At family services, we usually have a quiz or game. In true Christmas-party style, Mark Burgin organised a dancing game where, when the music stopped, we had to become either a Christmas tree or Santa carrying a sack of presents or a reindeer. It was a game of elimination, since you were ‘out’ if you were caught in the pose Mark shouted out.


As people were eliminated, the remaining competitors came to the front to dance…

and to pose…

and to win…

As always, there were prizes to win:


As you can see, this carol service was a relaxed affair and we had lots of fun:

But along with the sermon, there were serious moments too. A dialogue read out by Dave and Julie reminded us of the incredible plan of salvation God imagined for us. Entitled, “He’s going to do what?”, this looked at how two angels received the news of God’s plan of salvation.


If you’d like to join in more entertaining games and quizzes and sing carols proclaiming the wonders of Christ’s birth, then please feel free to join us on Market Street at 6 p.m. tonight, Sunday 19th December, for the second of our carol services with a smile!

Saturday 18th December 2010 saw the first of two carol services to be held at Goldthorpe Pentecostal Community Church. We like to combine traditional carols with modern songs and lots of silly games and quizzes so as to re-tell the Christmas story in a way that engages all who attend. That’s the aim, anyway!

Stephen spoke about presents, using the present below to illustrate his points:

There was no label on this present bag, so it wasn’t possible to know who this present was from or who it was for. Sometimes we get presesnts like that and don’t know who to thank when we open it up and find a fantastic present inside. God has given us a present like this called Christmas, but sometimes we fail to realise what the present is or who has given it to us. We can believe the Christmas story is just a ‘coincidence’ or an ‘accident’, but, as C.S. Lewis said, “They say that God became man. Every other miracle prepares the way for this or results from this.”

Jesus did not come to the world tagged up and neatly wrapped for one person only. He came for each and every one of us so that we might find forgiveness and peace with God and may come to know Him, God’s own Son.

As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 9:15, “Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!”

Yan Handley, a guest speaker, came to visit tonight and spoke challengingly on the freedom God wants to give us from wrong and ungodly attitudes. Our attitudes determine our altitude: wrong attitudes drag us down, but right attitudes lift us up.

Philippians 2 shows us the attitudes that Christ had and therefore acts as a model for the attitudes we should have. Attitudes are a settled way of thinking lying deep down within us. They affect our behaviour and can be conveyed in so many ways (tone of voice, silence, body language etc.) Our sinful nature breeds wrong attitudes and our attitudes are influenced by a whole range of factors, including our upbringing, the cultural influence all around us,and the spirit of the age. The most important influence on our attitudes has to be the Word of God, however. This has the power to mould and shape our attitudes so that we can have the same attitude as Jesus.

We know that if we are in Christ, we are new creations (2 Cor 5:17). We are converted from self-centredness to Christ-centredness. All wrong attitudes are rooted in self-centredness.

Attitudes are worked out in the context of relationships. Yan taught that if our vertical relationship with God is right, then our horizontal relationships with people will have the opportunity to be right; we will be able to love God and people as we should (see Matt 22:37-38).

Vertical relationship
(1) We need to hate sin and flee from temptation.
(2) If we love God, we must obey His commandments (John 14:15) and delight to do His will (Ps 40:8)
(3) We need to grow in our dependence on God (John 15:5)
(4) We need to grow in trust

Horizontal relationships
We need to love unconditionally, sacrificially and unilaterally as Jesus loved us (1 Jn 4:20). This involves:
(1) honouring others, not looking down on them (Rom 12:10, Phil 2:3-4)
(2) encouraging others, not discouraging them (Heb 3:13, 1 Cor 14:12)
(3) accepting others, not making them feel unwelcome (Rom 15:7)
(4) serving others, even as Jesus washed his disciples’ feet (John 13, Gal 5:13)
(5) forgiving others, not holding grudges and resentment in our hearts (Eph 4:31-32)

Yan also talked about relationships in the workplace, and how we need to be of a different spirit to those with whom we work, whose attitudes can often be categorised as disrespectful, disloyal and discontented. Instead, we need to follow the principles laid out in Ephesians 6, having a good attitude to work and our employers, understanding ultimately that we are working for the Lord (Eph 6, Dan 6:3, Jn 17:34, 1 Pet 2:18-19)

Our attitude to the world and to evangelism also needs to be right. It needs to be motivated by love. In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, the ‘religious’ people were too busy to help the injured man; God challenges us to do as the Samaritan did and help those in need.

