Happy New Year!

Melanie —  January 7, 2025

Happy New Year to all of you! We have had a wonderful time being all together as a family these past weeks. It’s been a very full house and a really special time! (See the bottom of this post for more photos)

Hannah, Noah and Owen flew to the USA yesterday to see Noah’s family. We will miss them so much as between our two trips we won’t see them for two months.

It’s been sweet having Michael (Aliyah’s fiance) with us for the past week. He leaves on Friday to go back to Dallas where he is studying.

The rest of us leave for the USA next week.These days before we leave are going to be very busy for us. Please would you pray for health and strength (during this season of many illnesses) and sleep (which has been very challenging for Melanie recently).  We’d also appreciate prayer for focus and efficiency as we prepare many details for our trip and for God’s help as we make preparations to make sure things are covered at Trinity Chippenham while we are away.  Humanly speaking, it feels impossible to get it all done, but we are trusting in Him to help us.

Also, two big church related requests: the full-time Trinity Chippenham elders are preparing to interview applicants for a new role at Trinity Chippenham – personal assistant to the elders. Our church is growing and the elders are in great need of help with practical matters so they can focus on pastoral ministry. Please pray for wisdom for them to choose the right person and that whoever is hired can immediately begin to help reduce the workload that the elders carry. Secondly, we are excited to share that we’ve found a potential building as a new home for our church. It’s still early stages, but the building search team will present what we know so far to the church on the 12th of January. Please pray for wisdom as they communicate to our church family and for God to open doors for us to move ahead if it’s His will for us.

Thank you for praying for us and Lord willing, we will see you some of you soon! Here are a few photos from the past weeks.

 

Our traditional Christmas morning stocking opening on our bed.

 

After we opened stockings, Joel got dressed up to go do a Christmas Day park run with his friends (they dressed for the occasion!).

 

We went ice skating on New Year’s Eve!

 

It was sweet for all of the older girls to get to do music together at Trinity the week after Christmas. A rare moment that probably won’t happen again for a long time.

 

Some of the family went to Bath on Michael’s birthday.

 

Owen has lots of adoring aunties!

 

All of our children and sons-in-law (to be) on Michael’s birthday!

 

A Busy Couple of Weeks

Peter —  October 16, 2024

We are just entering into a twelve-day period in which I am preaching or teaching 15 sessions. We knew it would be busy.  Let me explain how that happened.  We know we need to guard our schedules and be careful not to say yes to everything.  We say no quite frequently (I had to decline an invitation for this evening!)  But in the case of these two weeks, we already had some things lined up when extra invitations came that we both felt were important.  We agreed on a plan to make it more manageable for us as a family.

So, what are the 15 sessions?

Today, I will teach for three hours at Union School of Theology, using Zoom. It is a first-year Bible handling and preaching class.

I am in Guildford this weekend at a church I visit twice yearly.  I have five sessions spread through Saturday afternoon, evening and Sunday morning.  Two of these sessions involve training preachers. I have an evening session on how to respond to a shifting culture, and then I preach twice on Sunday morning.

I am travelling to Suffolk next week to speak at a Keswick Living Word event.  This is a gathering of local believers under the Keswick banner, where I will preach for three evenings from 2 Corinthians 3-5 on the New Covenant.  I also have two leaders workshops during the day.

Then, the following weekend, we will head to Surrey. On the morning of the 27th, I will preach at Oakhall Church from Galatians, then return to Trinity to speak in our Judges series in the afternoon.

There it is, fifteen sessions in twelve days.  Prayer is appreciated for travel, family relationships, and each session to make a difference.

Team Albania 24

Peter —  August 8, 2024

Team Albania 24 was a real success!  11 of us, including Aliyah, Joel and myself, travelled to Albania two weeks ago.  We spent 10/11 days working alongside the local church.  Five of the team were returning after being on the team last year, but six were first-timers.

 

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Arriving in Albania after an early start (we left Chippenham at 1am!)

What did we do?  Well, we led five church services, had four midweek meetings, ran a holiday club over five days, spent time with the children and youth outside of holiday club time, and spent time with local believers and missionaries to encourage them in their work.

It is encouraging to feel aligned with local workers and to feel the mutual trust building so well.  They risked sharing their relationships with locals with us and it was a real honour.  For example, the church in the village, which they have planted fifteen years or more ago, is doing well in its connection with women and children, but the men of the village are much more resistant.  We were invited to a gathering of 16 local men, all but one of whom would call themselves Muslim.  Three of us were able to share our testimonies and find out more about the challenges they face trying to provide for their families (essentially trying to farm with inadequate water supply!)  The gathering went well and hopefully it will be part of building a bridge to these men.

 

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The men’s gathering.

The children’s work went really well.  We definitely felt an increase in distraction and interruption on the day when we told the story of the cross, but other than that, they were very attentive and focused throughout the week.  It was really encouraging to see how the local women had grown spiritually during the last year.

 

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Our team with the children we served each morning!

 

One of the key roles we could have on this visit was to encourage the missionary family that we met on previous visits.  They are a wonderful family who are plugging away all year round.  We can come in and offer some energy and a week of activity, but they are the ones who are walking with the locals through all of life.  It was a blessing to be able to bring a Ukrainian speaker from our church who proved to be a huge encouragement to the Dad who doesn’t speak English and tends to miss out on so much of the fellowship as a result.

 

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Together with our missionary friends for an evening!

It was not all easy.  The temperatures were high, hitting 39 degrees C (102F) on the first day of the kids work.  Many on the team struggled to sleep well, even though we were blessed by the accommodation provided.  Some sort of cold/flu worked through several members of the team, taking them out of action for a day or so, one after another.  And sadly, on the Friday afternoon, we received the sad news that one team member’s grandmother had died unexpectedly.  Everyone’s heart broke for her , and we were able to get her on the next flight home, accompanied by another team member.  So there were challenges, but the team carried each other’s burdens and the ministry progressed even when one or two were missing at various times.

I (Peter) left the team on Saturday evening, to get back for church at TC on Sunday.  The rest of the team returned on Monday afternoon.  We are all tired, but thankful.  Please continue to pray for the church in Albania.  It is not an easy country to live in, but God is building his church and we were thankful to be able to contribute just a little bit to that work.  Thank you for praying for us.  We are grateful to be able to co-labour in ministry with you!

 

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Back on the plane to fly home . . .