Church News Volume 3, Issue 1

Dear friends,

I hope you have all enjoyed the summer months, maybe even managed to get away for a few days. As September arrives we begin to look forward and plan for the next year, for although January is the official New Year, most of us plan our lives from summer to summer, harvest time to harvest time, start of school year to end of school year.

It's the same in our Church life. Once the summer is over I begin to think about, and plan for, the events of the next few months, Harvest Festivals, Advent and Christmas.

God has once again been good to us in this part of the world. The sun has shone and we have been warmed by its rays. The rain has fallen and there has been plenty of water for the crops and our gardens. The wind has blown and provided cool breezes to make the warm summer days pleasant.

Events have taken place in our villages which have gone successfully, Cowlinge Open Gardens, Stansfield Fete, Wickhambrook Carnival, Ousden Family Day, Lidgate Fete Day, Stradishall Flower Festival, and we look forward to the Denston Harvest flower and art display later this month. Many of you have celebrated happy events over the summer, significant wedding anniversaries, birthdays, family events.

Some of you have suffered sadness through a death in the family, illness, or bad news.

There have been times when we have been discouraged, people have let us down, we have failed in some way, things have not gone the way we would have liked them to.

Maybe also times when we have been encouraged, by the kindness of others to us or to someone close to us, an event we have helped with going well, a difficulty overcome.

We all have things to thank God for, if we are regular church goers or not God has blessed each one of us.

Harvest Festival is not just a chance to thank God for His faithfulness in producing the fruits of the earth in their due season, but also to say "thank you" to Him for His blessings upon us as individuals, families, communities.

Come and give thanks! A warm welcome will be received to all who come to give thanks in any of our seven Benefice churches. Details of Harvest Thanksgivings below.

Revd Ian M. Finn

News Letter Archive.