Christmas

Christmas At Welcome Church

/ Steve Petch / 1 Comment

Christmas is just over a month away now, and bookings for our “Carol Service For Woking” opened last Sunday morning. The tickets (which are free!) are going very fast— even faster than last year—so please don’t leave it too long to book, or you may miss out on your first choice of when to attend.

Here’s a summary of our plans as a church over Christmas and New Year 2025/26:

Sundays 23rd & 30th November and 7th December: Our Christmas Preaching Series

Our Christmas Preaching Series starts this Sunday at our 9am and 11am meetings. I’ll be kicking the series off myself. I won’t be giving any spoilers here, but we’re going to have some fun together, so make sure you don’t miss what will be this year’s number-one series!

Sunday 14th December: A Carol Service For Woking

We’re holding four services across the day at 11am, 2pm, 4.30pm, and 7pm. Come and enjoy singing your favourite carols, followed by free mulled wine and mince pies.

Children up to school year 4 are invited to join our free Kids’ Christmas Parties, which will run alongside the 11am, 2pm, and 4.30pm services.

Booking is essential for all adults’ and children’s tickets, and be warned that we are likely to be sold out again this year. Don’t delay— – Click here to book

Remember: this is a great opportunity to invite your friends, family, neighbours, and colleagues—there is no easier invitation to church than to our Carol Services.

Sunday 21st December: An All Age Christmas Celebration

We’ll be meeting at 9am and 11am for an all-age celebration of Christmas. Instead of our usual Welcome Kids and Welcome Youth groups, we’ll all be meeting together for a whole lot of noisy fun and games as we celebrate Christmas as a church family and worship Jesus together.

Each meeting will be roughly one hour long, and we’ll start and finish with refreshments as usual.

Thursday 25th December: Christmas Day Online

This year, to make sure there’s room for everyone who wants to attend, we’ll be taking Christmas Day online. (Don’t forget, the 21st December is our in person all age celebration)

Join us on Christmas Day at 10am, at WelcomeChurch.Online, for a short time together with Christmas carols and an accessible Christmas message. It will be a great way to mark Jesus’ birthday together as a church, and we’ll all be able to join in and connect via the online chat feature.

Sunday 28th December: No Meeting!

There is no meeting planned for Sunday 28th December, but instead…

Wednesday 31st December: Crossover ’26

After an amazing Crossover Night from 2024 into 2025, we are coming together again on 31st December to celebrate all that God has done and all He’s going to do in 2026.

Join us as we celebrate God’s faithfulness over the last year and ask for God’s favour as we Crossover into 2026! Together we will praise, pray, and party! It’s a lot of fun—so don’t miss it.

We’ll be joined by a brilliant guest speaker this year, Pastor Chris Kimbangi from Hope Church, Guildford. (I knew him back when he was just a student in Chichester…)

This event is likely to fill up fast, so please book your FREE ticket to reserve your place, and let’s welcome in the New Year in faith and in style! Click here to book

Anything Else?

A few other things you may want to be aware of:

  • The church offices will be closed from Wednesday 24th December through to Thursday 1st January
  • Welcome Youth have their final meeting before Christmas on Friday 12th December, returning on Friday 16th January
  • Our Welcome Tots groups finish on Wednesday 10th and Friday 12th December, returning on 7th and 9th January respectively
  • Welcome Café will open for the last time this year on Monday 15th December, returning on Monday 5th January
  • Our Sunday meetings will return to their usual pattern from Sunday 4th January, and we have a great new series lined up for the New Year too
  • 21 Days of Prayer kicks off on Monday 5th January—more details will follow in a separate blog nearer the time

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Carol Services and Christmas Plans

/ Steve Petch / Leave a comment

I hope you enjoyed our Carol Services as much as I did. I want to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who helped them go so well!

Here are a few pics to give a feel for what went on:

The following is just a sample of all that I’m grateful for:

  • Both buildings were beautifully decorated inside and out
  • The ‘busking’ band who entertained us outside as we arrived did an awesome job
  • The Welcome Team were on the ball and looked after everyone well
  • Our worship band sounded the best I’ve ever heard them – they were SERIOUSLY good
  • We had a great range of people involved with the Bible readings, including a reading in BSL (British Sign Language) at each service. Each service also had live BSL signing that was appreciated by the deaf community
  • The sound and lighting team were in great form and served us superbly with sound, videos, visuals and a surprise ‘firework’ display for the finale
  • The Brew Crew delivered top notch refreshments flawlessly, on time, every time
  • The Welcome Kids and Tots teams went above and beyond the call of duty and the kids thoroughly enjoyed themselves
  • We were able to raise money for a local charity, Your Sanctuary, who work with victims of domestic violence ( I haven’t heard a total yet, but it’s not too late for you to give to that offering)
  • As a church, between us we invited hundreds of friends, family, neighbours and colleagues to attend

Roughly 2000 people attended in total, adding together the three services and the children’s parties. The Mayor of Woking joined us at 2pm, and we had the Leader or the Council with us at 4.30pm. Those who are especially eagle eyed may have spotted our local MP in attendance too. In addition to these we were joined by representatives of the York Road Project (a local homelessness charity), Woking Borough Council Family Services and the CEO of Your Sanctuary. It really was A CAROL SERVICE FOR WOKING.

If you missed the services or you just want to experience it again, you can follow this link to watch what went on for yourself. I’m looking forward to next year already 🙂

Welcome Church Christmas Plans

Now that the Carol Services are done, I also want to let you know about our plans for the following Sundays, which are as follows:

Sunday 17th December: we will meet as normal at 9am and 11am. This will be the last week of our ‘Faithful’ preaching series. We will also take communion together

Sunday 24th December: we will meet at 9am and 11am for a short, all age, family service to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas together. Welcome Tots will be running as usual for the smallest children

Monday 25th December, Christmas Day: we will not be meeting on Christmas Day this year as we are focusing us on Sunday 24th instead (next year may be different)

Sunday 31st December: we will meet at 9am and 11am and will hear from people sharing testimonies of what God has done in their lives over the last year. Come expectant to be blessed and encouraged, and let’s also be ready to support and cheer people on

Sunday 7th January: we will meet at 9am and 11am and kick off our new year preaching series, ‘Reset Your Life’. This is a four week series to start the New Year, and we’re encouraging you to invite people along to hear it.

We will also kick off 2024 with a week of prayer, starting on Tuesday 2nd Jan. I’ll post details about that next week.

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