God for the generosity shown in the abundance of creation and the sacrifice and fruitfulness of human labour.
Of course, it is impossible to think about these things without some recognition of the flip side. The way human beings have failed to be generous, how Jesus and his teaching were rejected when he came, and how in preferring the gospel of acquisition and selfishness to that of generosity, division between rich and poor have been entrenched and the world brought to the precipice of climate catastrophe. In celebrating generosity and abundance, we need to acknowledge that greed and scarcity are still very much with us.
Gospel is ‘good news ‘but that does not mean it is all ‘pats on the back’, it comes with words of warning and rebuke too. That was certainly the case with today’s gospel reading.
If hand or foot or eye offend then cut them off it is better to enter life without, than holding onto these things, be thrown into hell.
Jesus is not advocating literal self-mutilation, but he is calling for a radical generosity that gives fully and freely holding nothing back. What might that mean for us? A couple of weeks ago Dominic talked about the life of the martyrs how in every generation there have those for whom generosity literally meant giving up their lives for Christ. The blood of the martyrs has been called the seed of the church and their sacrifices continue to bear fruit, but as Dominic said few of us , thankfully, will likely be called to follow them.
As well as the ‘red martyrdom’ of those who literally gave up their lives for Christ, the church celebrates a ‘black martyrdom’, that of those who, renouncing the world, take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience and, as monks and nuns, live lives of prayer and service, offering a daily sacrifice of themselves. Again, their generosity continues to be fruitful in many ways, those of us fortunate enough to have spent time with those living the ‘religious life’ will have experienced something of that, but again, as with the ‘red ‘martyrs few of us will be called to follow the ‘black’, although who knows someone here today may indeed have that vocation.
So, what about the rest of us? Martyrs, monks and nuns are all very well, but we can’t all be ‘Premier League’ and maybe that is not what God wants anyway. We must learn what generosity and sacrifice might mean in our ordinary down to earth everyday lives with all the complexities and compromises we live with and negotiate. What might generosity mean for us? This is where I think the National church wants us to talk of ‘Time’ and ‘Talents’ and ‘Treasure’ maybe especially ‘Treasure’ and I don’t want to in any way detract from that. When we did our stewardship campaign back in 2019, before the lockdown, we talked about the needs of the church for financial support and for time and skills, and people did respond generously, it is through that generosity that the church keeps going. Paying the bills sounds mundane but it means keeping the doors open, the floors cleaned, the font filled, the flowers adding beauty and grace to our worship and so on. Standing here I am conscious of the generous gifts of time and talents that allowed us to reorder our worship, so we were ‘covid ready’ with the floors sanded and sealed, dry rot banished, risk assessments in place, volunteers at the ready and conscious too of the generosity that means week by week dozens of people pass through these doors receiving not just access to food and the necessities of life but also something of the peace that comes from being in a place of prayer, and that is a picture repeated in different ways in all our churches and with all our partner organisations. Thank you to all. I could also talk about the various ways you can give by joining our planned giving scheme, by direct debit, by card, tax efficiently by making a declaration or simply by volunteering and again all these are vital and if you want to know more do speak to me or any of the clergy or one of our treasurers or look at the giving section on the website, but I also really want to say something else that can easily be overlooked.
Being generous means being generous in our judgements, in our thinking ; firstly generous in our thinking about others. The first part of the gospel reading, you may recall, was St John, the beloved disciple, this time, getting it wrong, ‘We saw a man who is not one of us casting out devils in your name and because he was not one of us, we tried to stop him’. Jesus tells him ‘you must not stop him ’and ‘anyone who is not against us is for us’. Do not assume because someone is ‘not one of us’ they have necessarily got it wrong. God’s generosity goes far wider than our understanding and as we try to be God’s people here in Benwell & Scotswood we may have many allies we are unaware of as yet. There is no place for jealousy. Open hands begin with an open heart.
Secondly being generous in our judgements means being generous in our thinking, not just about others, but about ourselves. Today’s gospel about chopping off hand or foot or eye should not be read as an invitation to psychological self-harm any more than to physical. The emphasis should not be on mutilation, but on entering life. What do we need to enter life? What is it that holds us back? Those are the things to try and leave behind and sometimes they have become so much part of us that letting them go can feel like dismemberment. The gospel promise is that the freedom of leaving them behind will outweigh the discomfort of discarding them. Anxiety or a lack of self-worth can make us cling onto the things we think will bring security or a sense of value but making ourselves more anxious or feel worse about ourselves is certainly not the answer. Learning to be generous, to let go, to give of ourselves is something we can do in the school of Christ, and the classroom doesn’t need to be the cloister or the martyrs’ block, it can just as well be our workplace or our homes. ‘The trivial round the common task’ as the hymn says… it is not always going to be easy, but maybe despite the Victorians, we learn in moments of leisure as well as of labour, of delight as well as of duty. Hard things become easier when looking to our Teacher we see how generous He is in His dealings with us, who came not to condemn but to save and to bring Life in all its fullness
Amen
Intercessions
Prayers for others:
Mehri Karami
Edith Hutchinson
Regine Hemminger
Grace Thomson
Peter Wilson
John Nicholson
Liz Holliman
Joan Finley
James, Christina, and baby Xavier
Anastasia Miklewright
Ali Zareie and his family
The Riches Family
Jill Sorley
Joyce Phillips
George Snowden
Claire Mozaffari
Herbert Agbeko
Edward Fraser
All those who are struggling at home or in hospital with Covid-19
Baptisms:
Ella Grace Hutchinson
Rest In Peace:
Eric Harling
Peter Schofield
Trevor Fitzpatrick
All who lost their lives from Covid 19
Other intentions:
Generous giving
Afghanistan & Iran
The Peace
The Spirit brings love, generosity and peace.
The peace of the Lord be always with you
Prayer over the offering
God of all creation, the source of life and giver of all good things;
through your goodness you have blessed us with these gifts.
With them we offer our lives; that we may be used to serve others,
and give you glory. We make our prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Eucharistic Preface
Eternal God and Father,
all things are in your making.
In fulfilment of your promise
you have showered us with blessings
and filled us with your gifts.
You form us in your image, the first fruits of your creation,
and by your Holy Spirit embed within us generous hearts
that we may be channels of your self-giving love.
Through your Son Jesus Christ,
you have freed us from our sins
and made us a kingdom of priests
to serve you with joy for ever…
Post-Communion
Loving and righteous God.
here at your table we have tasted your goodness and generosity
which exceeds all that we can desire or deserve;
liberate us from all jealousy and greed,
that we may respond cheerfully by offering ourselves,
and love and serve others to witness to your glory,
in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Blessing
The God of hope fill us with every blessing,
that we may share in every good work;
and the blessing of God almighty,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
be among you and remain with you always.
Amen.