Dervock Presbyterian Church

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P & R Forum – Christianity Explored Course

Presbyterian and Reformed Forum

Christianity Explored Course (31st January- 21st March)

Mark 1:1 “The beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the son of God.”

Perhaps you’ve been coming along to our Christianity Explored Course in the community centre? Perhaps you saw the wee promotional video of Philip and Scott on Facebook? Or perhaps you just wondered what’s been going on?

P & R Forum - Christianity Explored Course

What’s the best news you’ve ever heard? – Was it surprising? – Did it change the way you think? – Or was it something you wanted to be true but didn’t dare hope?

Christianity Explored is a way of sharing the best news ever heard, and gives people space and time to think about the big questions of life. Over 8 sessions throughout the whole of Mark’s Gospel, we’ve been finding out more about the life of the person at the heart of the Christian faith – Jesus Christ.

P & R Forum - Christianity Explored Course

Here’s the format-

Session 1 Good news

Session 2 Identity

Session 3 Sin

Session 4 The cross

Session 5 Resurrection

Session 6 Grace

Session 7
The sower: Listen carefully
James and John: Ask humbly
Herod: Choose wisely

Session 8 Come and die

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We’ve been encouraged by the steady attendance of around 60 each Wednesday night.  Maybe you’ve been unable to join us on Wednesday evenings. Maybe you’re a Christian and you want a way of being able to articulate your faith to others. Or perhaps you’re not a Christian and you didn’t have the courage to come along.  If you speak to someone who attended the course they can get you a DVD of the different themes above and a copy of the work book.  The Revs. Dunwoody and Moore thank those of you who have been coming along and for those of you who have been praying for our nights together.

Once again, it’s been good to work together.

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Holiday Bible Club 2017

Holiday Bible Club 2017

Dervock Presbyterian Church

You may have noticed the mini bus driving around Dervock village picking up boys and girls and bringing them along to our annual Holiday Bible Club. This year’s Holiday Bible Club was held during the third week of August and we followed through the story of Daniel. Every day we memorised new memory verses, sang different songs, heard a story about the life of Daniel and had some other interesting activities along the way. On Monday and Tuesday, James from Fun with Drums visited us and we were taught how to keep beats and use many of the plethora of instruments he brought along. Jonny Bell from Coaching for Christ visited us on Friday and we were drilled and worked hard with the balls and equipment he brought. Harry’s Ice Cream van visited us also on the Friday and we all enjoyed an ice cream each. In between all of these activities, we made crafts, watched DVDs and played many games together.

 

Our stories took the following themes; the forbidden food, the dazzling dream, the stunning statue, the heavenly hand and in the pit. Daniel is a story that we’ve all heard many times, but it’s a constant reminder to us that we all set up our own kingdoms and we all make ourselves kings of our own lives, but there is only one King, and He expects our whole lives and devotion. Daniel is also a lesson to many of us when it comes to prayer. We hope the lessons from the stories this week will take root and grow in the lives of the 70 boys and girls whose names were on the roll during the week. We even had the challenge of organising the club on the Friday with no electric, but we persevered on and it didn’t cause too much of a problem, thanks to the organisational skills of all of the leaders. 

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Many thanks to the members of our own congregation who helped out and made sure we could staff it ourselves this year. This year it was good to see some of our ow members step up to the mark and help lead from the front. This is a good way of introducing members to leadership in youth ministry, why not think about coming along and helping with a quiz or a memory verse and developing skills in leadership? Thank you to the boys and girls who came along and thank you to the parents who dropped their children off every day. We look forward to planning next year’s, with even more input and participation from our own congregation.

 

If you enjoyed Holiday Bible Club, please don’t forget Sunday School during the year. It’s back again during term time.

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Holiday Bible Club Run The Race 2016

Run the Race 2016

“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”  Hebrews 12:1

As you can see from the photos, we had a very energetic, exciting and successful Holiday Bible Club this year.  During the third week of August between 65 and 70 children enrolled to join us during Olympic fever for our very own Dervock Olympics.

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Every day, our mini bus circled the village and brought eager boys and girls to our church hall, where we had games, crafts, clay modelling, drama, exercises, sports, singing, a DVD on the life of Olympian Eric Liddle, stories on running the Christian race and even a visit from Harry’s Ices, Ballycastle on the Friday afternoon.  When we asked many boys and girls what their favourite part of the week was, they replied, “the ice cream.” 

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Throughout the course of the week, the boys and girls looked at important aspects of running a race.  Training, joining a race, starting a race, perseverance and finishing a race, all of these important aspects of running can be applied to our own lives as we looked at characters like Peter, Paul, Stephen and the Lord Jesus.

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Our Holiday Bible Club team was made up of over 20 passionate and united volunteers who stayed in the Manse for the week.  They came from Saintfield, Ballygowan, Carryduff, Coleraine, Magherafelt, Gulladuff and Dervock.  As well as doing the Holiday Bible Club in Dervock, the team also traveled to Bellaghy to do a Holiday Bible Club there.  Since the Rev. Jonathan Sloan has left Bellaghy and been called to OC Randalstown, this will be our last year there.  The team are very grateful to those who fed them during the week and to those who drove the mini bus.  Also, we are grateful to the local ministers who came and led our team devotions every night, Rev. Philip Dunwoody (Dervock RP), Mr. Richard Morrison (Student for the Ministry, Toberdoney), Rev. Gareth McClean (First Ballymoney) and Very Rev. Dr Godfrey Brown (retired), we enjoyed at the end of a busy day being led through God’s Word and having a time of prayer and praise.

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The Holiday Bible Club might be over, the hall has returned to its normal state, the Manse is empty of the 20 plus people who stayed in it, but please continue to pray, that our Sunday School would grow through the work of our Holiday Bible Club and that many boys and girls will come to the activities we have on in our church.