AUTHENTIC COMMUNITY
Hi Werb’s Kids and Werb’s Parents!
Hope you are all doing well.
IT’S SEPTEMBER!
It was so good to see some of you at church today! If you weren’t able to make it there are plenty of other weeks that you can still sign up to.
HERE is the link to our services page where you can find all the details.
I know many of you went back to school this week. I’ve been praying for you and I really hope it went well. I hope you enjoyed being back, seeing your friends and teachers again. I know it’s all very different and this can be a little scary or make us worry but remember God goes with you and he will give you the strength you need to face the day.
You have been amazing during lockdown from clapping for the NHS, making rainbows and being warriors of kindness so I want to thank you.
But now we are stepping into a different season with some new stuff going on, I want you to keep the kindness and love with you that you’ve learnt about and done over lockdown. Except now we can share it and help others in our class.
Do you think you do that?
You can’t hug or get too close but you have an amazing smile that you can share. Smiling is the most gift and it’s an amazing way to make someone feel better instantly.
I really hope to see you soon so stay safe and stay connected!
Amy x
VISION STATEMENT
We’re starting a special new series based on our church’s vision statement!
A vision statement is what we dream of being as a church. It’s our aim or goal that we’re working towards.
I thought we could try and learn it over the next few weeks off by heart and then impress Phil by being able to say it from memory!
So this is our church’s vision:
“We want to build an authentic community, which is christ centred, that plays our part in transforming the city and beyond.”
This week we are going to look at the first part which is building an…
AUTHENTIC COMMUNITY!
So we want to be an AUTHENTIC COMMUNITY but what is that?
Authentic means honest and real.
And a community is a group of people that like to come together often for friendship and are a group that have something in common. So this means as a church we want to be really honest and real with each other as we grow closer together as friends and family because we all love Jesus.
But you don’t just have a community at church you have one at school too!And communities look after each other.
The very first church in the bible was an amazing community too. Peter from the bible who you met during lockdown is going to help us find out more about what this authentic community did together.
But before we get into it…LET’S PLAY A GAME!
I have created a VISION STATEMENT PUZZLE. Why not print it off and follow the lines to cut out the puzzle pieces. Then see how long it takes you to put it back together!
If it’s too easy see how fast you make it in. Or play hide and seek with the pieces and get some one hide them around the room. Then as well as putting the puzzle back together you’ll need to try and find the pieces too!
As we already explained we are looking today at authentic community.
Now, the very first church in the bible was an amazing community too and you can read all about them in the book of ACTS. This morning we met Peter again from the bible who helped us find out more about what this authentic community did together.
The first church was started more than 2,000 years ago by Jesus’ disciples and close friends.
When Jesus came alive again, after he was killed on the cross, his friends and family realised that he was really God’s son. They understood that Jesus had come to show them what God was like, and that he had died so that their sins could be forgiven and they could be part of God’s family.
Guess what – 2,000 years later, Christians still believe that. This very first church was very excited about Jesus and their whole life was changed because of him.
In our service this morning Peter helped us to see just how the first church cared and looked after each other and you can rewatch this morning’s service again on Youtube just search stwderby.
But here is another little video that helps show what the first church community was like and reminding us the church is about the people not the building!
Just like what Peter said this morning, the video states the early church learnt about Jesus and so wanted to be more like him!
Let’s see the sort of things they did by reading Acts chapter 2 verses 44-47.
“All the Lord’s followers often met together and they shared everything they had. They would sell their property and possessions and give the money to whoever needed it.
Day after day, they met together in the temple.
They broke bread together in different homes and shared food happily and freely, while praising God.
Everyone liked them, and each day the Lord added to their group others who were being saved.”
Can you list the things they did?
Let’s recap now the ways the first church helped and then we can see if we can do the same…
Met in the temple/church and read the scriptures/bible
We can now meet in church together which is amazing. But what’s more amazing is that you can read the bible wherever you are! You can do it at home! The first church loved learning about Jesus so that they could be more and more like him every day and you can do this too.If you don’t have a bible we’d love to help so just email amy.farrar@stwderby.org and we’ll help you get one.
Sold their belongings to look after those who didn’t have enough.
The first church really cared about everyone and wanted to make sure everyone had what they needed. So if someone needed something we would make sure they got it even if that meant selling something that belonged to them. They thought people were far more important than stuff and belongings!
So this is a little bit like giving to charity so we could do the same in this way but also it’s seeing others needs before our own. So if we had lots of things and someone had nothing maybe we would think about giving stuff away so that they had what they needed.
This also helps think about not being too greedy and how there are others in the world that don’t have as much as us. We need to always be grateful and say thank you for what we have too.Ate together to build friendship.
As well as eating meals together to build friendship and that authentic community they also broke bread which means they remembered Jesus’ death and resurrection. They did this regularly just like Jesus himself did when he had the last supper with his disciples. They thought it was super important to remember how Jesus saved them and we do too as we do this at church sometimes too which is called communion.
When it comes to us, we have to be careful at the moment to keep our distance but this doesn’t mean we can’t see friends. In fact being an amazing friend means caring for someone's health so by staying a little bit further away you are telling that person you really care about them! Plus we can have friends in our garden or see them at the park too which is fun!Regularly praying for each other.
The first church loved to pray together and for each other. This is another way that you can care about someone in your community. Prayer is amazing and talking to God can be done by anyone! When you pray for a friend or someone in your community you can be so real and honest. And it’s an amazing way to show support and that you care.
When you pray for them you could ask God to keep them healthy and happy. Or if you know they are struggling you could ask God to help them.
CRAFT TIME!
We are DESPERATE to see what you’ve made. We would love to see your crafts and pictures and show them off at our next services online and in person! Please send a picture of ANYTHING you make from this week and Amy will include it in next week’s video!
Some things to do during the talk:
Draw St.Werburgh’s Church! We have plenty of pictures on the website you can copy!
Church is about people so draw anyone you remember who was in your Werb’s Kids group or any of your leaders.
Get creative!
Paper chains people
HERE is a video of how to make them. I didn’t make my people as small as they do in the video and it might help to draw on the person first before you start cutting! The main thing to make this work it that you don’t cut where the hands would be as this is the part that needs to be linked together in order to make the chain.At church we used this craft to pray for those in our communities.
I asked everyone to draw someone specific on each person in the chain.
So someone from your family, a friend, someone at school, your teacher or your next door neighbour. As well as the people we know let’s also draw some people we don’t know who we want to pray for like nurses, doctors, fireman, shop workers, and all the key workers who have helped us recently.
As you colour them in pray for God to look after them. You could put this up on the wall and it could remind you to regularly pray for these people!Salt dough
Think about some of your favourite people and make them out of salt dough. Create a little community of people! If you wanted to paint these figures you’d need to heat the oven to about 150° and cook them for a couple of hours or until hard.
WORSHIP
This morning at church we talked about how although we can’t sing together we can still worship together.
Don’t forget the playlists on YouTube that you can listen to to worship to God at home.
This morning we sung a song called ‘Who You Say I Am’
We reminded ourselves that God tells who we are. We are chosen children of God and this is amazing. It tells us that no matter what we do we are always loved by God.
If we know who we are and how much we are loved then that means we can be better at loving other people in our communities. You might want to play this song whilst you do the paper chain people craft and pray for those you are drawing.
Edited and adapted by Amy Farrar from several sources including energize.com
