This week week our services and events are:

Sunday 11h Dec - Advent 3 8am - BCP Holy Communion11am - Holy Communion4pm - Candlelit Carols - followed by refreshments including mince pies - see below for details7pm - Zoom Coffee and Chat - for joining details see below Tuesday 13th Dec 2:30pm Friendship Teas - in the AnnexeSongs of the Christmas Story - Advent Course Week 3 - see below for details

Carols by Candlelight

This Sunday it's the first of our festive services!
A chance to contemplate the meaning of Christmas, with the help of a beautiful candlelit church, popular carols, and short readings.
A truly all-age service, followed by refreshments.

Songs of the Christmas Story - A four week Advent course for EVERYONE

Join us for Week 3 on Tuesday 13th December as we explore the third of our songs

10am St Michael and All Angels, Birchwood7pm St John’s, Lemsford (Annexe) It was wonderful again to see so many people at last week’s Advent course. You can join at any time, so if you couldn’t make last week’s session please still come along this week
The sessions will run for about an hour and are designed to be suitable for everyone, wherever you are on your faith journey. They contain a mixture of prayer, questions, discussion, music and invitation to action.

New Parish Magazine for December/January

Well OK so it's not totally new, with the print copy having been available on Church for a week or so.

As always the magazine contains its usual great articles by Rev Kathryn & Michelle Boylan (Head of St John's Primary). This edition also contains a lot of other great things including photos from Lilia's Baptism and the Remembrance Service as well a poem from Ted and articles from Rev Sue Stilwell, Rev Ron Ingamells and Andy Chapman (Lemsford Local History Group), tributes to June Copping & Queen Elizabeth II and more.

It's a great read for which we must thank Geoffrey Hollis for the last time as editor, although he will continue to write articles in future editions.

Food Bank Special Christmas Requests

As Christmas is coming, the Food Bank would like to receive some special treats for those in need, such as boxes of chocolates and sweets for children. Please do try to bring those in during the weeks before Christmas if you can. We are respectfully asked not to donate mince pies or Christmas puddings. Please do support the Food Bank, as all donations are very much appreciated.

Of course our local Food Bank at the New Zion Christian Fellowship church would also appreciate receiving donations of food and other things from us now and all year round. It would be wonderful if you could support them by bringing various things in on Sunday mornings, and placing them in the big plastic box which will be placed in the porch. The sort of things the Food Bank would like to receive are:

All food with good sell by dates (tins of fruit and veg, jams, packets of cereal, coffee, tea, long life milk and so on)Toiletries such as shampoo and conditioner and toilet rollsCleaning products (kitchen and bathroom cleaners etc)

We are asked not to donate clothes.

Nigel will arrange to take our offerings to the New Zion church every Wednesday morning.

Thank you so much.

All the Christmas Special Services and Events

11th December (Sunday) - Advent 3 8am - BCP Holy Communion11am - Holy Communion4pm - Candlelight Carols - followed by refreshments including mince pies 18th December (Sunday) 8am - BCP Holy Communion 11am - Nine Lessons and Carols - followed by refreshments including mince pies 19th December (Monday) - tbc eve - Carols around the Village and Pubs24th December (Saturday) - Christmas Eve 3pm - Crib Service11pm - Midnight Mass 25th December (Sunday) - Christmas Day 8am - BCP Holy Communion11am - 'All Together' Christmas Service with Holy Communion 1st January 2023 (Sunday) - New Year’s Day 8am - BCP Morning Prayer11am - Holy Communion

Please sign up for a spot in the Cleaning Rota

Still slots to fill!

"The Cleaning Rota" did not run during Covid and instead the Churchwardens Jenny and Nigel cleaned and disinfected per Covid best practice, but now it's time to ask for your help with getting the rota started again.

Jenny will be contacting people who have previously taken a turn with cleaning. More volunteers are needed to help us. All the materials you'll need are provided. All that we need is your time!

Let's spread this load between us all!! Please contact Jenny if you would like to take a turn with cleaning.
You can choose a date that suits you! We continue to think of Ukraine:

Update - John Blanch emailed me to say that the "Taste it Polish Restaurant" in Hatfield is no longer taking donations of clothing for Ukraine. However this doe snot stop our efforts.

Bishop Alan says we can pray, and practically we also have an option to donate to the Red Cross Appeal which I again repeat here:

To see their appeal details, please copy and paste this link into your browser: https://donate.redcross.org.uk/appeal/ukraine-crisis-appeal. You may donate any amount you wish, and your cash will go towards helping people who are being affected by the crisis, by supplying them with food, water, first aid, medicines, warm clothes and shelter. Donations may be made direct to the Red Cross appeal, or alternatively, you may care to donate using the QR code below. The QR code will also be displayed in church.

If you don't do QR Codes then clicking this link on your computer goes to the same "give-a-litte" link: https://givealittle.co/campaigns/753bbfac-510a-47d8-86cf-f6a707ddc585

Zoom Chat has moved to Mondays at 7pm (not 28th Nov though)

We've moved our Zoom chat to Monday at 7pm and the first one went well. If you've found you couldn't get to the Sunday 4pm one, or never came to any, this is your chance.

Hope to see you there. - see below for joining link and details.

Church Giving.

We are now passing the offerings plate at services. I know that many of us are happiest giving cash rather than scanning QR codes or tapping payment cards or smartphones, so this is good news indeed.

But, if you like the QR Code, you can point your Smartphone’s camera or QR app at it, and it will let you give, or from your PC/Mac you can just click this link: https://givealittle.co/campaigns/10cd954f-25f7-46d9-8813-634634729bfa. You can also give via the new (easy to use) card payment device – both at the back of the church - these donations go to St Johns funds. We are planning to make the QR Codes easily accessible from the pews too.

Coffee and Chat Details:

Topic: Coffee and Chat
Time: Monday at 7pm - use this link

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81951586866?pwd=Z1ZhTjEycElnQjJmSWtrRkRBaWg0UT09

Meeting ID: 819 5158 6866
Passcode: 904402

Upcoming Events and Services

Services and Events 11th December Holy Communion (BCP) 8am KA 3rd Sunday in Advent
Holy Communion 11am KA

Candlelit Carols 4pm KA
18th December Holy Communion (BCP) 8am JM 4th Sunday in Advent
Nine Lessons and Carols 11am IL
24th December Crib Service 4pm TBC Christmas Eve
Midnight Mass 11pm KA
25th December Holy Communion (BCP) 8am KA Christmas Day
Holy Communion 11am KA

Friendship Teas - every second Tuesday of the month at 2:30pm in the Annexe!
The next one is this Tuesday November 8th at 2:30pm