Church of All Saints in the Vendée “To know and to share Jesus Christ” February 2013 CONTACTS: Locum Priest: Revd Bernard Rumbold Phone no: 0251 00 98 59, e-mail:
[email protected] Church Wardens: Barbara Kenyon: Phone no: 0251 40 51 59, e-mail:
[email protected] Joan Stewart: Phone no: 0251 00 34 70, e-mail:
[email protected] Readers: Robin Kenyon: Phone no: 0251 40 51 59, e-mail:
[email protected] John Matthews: Phone no: 0549 75 29 71, e-mail:
[email protected] Website: www.allsaintsvendee.fr WHAT IS THE CHURCH FOR? That sounds like the title of a long, erudite and mind-numbing book! I'm going to try to answer the question in a few hundred words and I will make them as non-theological and 'non-party' as possible. So here goes.... Firstly, who or what is 'the Church'. Well for our purpose, it`s the group of Christian people who meet regularly or occasionally as the congregations of All Saints Vendée. Somebody is going to ask 'who are Christians'; again, for our purpose, the same group of people! There are, of course, many talents given to people by God to do different jobs - administrators, musicians, cooks, worship leaders and so forth, but, there is only one type of Christian, none are more senior or important than others in God's eyes - the word 'minister' means a servant. They can be members of any church that proclaims 'Jesus is Lord' - or none. We can probably identify at least four different tasks that the Church is 'for' : Worshipping and glorifying God - we do this when we meet together for our Sunday services, when we pray or read the Bible in our own home and, perhaps most importantly, when we put our Christian love into action by serving others as described below.