Village Voice Oct/Nov Issue 188

CHURCH NEWS
Holy Trinity & St Margaret's
By the time you read this we will have had our
Harvest Supper Celebration in the Village Hall,
which at the time of writing is fully booked!
You are invited to join us for our Harvest
Festival services on Sunday 7th October
(9.30am at St Margaret’s and 11am at Holy
Trinity). Our harvest gifts will be forwarded to
the Wycombe Women’s Shelter (please see p.
15 for details of Wycombe Womens Aid - which
runs the Women's Shelter)
We are insulated from nature by our warm
houses, cars, tarmac’d roads, etc. But not that
long ago before the age of cars, double glazing,
goretex and the like we lived much closer to
nature and life was colder, wetter and muddier.
Without our modern day transportation system a
village like ours was immediately dependent
upon a good harvest. In years when it failed
people would starve. So thanksgiving for
harvest was a religious expression of a very
deep human emotion. For us, Harvest feels
rather remote but it is still vital and there are
many, many areas in the world where it still has
that immediacy.
Sunday 4th November is All Saints Day and
in the Family Services in the morning we will
be collecting our Shoeboxes so that they can be
delivered to orphanages and homes in time for
Christmas. The annual shoebox appeal is a
terrific initiative which is so easy for us but
which has a huge impact on those who would
otherwise not receive anything for Christmas.
The idea is that one fills a shoebox with
essentials and gifts for a child in an orphanage
or home overseas to receive at Christmas. Last
year we added 168 boxes to the total of 675,000
that were sent to children in 13 countries across
Eastern Europe, Africa, Central Asia and the
Middle East. Let us see if we can do more this
year. Because of the inevitable regulations there
www.pennandtylersgreen.org.uk
Village Voice October/November 2018
are things that can and cannot be packed into the
boxes and a list can be obtained from the
Sanctuary. Later on that day we will be holding
our annual Memorial Service where you are
invited to come to Holy Trinity church at 3pm
and in a very simple service remember, give
thanks for a loved one. The loss can be recent
but many come to light a candle to remember
those they have lost many years ago. Time
lessens the sharpness of the grief but the
memory is still there. Many find comfort in
remembering in company with others also in
sadness but most importantly in the presence of
our loving heavenly Father.
This year Remembrance Day falls on a
Sunday so as well as the Acts of Remembrance
in our morning services, we will be a part of the
events on Tylers Green Common in the evening
(full details are reported elsewhere in VV). I
look forward to seeing you there. Revd Mike Bisset
Penn Free Methodist Church
Recorded sermons online: Two of our recent
uploads are addresses based upon Daniel 7:1-8
and Daniel 7:9-14, where we read of the
prophet’s vision of 4 terrifying beasts : a lion,
bear, leopard and then a fourth beast which was
so terrible that no earthly animal could be
likened to it. These beasts represent the four
great empires that arose between Daniel’s time
(mid 6th century BC) and the coming of Christ,
namely, Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome. We
are thus supplied with vital historical
background leading up to the appearing of the
Lord Jesus Christ upon this earth.
One of the glories of reading the Old
Testament is that it speaks so much of Christ.
The notion that the God of the Old Testament
and that of the New are different in character -
the former being a God of wrath, whereas the
latter is a God of love - is complete fiction.
God’s character never changes. In any case, the
Lord Jesus Christ IS the God of the Old
Testament “manifest in the flesh” (see 1
Timothy 3:16), having taken upon Himself our
human nature. The sermon on Daniel 7:9-14
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