Ascension Day
Kia ora whānau,
Tomorrow (Thursday) is Ascension Day on the church calendar and the beginning of Thy Kingdom Come, a global prayer movement that our Diocese has been committed to for the past three years. Thy Kingdom Come invites Christians around the world to pray from Ascension to Pentecost (21 –31 May) for more people to come to know Jesus and experience his Kingdom. Jesus teaches us to pray “Thy Kingdom Come” and so we follow his leading, joining with others around the world to:
Pray for five of our friends or family to come to know God.
Pray for the world to hear the Good News; to experience God and His Kingdom.
Ask God to help us speak Good News and live God’s Kingdom way.
For the last two years we have turned our chapel into a prayer room during this time and had ten days of 24 hour prayer (almost) and other prayer events happening. Unfortunately, we are still at alert level two and we are not ready to open up our chapel yet. But because we are a church that does change well, we will have no difficulty adjusting to this and will still lean into prayer over these next ten days. Here is what we are planning:
Zoom Ascension Day Prayer Service, 7:30-8:00 on Thursday evening
The Prayer Course: every evening at 7:30pm on zoom. This is a course by Pete Greig (Author of Dirty Glory and Red Moon Rising). Based on his book How To Pray, this is eight sessions consisting of a 20-30 minute video and then we will have a discussion and prayer time afterwards.
Other Morning and Evening prayer by zoom (times to arranged)
The Diocese has a 24/7 prayer room that you can zoom into at any time. You can click on Thy Kingdom Come for more information on joining the prayer room (and other Thy Kingdom Come resources)
The St Tom's 24/10 Prayer Sign Up Sheet. Sign up for an hour (or more) of prayer throughout the ten days.
The point of all this is to pray - not to become overly busy. We are all adjusting to a different way of doing life at some level and I am sure some of us are a bit worn out from that. My hope for these ten days is that, for some of us, our prayer life and thus our connection with God will be reignited. Jesus said that his yoke is easy and his burden is light. As Wendy reminded us on Sunday, we have a paraklete, someone just like Jesus who comes alongside of us to give help, strength and comfort. He (The Holy Spirit) will help us to pray.
Keep your eyes on Jesus.
Mark