For our attitudes to change, we need God’s anointing and we need to:
(1) acknowledge that God’s Word is true and is our plumbline, our guide for righteous living.
(2) agree with what God says
(3) ask God for the mind of Christ to be in us

The standard is high – we only have to read 1 Corinthians 13 and substitute our names for the word ‘love’ to see how high! But by God’s grace our attitudes can change.

Birthday girl (a week late, but there’s no escape!):

Mark preached on the subject of giving yesterday morning, taking his text from Luke 21:1-4:
“As Jesus looked up, he saw the rich putting their gifts into the temple treasury. He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins. “Truly I tell you,” he said, “this poor widow has put in more than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.””

It’s relatively easy to give out of abundance, but this woman gave out of her poverty. She gave all she had. A gift’s true value is measured by what it costs the person to give it, not by the item’s value.

Giving can be a spiritual gift (Rom 12:6-8).

We tend to judge people’s giving from the outside, looking at the monetary value of what they give, but God sees the heart and judges from the inside. Moreover, giving is about more than money: God wants us to give our love, our praise, our time, our whole lives as an offering to Him as a token of our worship.

The attitude in which we give is also of paramount importance to God. 2 Corinthians 9:5-8 teaches us that God wants us to give cheerfully and willingly, out of a thankful heart. He wants us to be ‘cheerful givers’ – hilarious givers! – because He himself has given so much in that spirit.

Christmas is often associated with gifts. Let’s not give grudgingly or reluctantly, but with gratitude and thankfulness. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift! (2 Cor 9:15)

When we first started work on ‘St Mark’s’ in February, there were lots of things we wanted to do with the building which needed more finance than we had available. We spent from February until June getting the building ready for services and have been so blessed already with all the work that was done in that timespan. The main worship hall was replastered and decorated; new heating was installed there; the room was re-wired; new windows and blinds were purchased for that hall and we were able to do far more than we had originally thought. We were amazed at the weekly offerings and how God provided so much to allow us to get the place ready for opening.

But with a building this big, there is always more to be done, and the recent spell of cold weather has reminded us forcefully that the windows in the community hall needed replacing. Bible studies on Thursday evenings have seen us shivering at times, with draughts from the windows effectively reducing the efficiency of the heating system. So many windows in such a large room cost a lot, however!

God continues to be gracious to us and slowly and steadily we have seen offerings continue to be so high that this week, we were finally able to have new windows fitted in the community room. These are double-glazed and should help to keep the room warm and the bills down!

Original view:


Taking out the old:

It was cold!

Putting in the new:


We are grateful to the church trustees for their wise stewardship of resources and most of all to God for His ongoing provision and care.

What do the following pictures have in common?



The answer is that all these images featured in Tony’s quiz at the family service and had to do with angels, the theme for the evening. (The first is the ‘Angel of the North’ sculpture, the second ‘Charlie’s Angels’ and the third a popular image of the devil, who was, of course, a fallen angel.)

Dave then spoke on the subject of angels, a very apt topic for this Advent season! He spoke mainly from Luke 2:8-20, but also looked at the role of angels:
(1) to magnify God (Neh 9:6/ Rev 5:11-14)
(2) to bring God’s message to people
(3) to minister to people (Heb 1:14/ Heb 13:2)

People’s reactions to angels generally involve terror. They were terrified by the messenger, and often tottered at the message brought! More often than not, angels reassured people by telling them ‘Do not fear’:
(1) Don’t be afraid of God’s purposes (Mary)
(2) Don’t be afraid when things seem to go wrong (Joseph)
(3) Don’t be afraid of the good news (the shepherds)

Our response needs to be to surrender to Christ’s leadership and to become messengers of this good news ourselves!