Chads News - 22nd October 2025
22 October 2025 12:00
Most mornings I read two or more chapters from different sections of the Bible. One of the joys of this is when God speaks the same message from very different parts of his Word. This morning my two Bible chapters were 1 Kings 5 and Titus 3. In 1 Kings 5, Solomon is preparing to build the temple and can do so because the kingdom is not at war and able to focus on building a house for God. In Titus, Paul is writing to a church planter, establishing new worshipping communities and he emphasises the importance of living with integrity, living peaceable and considerate lives and avoiding foolish controversies, quarrels and pointless arguments. The importance of peace, unity and loving community for working together to build God’s church struck me afresh.
Loving community is one of our core goals at St Chads, this involves loving our community and also being a loving community. In this month of gratitude I’m simply writing this to say how much I delight in and value the unity and sense of loving community we have as a church family. We’re far from perfect, we’re a group of human beings, but there is a love and sense of unity in St Chads, which I would never want us to take for granted. The time we put into building deeper more honest relationships is valuable and so essential.
In a couple of weeks time we have our next ‘Gather and Share’ Sunday, a chance to share Sunday lunch with others, to put the gift of hospitality into practice and build new friendships. Please sign up for that.
Our ‘ministry of the month’ for October is Small groups and we prayed for them on Sunday. They are a crucial part of learning to follow Jesus together and loving community. Please pray for our small groups and we are asking God to call some more folk to take on leading groups. If you are sensing that call from God, then do talk to me, or Katie or Dave about that.
Also coming up we have our Neon Light Disco to enable our children to have a spiritually safe, joyful evening together on 31st October. And on 23rd November our Memorial service is an opportunity for a key part of loving community, which is to grieve together and comfort those who mourn. All of these are expressions of building a loving community.
Paul urges Titus: “insist on these things, so that those who have trusted in God, may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone” (Titus 3.8)
I urge you the same!
With love,
Richard
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