Join us Online: YouTube (from 6am Sunday)

The church is open at 11:00am on Sunday for a family service.

If you plan to come to in-person church please register!

(You can now book for services through to June 20th, you can either book one week at a time or all the services in one go. We'll take your most recent booking when drawing up the register. So you can always rebook to change what you have said you are doing.)

Register to attend

Also, join us for a chat at 11:30am on Sunday: 

Click this link to join the Zoom meeting.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." (Acts 1:8)

How are you feeling about the end of lockdown? Anxious, excited, uncertain, confused? All of the above?

Jesus's disciples had been through an emotional rollercoaster. They had experienced the hope and excitement of the crowds cheering Jesus as he entered Jerusalem, the absolute horror of seeing him crucified and the incomprehensible amazement that he had been resurrected from the dead. Then Jesus had ascended into heaven and told them to wait for what will come next. How do you think they felt? Anxious, excited, uncertain, confused? All of the above?

Their response was to 'join together constantly in prayer.' (Acts 1:14) As we approach the annual celebration of what happened next: 'Pentecost' - the coming of God's Spirit, let's have the same attitude.

Jesus had a great mission for the disciples to carry out, a mission that we are still a part of today. It is a mission to share the good news about Jesus with the world and we cannot do it without God's help, that is without the Holy Spirit. He is the one that can empower us to do what we feel anxious about and enable us to achieve what we feel excited about.

As we consider how God might use us as our lives emerge from this lockdown, let's pray together and seek the power of God's Spirit once more.

Join us this Sunday for our Pentecost Sunday service. We will be looking at Ezekiel 37:1-14.

Please read on...

• Prayer: Urgent: Opener to send in. Last two days of Thy Kingdom Come prayer meetings. Livestream testing. The latest prayer requests.
• Care: The Great Ramsgate Spring Clean, Ramsgate Future community questionnaire.
• Share: Last Sunday. St. Luke's Life Stories. Two video messages from Tearfund on the situation in India and Brazil.

Contributions to this week's Opener

URGENT:

For this Sunday:  We need people responding to:

"Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your people" with 

And kindle in us the fire of your love.

Please send video contributions in as soon as possible (by 10am on Friday). You can send them by Whatsapp (07769 871520) or by WeTransfer.com to: [email protected].

Thy Kingdom Come

Only two more chances to join us in St. George's church for one of the Thy Kingdom Come prayer meetings. The meetings are socially distanced informal daily prayer meetings for 30 minutes from 9:30am to 10:00am in St. George's church until this Saturday 22nd May. Everyone is welcome from St. Luke's and St. George's or indeed anyone else!

Check out the page on our website...

Livestreaming of Services

We are going to continue posting pre-recorded services online up until the final stage of lockdown release. However, from now on we are going to also start livestreaming the in-person services on YouTube, so that we can practice doing this well and make improvements in preparation for replacing the pre-recorded services.

The livestream will not be publicly at the moment, but we would like a few volunteers to watch it each week and provide feedback to help us improve. If you would like to do this, then email me by Saturday 5pm and I will send you a link for the livestream in time for Sunday morning.

If you are interested in being trained to run the livestream from church, then also let me know and we can provide a training session - although it is fairly straightforward! Secondary School aged young people are also welcome to give this a go.

Prayer Requests:

​​Be assured I will do my best to check that people are happy for the requests to be shared before including them. Please pray for...

• For the faster roll out of the vaccine across the world.

• For the development of our livestreaming abilities at St. Luke's.

• Jean Simmons - they decided against amputation. Please pray that she can be kept comfortable at this time.

• Barb (Gloria's daughter's friend) now finished chemotherapy and having a scan to assess the need for further treatment.

• All the children on Elephant Ward in Great Ormond Street hospital

• Rosemary Ebelthite's cousin's son Grant. He has a new oxygen machine and this has enabled him to go back to work.

• Pauline Emptage waiting to hear from King's College Hospital about next steps for treating her back.

• Alison's granddaughter, Lexi, who has been diagnosed with a growth on her knee. It looks like it is benign, but please pray that the surgery will be successful and the following biopsy will show it is benign.

• Katrina (Norah's daughter) waiting for test results after they have found a lump on her lung.

• Joy Smithers. Give thanks for healing. Please pray for effective Physio to help her start moving again.

• Collette Judge who is undergoing treatment for breast cancer.

• Shirley Crabb that her hip operation can go ahead soon.

• Flo Baldock still having tests and treatment for her stomach, but also struggling with a chest infection.

• Jean Mayton, after a serious bleed on the brain recently. Give thanks that she is showing signs of recovery.

• Nathan Court for his continuing treatment.

• Jeannette (Claudia's sister) undergoing chemotherapy treatment.

The Great Ramsgate Spring Clean

The Great Ramsgate Spring Clean is part of Keep Britain Tidy’s annual Big Spring Clean, and consists of a series of short local litter-picks across town, each organised by a different group of local residents.

Anyone can take part for part or all of any of the litter-picking sessions, and children are also very welcome if accompanied by an adult. The litter-picks last between 90 minutes and 2 hours and social distancing and guidelines on group sizes will be observed at all events.

Pickers, hoops, rubbish bags and Covid hygiene items will be provided for all events - and the collected rubbish will be picked up afterwards by Ramsgate Town Council and disposed of properly.

Events will be running from 28th May until 13th June 2021.

Can I highlight the one for Boundary Road Park, which the vicar is going to be involved with:

SAT, 29 MAY AT 11:00 Boundary Park

Meet near children's play area in Boundary Road Recreation Ground.

Ramsgate Future Community Questionnaire

Thanet District Council is working to create a plan for the future of Ramsgate that supports a thriving town centre and the needs of local people. Having secured funding from the Future High Street Fund and High Street Action Zone, we now have a great opportunity to build on this through further funding and investment to:

• Create new and better employment;
• Enable local people to develop new skills for the economy of the future;
• Support local businesses to grow;
• Improve connections and make it easier to get around;
• Celebrate and invest in our Seafront, History and Heritage.

The Future Ramsgate Investment Plan will make the most of the town’s assets and deliver a shared vision to transform and regenerate the town.

If you have about 15 minutes to spare please click on the link below and fill in the questionnaire.

Last Week's Talk:

Love is... eternal life (1 John 5:9-13) - Available Online

Does it matter what we believe? Sometimes it does. Sometimes it can be a matter of life and death. John here shows us that what we believe about Jesus is a matter of eternal life and warns us against some of the lies that may risk our salvation

St. Luke's Stories

Remember you can use this form to send in your personal reflections on your pandemic experience, which we can then publish. We also welcome mini-autobiographies and poems! Please just email them. In the meantime check out the poems and stories already there...

Please Pray for India

Countries around the world are providing assistance to India as it faces a catastrophic coronavirus surge. Prince David, who oversees Tearfund’s work in India, shares with us how bad this current situation is, but how the aspiration, courage, and resilience of the Indian people will see them emerge from this crisis. Please join us in praying for the people of India. Please pray for India (vimeo.com)

Please Pray for Brazil

Brazil is facing one of the worst coronavirus crises in the world. More than 15 million cases have been reported, and around 2,500 people are dying every day. Please give to Tearfund's 'Recover Together' appeal today. Please pray for Brazil (vimeo.com)

Finally, let's keep praying that we will be empowered by the Holy Spirit to be God's church as we emerge from the lockdown.

Yours in Christ,

Paul Worledge 

Vicar, St. Luke's Ramsgate

www.stlukesramsgate.org​