Nearly 2 months in!

Welcome back! I’m nearly 2 months in to life at Gaines, although it definitely feels like I’ve been here longer than that already! We’ve been busy… read on to find out more. You can still support me at give.net/20216952

Day 40

Our second weekend group in March was a youth group from Holy Trinity Church, Tewkesbury. The teaching was on the ‘I am’ sayings from John’s gospel – always such a privilege to open the Bible with young people. Other highlights included: toasting marshmallows round the bonfire, ice skating, a competitive game of crocker, graffiti, quiz of the year (pictured above), good food (comes as standard), and craft in the Art Studio.

Day 43

We’re blessed with some beautiful scenery right on our doorstep, which we try to take as much advantage of as we can on days off!

Day 44

We all headed up to Nottingham to help out with Crossteach’s ‘Easter Experience’ (complete with outfits!), an interactive workshop to enable children to hear about the Easter story and all God has done for them on the cross. Although I was ill, so unfortunately didn’t get to take part.

Day 46

Most of us headed to Birmingham for the day for the Midlands Ministry Training Course (MMTC): Book in a Day – Judges. I will be doing MMTC from September, it’s a ministry training scheme (it’s in the name!) for one day a week run by the Midlands Gospel Partnership who are passionate about the Gospel and passionate about equipping people to share it well – so a pretty exciting thing to get to be a part of! Going to the Judges day gave me a good flavour of what it will be like, and I’m excited for September!

Day 47

This third weekend saw us welcome a Welsh group from Lliswerry, Newport. The teaching was on Ephesians, about God’s Big Plan. Additional highlights included: archery, ice skating, walk and wide games in the woods, quiz of the year, smores round the epic bonfire (Bethany and I made it), chilled out craft, an ever competitive game of crocker, and pancakes for breakfast (always a win).

Day 53

Thursdays have been my study days prior to starting MMTC in September. So far I have been studying Nehemiah (great book!) and have read a book on the Holy Spirit by Christopher Ash.

Day 54

The youth from Woodgreen Evangelical Church (the church we are all part of  in Worcester) came for the weekend; despite the relatively low numbers it was a really great weekend! The teaching was from Ephesians again, familiar yet always refreshing to see all we have in Christ. Other highlights were: watching the sunset from the top of the Malverns (pictured above), a very competitive archery session, sharing communion together, film (with popcorn!), table tennis, crazy songs round the bonfire, and small groups delving into Ephesians.

Coming up…

The final March group from St Stephen’s Church in Birmingham (although I won’t be around as I’m off leading on a Christian sailing camp on the Norfolk Broads). Word Alive: we’re all on team helping with the children and youth.

Please Pray!

• We’ve been really encouraged and challenged by reading through 1 Corinthians together in morning devotionals, about how important and absolutely central the Gospel was to Paul – pray we keep this same focus
• Thank God for the privilege it is to be involoved in Gospel work; it’s amazing to be able to journey (even just for a weekend), read the Bible together and be encouraged by young people living for God
• Energy! It’s been quite a long run of groups for us, with various coughs and colds, pray we’d stay healthy so we can bring the Gospel to the groups that come; and as we then all head to Word Alive in a week and a half

It’s All Fun and Gaines

It’s now Day 38 – read on to find out what I’ve been up to! And don’t forget, you can still support me at give.net/20216952

Day 16

Not strictly Gaines related… but I had a few days off and went white water kayaking in Devon, which was a lot of fun!

Day 23

We got donated over 1000 litres of paint by a local company, which was really exciting and generous of them. The photo above probably shows only about half of it!

Day 25

I got the opportunity to go on a rolling course – fortunately in a swimming pool and not the river!

Day 26

The lake has been looking beautiful in the sunshine, hopefully they’ll be groups paddling on it soon when the weather warms up!

Day 30

Pancake day was celebrated in style, but unfortunately no photos!

In between eating pancakes and enjoying the sunshine, we’ve been preparing for a 5-week run of weekend groups; which has included preparing Bible studies and talks, sorting programmes, cutting the grass, fixing all things activity-related and cooking lots of yummy food.

Day 33

Our first of 5 weekend groups in March: the Christian Union from the King’s School, Worcester. The weekend included: teaching on Ephesians, table tennis, archery (it got VERY competitive), food (lots of it), quiz of the year, craft, prayer stations, walks, football, murder mystery and a game of signs that seemed to last the whole weekend.

I got the opportunity to do one of the talks over the weekend: a little nerve-racking but exciting too, and it’s good to be pushed outside your comfort zone every now and again..!

The photo above shows the view from the final stretch of our afternoon walk back to Gaines on the Saturday – you can just about see the house in the distance! It’s a privilege to be living in such a beautiful part of God’s creation.

Coming up…

More groups! And preparing for our summer camps too -if you know someone who’d like to come along as a camper or a leader check out www.campxl.org

Please Pray!

• For us to faithfully teach the Gospel to all the groups that come through our doors as well as showing it in the way we live and work as a team
• For the generosity of those who support Gaines: prayer/financially/volunteering/paint donation etc.