Shirley Alexander from Sydenham writes:

“Discover the Missing Peace”

At Sydenham Methodist Church in East Belfast we had been looking forward with great expectation to our Lay Witness weekend. A vital aspect of preparation was, of course, prayer. Over forty members of the congregation began to meet in prayer triplets to pray for the team, the preparations, and that God would move in people’s hearts and lives.

We were delighted with the number of people who came to the evening meals on Friday and Saturday – over 120 each night. At the first meal some of our friends (including the minister) of our neighbouring Church of Ireland congregation helped us by washing up after the meal. One woman in their group, who has recently started coming to the church, was so impressed by this act of Christian love that she went home and committed her life to Christ. You never know what’s going on in the kitchen! A lovely thing about the weekend was the great sense of fellowship as members of the congregation had time to chat and get to know each other better. Many said, ‘we must do this sort of thing more often!’

As each team member shared their story at the various events over the weekend there we sensed that the Lord was speaking to us through the personal stories. People opened up to team members and requested prayer.

At the end of the Sunday morning service we were invited to write our name on a jigsaw piece and place it on a large picture of our church, as a sign that we are committing ourselves to serve the Lord in this congregation and community. Seventy people came forward, some remaining behind for prayer at the communion rail.

Pray for us in our follow-up: a membership class on Tuesday evenings and a new style of Sunday evening service, to which we hope we will soon welcome newcomers.

We thank the Lord for a wonderful team who served us lovingly and faithfully, and thank you to all of you who prayed for our mission.

Sydenham 2006 Team (left – right)…

Nigel Woods, Cathy Biggerstaff, Heather Boland, Oliver Hetherington, Laura Ewing, Sammy Davison, Eddie Drury, Maureen Blevins, Angela Lipsett, Karen Hetherington