Welcome to Grappenhall Independent Methodist Church
'The friendly Church on Knutsford Road'
For Baptism, Marriage and Funerals see our 'Contact Us' page. For Room Bookings see our 'Events' page.
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Morning Worship each Sunday at 10.30
Time to return to normal! There have been many
false dawns; didn’t we all think that it would be over by August and I
distinctly remember the Prime Minister urging office-based workers to return to
their places of work at the beginning of September and the less said about
Christmas the better! Here we are halfway through April and just beginning to
emerge from the longest lockdown in what for many has been a depressing few
winter months.
By the end of the month, the majority of our
church congregation will have received their second vaccination and will have
built up resistance to the virus to enable them to begin a return to normal
activities and once more socialise with others. I suspect that there will be
some who will still be reluctant to return to a ‘normal’ way of life and we may
find that some people’s routine will have been changed forever!
We as a church believe that for the benefit of
both individuals and the church, we must start to return to normal so hopefully
more of those members who have felt unable to attend church will feel more
confident about doing so during the coming weeks. Attendance at present
relies on what has been described as a ‘faith-based booking system’. By that we mean that following a risk
assessment, which considered the size of the building and the need to maintain social
distancing, we have limited attendance to 27 people. We have never reached that
number though we have been close on a couple of Sundays. If we did reach that number,
then we have overflow facilities in the hall to which the service will be
relayed.
These arrangements will remain in place until
at least the 21stJune. On that date or shortly after, it is hoped
that most if not all restrictions will be lifted and then we can return to more
normal worship and we may be able to sing! Also, under consideration, during
the summer months, is to have coffee after church on the lawn at the side of
church. No decision has yet been made on the resumption of weekday church
activities such as the ‘Bible Study Group’, ‘Keep Fit Group’, ‘Coffee and
Conversation’ and Choir; we will let you know what these groups decide.
Resuming normal services in a church like ours
after going through such a disjointed period is unlikely to prove easy. At present we are only
able to appoint preachers to the plan for the immediate future, month by month.
This means that the majority of services for the foreseeable future will be
taken by our own church leaders but hopefully interspersed with visiting
ministers.
Reflections - the button for thoughts for today's world (See Menu Bar)
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