The Benefice of and Bellerby Weekly News Sunday, November 29th First Sunday of Advent

Services Sunday 29th November With the lockdown restrictions currently in place, our services will be pre- recorded and available on Facebook and YouTube at any time after 10:30am. At 11:30am there will be virtual Coffee and Chat in Stephen’s Zoom room. Contact Stephen to get details if you would like to join in. Monday, Wednesday and Friday 9:00am Morning Prayer will be said on Zoom.

From the Vicarage

My Dear Friends ‘Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come.’ Mark 13:33 You will get to know that Advent is my favourite time of year – I love the anticipation and the hope that this season brings. I also love the advent hymns and readings. When I was at teacher training college in Lincoln we always held an Advent Carol Service in the Cathedral and that is one of those memories that I have that is filled with warm memories – singing beautiful music and looking forward to the Christmas activities ahead. Our readings today set us on this journey and I think we need it more than ever this year, a year when we seem to have been waiting constantly – for the infections to go down, for the vaccine to come. What I encourage you all to do is use this experience to focus on the real meaning of Christmas the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ and keep in mind the great advent hymn – ‘O Come, O Come, Emmanuel’.

With blessings and prayers Rev’d Stephen

This week’s sermon

I am not sure whether I have said to you before but Advent has always been my favourite time of the church year. I love all the advent hymns and readings and I love the themes of waiting, anticipation and most of all hope. Waiting is the hardest thing to do because it feels like you’re not doing anything. And it seems twice as hard when you’re young. When we were children, Christmas always seemed ages and would never arrive. What makes it worse is that as citizens in the 21st century have an ever- shrinking attention span; our wealth and technology allow us to access virtually anything we want any time we want. Everything is sooner, faster, now. Go, go, go! You snooze, you lose, is the motto of our society. If anyone needs to learn the Advent virtue of waiting upon the Lord, it’s us here and now. Our scripture from Isaiah today has an interesting take on waiting. The writer is marveling at how different the God of Israel is from the other gods in the cultures of the time. And then the writer remembers, “When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence. From ages past no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who works for those who wait for him.” The prophet is surprised not just by the mighty deeds like earthquakes – the writer is equally stunned that here is a God who works for the people, and the people for whom God works are the people who wait for God. What is it like to wait for God? Many of us know exactly what that is like. We wait for God to explain why a family member died too young. We wait for God to open a path into a new place where healing might begin. We wait for God to reveal how we should build God’s kingdom here in this place and at this time. And of course, virtually this entire year has been a time of waiting. We’ve waited during lockdowns and quarantines. We’ve waited on masks and respirators and toilet paper. We’ve waited on test results for the coronavirus, wondering whether we are positive or not. We’ve waited endless weeks and months, not able to visit our loved ones in hospitals and care homes, in order to protect them. We’ve waited on children going back to school and waited to see if jobs would hold out during the crisis. We’ve waited for a vaccine. And we’ve waited and waited and waited to go back to church in the old ways that were familiar and comfortable to us. 2020 has been nothing but a year of waiting. Perhaps we are better equipped now than we ever have been to understand the oft-repeated Biblical mandate to wait upon the Lord. The Good News shared with us today is that God is working for us as we wait for God. And we’re actually doing two kinds of spiritual waiting right now. We’re waiting for the coming of the Christ Child on Christmas Day, that glorious moment of incarnation when God comes to be with us in human form. That’s a fixed endpoint that we know ahead of time. Come December 25, we will be celebrating Jesus’ arrival whether we are with 2 other households or not. But we’re doing another kind of waiting. We’re waiting for the signs of the Incarnation in our own lives. We’re waiting to see the new and next way that God will be manifest in our own individual time and place and in our working together as God’s people here in this place and at this time. God is with us, but where and how? That is how we keep company with Mary: as the watchful sentinels always on the lookout for the new revelation waiting to be discovered among the everyday. Patience is a hard-earned virtue, and many of us are deeply wearied by all the waiting we’ve had to do, all the times we’ve had to say no to ourselves and our families this year in order to stay safe and keep others safe. You know it is not my favourite activity. It might feel like 2020 is a year out of time, a wasted and empty expanse that consisted of nothing but life on hold. But is that true? Was this time of waiting really wasted? Mary’s time of waiting was almost as long as ours has been. What has been blossoming and growing in your heart during this time of waiting? What new thing is ready to be born in our spiritual community after having been forced to slow down and really ask what is most important about church? How has your family found new strengths and graces by the call to adapt and the sudden multiplication of time together and new challenges with school and work? Mary’s time of waiting was to a purpose. It had a goal and an end, and she faithfully pursued it with God’s help. As you reflect on your waiting this year, what has God grown in you? What will be the gift you offer the world this Christmas as Mary did? It takes awake and alert eyes to see the grace even amid the suffering we’ve endured. But the Good News is that the slow, necessary, at times painful work of being changed, of being made ready for incarnation, is not up to us alone. God is the agent of our transformation as we wait. Knowing that reminds us that we don’t have to figure this out on our own. There is peace and comfort in the truth that as the endless days of waiting crawl by, God is active within us and our communities. Isaiah tells us in our scripture today, “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.” We are God’s work of art, being painstakingly shaped into the vessel of incarnation that will bring the presence of Christ to the world. You are a masterwork. And a masterwork takes time. And Paul reminds us of what we most need to hold on to through the long weary days of waiting for grace: “You are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also strengthen you to the end.” Look back on this year and see the strength with which you endured its trials. See the creativity with which your spiritual community sought to walk together in new ways. See the call to justice and peace that rang even through our most bitter divides in society. And know that it has all led to this, the season of Advent, the time of upheaval and waiting, of change and pause, of grace and truth. And so, we pray, and we stick together, and we love one another, and we wait upon the Lord. And Isaiah, the great prophet of the Advent season, announces the Good News: “Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” Amen.

