News for 2007
January:
We started 2007 with a number of us undertaking care and counselling training at the Church, as two separate groups, using the Caring God's Way course. This course comes from CWR, a Christian ministry founded in 1965 by Selwyn Hughes.
April:
One of our regular Church meetings took place on the 25th April. Plans for our presence at the May Day fete at Woodmancote were discussed.
May:
On May Day, the Church provide a stall, with a picture quiz to put the 'furniture' on the front of our building. We had a mock up board made of the Church building, with pictures to stick on to test the locals knowledge of the Church building features. We had some strange combinations of windows and doors, but it was all done in good humour. The aim of the stall was to increase our communities awareness of the location of the Church and activities that take place within the Church.
We also started a third 'Caring Gods Way' course in May on Sunday afternoons for those of the congregation that were unable to attend the January-March courses.
June:
The regular and very popular cream tea took place on the 24th. Unfortunately, this year we had wet weather on the day. This was the first we had remembered for many years. However, in true British spirit we transfered everything and everyone to the Church. A good time was had, plenty of scones, jam & cream. Washed down with plenty of hot tea too! Good humour throughout the afternoon put paid to any damp feelings!
We held another Church meeting on the 20th.
August:
Some of us attended the Cheltenham Bible Festival at the Racecourse. This ran from the 9th to the 11th August. On the Saturday (11th) some of us experienced a wonderful concert, led by Stuart Townend, with Lou Fellingham and Phatfish supporting. Many of Stuart's recent songs were sung, with the 'audience' in full participative voice. Fantastic! The Bible Festival was supported by four local Churches, with WFC being one of these providing support to the FIEC for the joint Sunday service held on the 12th.
September:
The Church held a week of prayer this month. Many of us joining together every evening and witnessed great spiritual growth, and a yearning for more prayer and communion with each other. We held another Church meeting on the 5th.
October:
Harvest was celebrated on the 7th and we also had harvest tea at the church in the afternoon. Keith and a number of others held a harvest tea at Shipway court in Bishops Cleeve, as a new outreach initiative to the community.
The Church AGM was held on the 17th, where it was announced that Gareth Howell was to stand down from the leadership team after many years service.
As a new initiative, Keith started to open the Church on Thursday mornings (10-11am) for members of the Woodmancote community to drop in for coffee, read a newspaper and offer opportunities for folk to have a chat about any Christian topic.
Also, the prayer group meeting that had met on Tuesdays outside of the Church, in people's homes, re-launched in October for anyone to meet. It had been traditionally a womens prayer group. Now the new group meets at the Church on alternate Tuesdays at 2pm, with a cup of tea and bible study.
On the 26th the Church sponsored a Woodmancote community quiz at the new village hall. Again, as in previous years, this proved to be extremely popular, made especially so by a large range of tempting puddings!
November:
During this month, the Church suffered from the sad loss of Jean Gyde & Kate Reed.
December:
As the year came to a close, we had the regular events within the Church calendar including Carols by Candlelight, the Christmas Nativity service for the young at heart and our Christmas morning service of celebration.
We had a gift service on the 2nd with many gifts being taken to the Birmingham City Mission. Some of us visited Shipway Court in Bishop's Cleeve on the 17th to sing carols with some of the residents, and bring a short Christmas message.
We held two prayer evenings at the Church, especially for Christmas, on the 18th and 20th.
The Church led carol singing at the AppleTree Inn on the 19th. A special collection was made for the Meningitis Trust raising a total of £111.00.