Blessings to you on this 4th Sunday of Advent. Christmas is certainly fast approaching!
Last week, we held our Sunday School prize-giving. The Rebecca Alexander prize for girls was awarded to Eva Gregory. Because our Sunday School group (as distinct from Youth Bible study) was almost exclusively girls for most of the year, we were not able to award the Neville Thomas prize for boys. As we look to 2021, we are praying for some more boys to Sunday School (and also some more girls for Friday night Youth).
The other big event last Sunday was our first Carols at St Jude’s (outdoors with picnic and family fun). It was a great success, as detailed by Andrew Goddard in his report inside the service bulletin here.
I hope you will be able to make it back for Lessons and Carols this evening (7.30 pm). The church will be lit up with many candles for this special event featuring the traditional Christmas readings, choral pieces and also – thanks to COVID restrictions easing – congregational singing of all the favourite Christmas carols! Normally we would hold a special Christmas supper afterwards: that is not possible this year, but we can be very grateful to God that the service itself will be almost back to its pre-COVID norm.
At St Jude’s we are serious about the work of proclaiming the gospel not only in our own parish, but to the very ends of the earth. We support God’s mission in prayer, financially and through personal encouragement of those who have gone out for the sake of the Name. As part of our mission support, we allocate 10% of our yearly offertories to various mission agencies. This year’s amount (totalling just under $20,000) was divided between CMS, ABM, Anglicare, Bible Society, BCA, Nungalinya College and SRE East.
You can find your December Mission News here, and use this to guide your prayers for our mission partners.
Christmas service times are Christmas Eve, 6.00 pm Family Christmas Celebration and 11.00 pm Holy Communion. Christmas day 8.00 am and 9.30 am Holy Communion. Our Family Christmas Celebration at 6 pm on Christmas Eve is a child-friendly, more contemporary service. Our other three services are communion services.
There is also a children’s talk on Christmas Day 9.30 am.