Northfield Methodist Church

Dear Friends,

Today is that special day when we celebrate Pentecost - the gift of God's Holy Spirit poured out and made available to all. The Holy Spirit, who at various times and in various ways used to come to the prophets, is now among us!

Dear Friends

Welcome to our services today.

Today we celebrate 'Pentecost'. The word comes from the Greek word 'pentekostos', meaning fiftieth. Since about the second century, Christians have celebrated the coming of the Holy Spirit fifty days after the death and resurrection of Jesus, on the Jewish Feast of Pentecost, and with the descent of the Spirit, the birth of the church.

After Christmas and Easter, Pentecost marks the most important celebration of the Christian calendar. As we read about Pentecost in Acts 2 and other scriptures it is easy to be, once again caught up in the enthusiasm of the early days of the church!

It is with great pleasure that we welcome Rev Janet Verrier to Northfield today. Janet is part of the team at Bryanston Methodist Church. Janet was a single mother for about twelve years. She has a wonderful heart for God and for people. We look forward to the insights that she will bring. Janet will be preaching at the 8am, 10am and 6:30pm services.

Dear Friends,

Warm greetings!

There are three 'events' that will be happening in the Sanctuary over the next few weeks. We would encourage you to keep a note of them and to share in these times of worship and learning.

First of all, please note our special guest preacher for Mother's Day and Pentecost Sunday. She will be the Rev Janet Verrier. Presently Janet is part of the pastoral team at Bryanston Methodist where she has a very effective teaching / pastoral ministry. We were really blessed by our last guest preacher, Pastor Leonard Stone and we are sure that you will enjoy Janet just as much. Please share this news with your friends and neighbours.

Dear Friends

Warm Greetings!

We are in the second week of the sermon series entitled "Come Holy Spirit". The series will continue until Pentecost, which is on 11 May 2008, and is aimed at enabling us to experience more of the power of the Holy Spirit.

It so happens that Pentecost and Mother's Day coincide this year and to celebrate the special day, we have invited the Rev Janet Vennier from Bryanston Methodist Church to be our guest preacher, she will be preaching at the 08:00, 10:00 and 18:30 services.

We invite you to participate in the journey towards Pentecost by studying the Scriptures and by intentionally entering into communal prayer. To this end we will be having early morning (6:00am-7:00am) prayer meetings in the Sanctuary from Monday 5 May till Sunday 11 May. The prayer meetings will be led by the ministers and some of our staff.

Lastly, we would like to inform you that Schalk Pienaar will be on furlough (sabbatical) from 21 April till 21 July 2008.

Much love to you.

The Ministry Team

Dear Friends

The theme we will be following for the next six weeks leading up to Pentecost (11 May) is "Come, Holy Spirit". Each Sunday we will examine various aspects of the work of God's spirit in us.

This week we focus on the strength which the spirit gives us to help us in our weakness. One of the words Jesus used to describe the Spirit was, "Comforter". Sadly it is a word which has changed its meaning over the years. Today it has come to mean something like, feeling sorry for someone, or cheering them up. But originally it had a much stronger meaning. It meant "a power which comes alongside us when we are weak or in need."