June 2019
1st 2.00pm Matlock Prayer & Praise (Imperial Rooms)
2.30pm Chat-a-Cake (Hall)
2nd 8.00am Holy Communion [Easter 7]
10.00am Prayer Time (Lady Chapel)
10.45am Family Communion
4th 7.30pm Study Group IV (Meeting Room)
5th 9.30am Holy Communion (1662) (Tansley)
1.00pm Wednesday at One (Lady Chapel)
6th 2.00pm Longmeadow Service
8th 2.00pm Experience Pentecost
9th 8.00am Holy Communion [Pentecost]
10.00am Prayer Time (Lady Chapel)
10.45am Family Communion [Preacher: Rev. Tony Wells]
10th Experience Pentecost Day for the Schools
11th 7.30pm Study Group V (Meeting Room)
12th 9.30am Holy Communion (1662) (Tansley)
10.30am Prayer Walk (Tansley)
1.00pm Wednesday at One (Lady Chapel)
13th 10.30am Matlock Clergy Meeting (Meeting Room)
16th 8.00am Holy Communion (1662) [Trinity]
10.00am Prayer Time (Lady Chapel)
10.45am Family Service
18th 2.00pm Valley Lodge Service
7.30pm Study Group VI (Meeting Room)
19th 9.30am Holy Communion (1662) (Tansley)
11.00am Lilybank Service
1.00pm Wednesday at One (Lady Chapel)
20th 7.30pm Corpus Christi Communion (St. Giles)
22nd 2.00pm Midsummer Fete (Hall)
23rd 8.00am Holy Communion [Trinity 1]
10.00am Prayer Time (Lady Chapel)
10.45am Family Communion
4.00pm Bank Road Messy Church (MMURC)
6.30pm Evensong
25th 2.00pm Diocesan Spirituality Group (Meeting Room)
7.30pm Study Group VII (Meeting Room)
26th 9.30am Holy Communion (1662) (Tansley)
1.00pm Wednesday at One (Lady Chapel)
28th 2.00pm Darley Hall Service
30th 8.00am Holy Communion [Trinity 2]
10.00am Prayer Time (Lady Chapel)
10.45am Family Communion
Baptisms
Weddings
22.4.2019 Jim Page & Pauline Eastwood
Funerals
16.5.2019 Christine Dodshon
USPG Walk – Many thanks to all who supported the Team. We successfully trekked from Derby to Matlock and along the way met our new Bishop of Derby. Date for the diary is 27th April 2020 when we will be walking for the seventh year in a row.
Experience Pentecost – Saturday 8th June, 2.00-4.00pm. Crafts & Activities for all ages looking at the story of Pentecost and its meaning.
Midsummer Fete – Saturday 22nd June between 2.00 p.m. and 4.00pm with Floral Displays, and an Art Exhibition in the Church. Stalls will be placed around the attractive church gardens and will include Craft, Treasure Island, Jar Tombola, a Bran Tub, Ice a Biscuit, and guess the name of the Teddy. There will also be a silver trail, Children’s Games, guess the number of flowers, a competition for the best flower arrangement in a cup, a Raffle and much, much more. Afternoon Teas will be served in the Church Hall, and entry to the event is completely free.
Dear Friends,
Those who take the time to look at the weekly pew sheet will know that beyond the regular typos and mistakes, I try to find a quote for reflecting on through the coming week. Some quotes are taken from ancient writers and others more up to date; some well-known and others more obscure, but all reflect that desire to come to a living relationship with the Creator God.
This month we celebrate the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity; the great mystery that lies at the heart of our Faith, that God has revealed Godself to be One God yet three Divine Persons. Every year we try and explore that mystery some more, but as we delve deeper into the knowledge of a Love so intense that it unites Father, Son and Holy Spirit perfectly, we are led to that place where words and language fall silent in adoration. For as Michael Ramsey once remarked, the truly amazing thing is not that there is One God yet Three Divine Persons but that God should love each one of us with so deep a passion as to desire us to enter into eternal communion with the Divine.
Our worship, week by week, Sunday by Sunday, is not a case of turning up to a weekly club of like-minded people, but rather it is about the offering of ourselves, our whole being to the Lord. Worship is not about ‘my spiritual fix’ but is about bringing the whole of ourselves, imperfect as we are, as an offering of praise and thanksgiving to the Almighty.
William Temple once wrote this, “Worship is the submission of all of our nature to God.
It is the quickening of conscience by His holiness,
Nourishment of mind by His truth,
Purifying of imagination by His beauty,
Opening of the heart to His love,
And submission of will to his purpose.
And all this gathered up in adoration is the greatest of human expressions of which we are capable.”
And I would add, enabled by our faith in Him from His grace to us by His Spirit of truth because of His love for us seen in His Son Jesus Christ.”
Worship is also about transformation. This transforming is not only one of our vision and understanding of God as we explore the mystery of the Divine but also a transformation of us through the action of the Holy Spirit. By spending time in the Divine Presence, we are to be transformed; changed from glory into glory, as the rough edges of our lives are smoothed and polished.
Rowan Williams in his book, ‘Being Disciples’ (p.82f), writes - “We need to ask whether we come to prayer, and try to live as Christ’s disciples, in the expectation of being stretched. Do I expect there to be a bit more of me at the end of a period of prayer or worship than there was at the beginning? Because that is really what it’s about – whether there will be a little more of me afterwards. Or, to change the metaphor, will God have cleared away some of the clutter during that time and created a little more space there for his life?”
Sunday by Sunday we come intentionally to seek encounter with the Living Lord; Creator, Risen Saviour, Transforming Spirit. We come to offer ourselves in love and thanksgiving, not for what we can get our of the time of worship but what we can bring.
“We breathe in a rhythm, in and out. Oceans are in rhythm with the cycle of the moon in the cosmic music of the ebb & flow of the tide. God within the Trinity lives in a silent pulse of love, a going forth in self-emptying love for the Other & a waiting to receive one’s uniqueness in the love returned through the mutual Spirit of love. God in our Baptism, implants this divine rhythm into the core of our being. True prayer is tuning in to God’s breathing into us His love & breathing us out as co-creators with God of a new world”
[G.Maloney, ‘Why not become totally fire?’, 1989, p.53]
Every blessing
Richard
