Luke 1:37 (ESV) For nothing will be impossible with God December here at Grace Church Orkney has been a time of celebration and praising God for His amazing works right before our eyes. We have been reminded of this verse from Luke chapter 1 in one of our Sunday sermons and also how the Lord provides from the Gospel of Mark. We have seen the Lord working many wonderful things this month and we have been reminded that nothing is impossible with God. We were so grateful to see Tim get baptised this month. Tim and Sarah have been coming along to GCO for a while now after moving to Stromness from mainland Scotland. Tim felt the call to be obedient to the word of God and it was with much joy he was baptised in the church after his public declaration of faith.   December also saw new houses and moving days. The second ministry house the church was able to buy had the sale completed on the Friday before Christmas. This home is in another part of the town. It is a smaller house than the one in Grieveship so Matt and Cee moved into that one. This allowed the Huffmiers to have the larger home for them and their 4 kids. As well as providing houses for the team in an area where housing stock is very low and expensive, this also gives us new opportunities in the town. We pray that this will give us more opportunities to meet people and share of the hope we have in Christ. We also had a guy from Niddrie in Edinburgh come up to stay with Mez and Miriam. He has been known to the church there for many years having been part of their outreach football team and found himself at the point where he needed to get away to change his life and find his need of Jesus. It was great to welcome him to the Island. We look forward to helping him on this journey and pray that he recognises his need of Jesus as his Lord and Saviour.There are now a number of guests at Mez and Miriam’s. Please pray for those who have yet to come to Christ for salvation. Of course, December is Christmas and we were blessed to have a Christmas Day service in the church. Mez preached on the true meaning of Christmas while Andrew led the worship. It was a lovely time to come together and praise Jesus at this time. We followed this by having Christmas dinner together in the church. For many of us this was a very special time as there are those among us who don’t see their families for one reason or another – some have broken families and some are too far away to meet up. To spend the day with our church family is a real blessing and a joy and a beautiful gift from there Lord.  Christmas also brought opportunities to be around the town and get to know more people. A few events that we were able to go along to included the Christmas lights switch on, the Stromness pantomime which Vanessa, one of our newest members, had a main role in, carols in the local schools and carols in Mervyn and Eileen’s barn on their farm. There has also been the Kirkwall and Stromness tractor runs as well as the Ba’ – an Orkney traditional event held on Christmas Day and New Years day in the streets around Kirkwall. Imagine rugby or American football throughout the streets with no rules, no protection and can last anything up to 6-8 hours! New Year’s Eve brought the annual Yule Log Pull competition to Stromness. This event involves people from the North and South ends of Stromness competing against each other in a huge tug of war through the Main Street. A few of the men from church took part competing for the South end (known locally as the Soothenders).   As we head into the new year, please pray we see more people in Stromness saved for God’s glory. Pray we are blessed to have more baptisms Pray as we continue to serve Him. Pray that the Lord blesses our plans for new ministries for this coming year. Pray that we are able to welcome more people to the island who are in desperate need and that we can share the Gospel with them. Finally please pray that we do everything for the glory of Jesus’ name. Thank you for your continued support.Happy New Year! Do you feel called to : PRAY GIVE COME PRAY Join us in praying the Lord blesses the work here and enables us to spread the Gospel in Stromness, Orkney and that souls are saved for His gloryGIVE Join us by giving financially so that the least, the last, and the lost in the community can hear the Gospel of the Lord Jesus ChristCOME Join us by coming to visit to encourage and see the work God is doing or to work on the ground serving Christ in the schemes of Scotland To give to the ministry as a financial offering from the U.K. please follow this link and select Orkney :https://20schemes.infoodle.com/f/OnlineDonationsFormPlants Or follow this link if you are in the USA and select Orkney :https://app.etapestry.com/onlineforms/20SchemesInc/churchplants.html |