Only a few of us made it to the Boxing Day service which was led by Darryl who gave us a biblically themed quiz, with chocolate prizes. Darryl also reminded us of Christmas traditions with a reading from Cider with Rosie.
For his message Darryl reminded us that not only did Jesus come to us on Christmas Day, he will come again as judge to us all.
We had our traditional short morning service, and as is usual we sang happy birthday to Joshua who was 14 today. It was nice to step out of everything else that happens on Christmas Day to focus on the real reason for the season, as they say.
For the message I reminded us all that there is a story behind the nativity story, the story of how God has not abandoned us, but chose us in Christ from the beginning of the world. I also spoke about the way that Christmas connects us with so many people that we tend not to have anything to do with, including those that are on the margins of society such as the homeless, prisoners and the housebound. I also mentioned how the birth of Christ is something we could celebrate with our Muslim friends, since the Qur’an teaches that Jesus had a miraculous birth, was favoured by God, and is one of the greatest men that ever lived.
The church was full of light at this service, in every sense of the word. Candles adorned all areas of the chapel, but water and sand was on hand in case any health and safety inspectors are reading this!
We opened with words about Mary, and about the sacrifices that women all over the world make in order to give their children a better future. All our favourite hymns were there, interspersed with readings from the nativity passages from the gospels. All this was put in its theological context with a concluding reading from the prologue to John’s gospel.
Afterwards we had tea and biscuits in the back and a good chat.
This service was led by Margaret Wells, an old friend of the church who was presented with flowers to thank her for all her years of visiting to preach at Tapton.
Margaret’s services are always well received, and this was no exception. Talking about how Mary received the message about what she was going to do she reminded us how God uses ordinary people to do his work, and that includes us!
Afterwards we all enjoyed a cup of tea, biscuits and a good chat. After being stuck indoors because of the snow many people were pleased to catch up with all their friends again.
Despite the atrocious weather that has caused so many Tapton events to be cancelled lately, this went ahead with a bumper crowd (well done, Pat!). The food was excellent, as usual, and there was a social afterwards led by Andrea.
This service was prepared by our organist John Silverton, and was in a more ‘traditional’ style than we are generally used to at Tapton! It featured the 1662 version of the Lord’s Prayer and some call and response elements in the service. There was an excellent range of hymns, all with an advent theme, and the readings were Isaiah 40: 1-11, Romans 13: 8-End, and Mark 1: 1-15.
A very helpful handbook was prepared to take us through all the different elements.
There was a choral prelude, ‘Now come, thou Saviour of the gentiles’ by J.S.Bach. The organ voluntary was ‘Sleepers wake, a voice is calling’ by J.S. Bach.
Our thanks to John for all his hard work in preparing this service which was certainly appreciated.
The recent spate of heavy snow has hit Tapton pretty hard, this part of Sheffield tends to get more snow than other parts of the city and it’s made conditions a bit hazardous. Soup & Roll Club was cancelled on Thursday and it’s just been decided today to cancel tomorrow’s Sunday worship. There was a baptism planned for this Sunday and the decision had already been taken to rearrange that for February, we’ve now decided that it’s not safe for people to be trying to get to church tomorrow.