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Dear friends,

It seems that we will be able to meet in-person-again shortly. Our goal is to start in-person meetings on Sunday 31 October. We will likely be restricted to sixty-five people in-person, so this will probably be by online booking as it has been in the past.

What becomes apparent with frequently changing legislation is that the only certainty is uncertainty. We need to be able to think on our feet, and to react quickly to ever changing guides and rules. The leadership team will be meeting this Saturday 23 October to discuss the immediate way ahead, which I will share fully in next week’s blog.

We hope at the time of our reconvening in-person to worship, that we will be worshipping to the sets pre-recorded for us prior to the in-person worship gathering by our own worship teams. In time we might need to experiment with various other ways of ‘doing Church’ and of meeting together in homes and even outdoors as and when the weather allows us to. Christians gather one way or another and we hope to come forward with some novel ideas to do this.

Please pray for your leaders as we try to steer the ship in these challenging times. Because of short notice this Sunday, 24 October will be online only.

However we plan to move forward in-person, our online presence will now remain part of how we meet as a church and how we reach beyond Yellowknife into the NWT. We are well set up for it and aim to take the online platform to a new level where we will be able to do training and courses online as well, in time to come.

Please note that I am out of contact from Monday 25 October till lunch time on Friday 29 October. I am in a week- long all-day online seminar at Fuller Seminary as the last requirement they have of me before I graduate D. Min at year end.

I will close the series of ‘More encounters with Jesus’ on Sunday 31 October, after which we will be exploring the NT book of Revelations together through to and including Advent Season.

Remain in the vine. Do not be distracted by all that is happening around you. Jesus is who we have, day by day.

God is at work, and we need to tap into what he is doing. John 15:1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes[a] so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. 5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. 9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.

Grace & peace

Melt