Bible Readings for the Coming Week

Monday 30 Tuesday 1 Wednesday 3 Thursday 4 Ezekiel 47.1- Isaiah 43.1-13 Isaiah 43.14-end Isaiah 44.1-8 1243.1-13 Revelation 21.9- John 12.20-32 Revelation 20 Revelation 21.1-8 21 Friday 5 Saturday 6 Sunday 7

Isaiah 44.9-23 Isaiah 44.24-45.13 Zephaniah 3.14-end

Revelation 21.22- Revelation 22.6- Luke 1.5-20 22.5 end Today’s Service

Collect Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness and to put on the armour of light, now in the time of this mortal life, in which your Son Jesus Christ came to us in great humility; that on the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Readings for 1st Sunday of Advent

Isaiah 64.1–9 64 O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence— 2 as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil— to make your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence! 3 When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence. 4 From ages past no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who works for those who wait for him. 5 You meet those who gladly do right, those who remember you in your ways. But you were angry, and we sinned; because you hid yourself we transgressed. 6 We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. 7 There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity. 8 Yet, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. 9 Do not be exceedingly angry, O Lord, and do not remember iniquity for ever. Now consider, we are all your people.

1 Corinthians 1.3–9 3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 4 I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, 5 for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind— 6 just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you— 7 so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. 8 He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Mark 13.24–end 24 ‘But in those days, after that suffering, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. 26Then they will see “the Son of Man coming in clouds” with great power and glory. 27 Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. 28 ‘From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 29 So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 30 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. 32 ‘But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. 34 It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. 35 Therefore, keep awake— for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, 36 or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. 37 And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

We now bless our community and each other: To a troubled world, Peace from Christ. To a searching world, Love from Christ. To a waiting world, Hope from Christ.

Prayer requests If you have prayer requests for those in special need of prayer or in need of ongoing prayer please let Jan know.

Within your daily prayers please remember: Those in special need of prayer Those in need of ongoing prayer Those who mourn Please pray for the growth of our church Shoebox appeal for the elderly

Can you make a difference to a lonely or isolated elderly person this Christmas? Many elderly people will be facing a very different Christmas this year. They may have to face Christmas alone and will miss out on social contact with family and friends. Age UK North and Darlington would like to try and help by collecting shoe boxes to show that someone cares. We are asking all colleagues, volunteers, friends and family if they could put a shoe box together full of presents that an elderly person would love. How can you help? We would suggest items such as puzzle books, hot chocolate, biscuits, warm socks, gloves, slippers, scarves, hats, toiletries, confectionary, pens or handmade gifts– the list is endless but no alcohol please. If you would like to help, please drop your shoebox off at St Matthew’s Church, Leyburn, which will be open until 4pm each day and until December 7th for drop-off. 72 hours after that the Shoeboxes will be collected. Please leave your box in the space labelled at the back of church. We will then arrange to distribute the shoeboxes to local people across the whole of the area.

Cashless donations can be made to St John’s Bellerby: by internet banking to: ‘Bellerby PCC’, Sort Code 20-25-29, Account No. 60160342 or via the VirginMoneyGiving button on our church website

St Matthew’s is open for private prayer every day from 9.00am to 4.00pm.

Website Visit www.leyburn.church for updates and to watch services.

Facebook www.facebook.com/LeyburnandBellerby

Rota If you feel you are able to act as a sidesperson, read a lesson or do intercessions for us at St Matthew’s please let Jan know.

Pastoral Care If you need prayer or support, please contact Stephen. We will try to keep in touch with people by telephone or email.

01969 622977

[email protected]

Next Edition Please let Jan know by 6:00pm Tuesday if there is anything you would like included in the Weekly News.

07375 942854 [email protected] Call, WhatsApp or Text

Advent and Christmas 2020 Sunday Services When lockdown ends our Sunday services will continue as usual: 9.00am St John’s, Bellerby 10.45am St Matthew’s, Leyburn Sunday, 29th November Advent Sunday (Online) 6pm Advent Service A service to celebrate the coming of Jesus the light of the World Sunday, 6th December 6pm Advent Memorial Service (Online) A service to remember those who we love but see no longer and to lament for the sadness of the year gone past Sunday, 13th December Leyburn Christmas Trail Follow the nativity story around town from now until Christmas, trail booklets available from church National Christingle Service (Online) Using your Christingle kit celebrate Christ’s message of love and light Sunday, 20th December 6pm Nine Lessons and Carols (Online) Hear the story of Christmas and the carols that tell of the birth of Jesus Christmas Eve 3pm Family Crib Service (online) Telling the story of the Nativity for all the family 11.30pm Midnight Communion (Live-streamed) St Matthew’s, Leyburn The First Communion of Christmas Christmas Day Service of Communion 9.00am St John’s, Bellerby 10.45am St Matthew’s, Leyburn