Welcome Church

For Your Prayers – April 2025

/ Steve Petch / Leave a comment

Hello Welcome Church!

Here are a few key things we would love you to be praying for this month. They are all key to the life of our church:

Go 9

We’ve talked several times about our Go 9 initiative, so I won’t repeat the details here – if you don’t know what Go 9 is, or are looking for more information please click here.

The deadline for people to let us know they’ll be moving to the 9am service is Easter Sunday, 20th April. Remember: this is all about our mission to Woking, and about making room for future growth

Please be praying for God to speak to people clearly about this move, maybe even to yourself!

Pastoral Lead Job

As you’ll be aware, we’re recruiting a new Pastoral Lead for Welcome Church – if you missed the information click here for details.

The deadline for applications was last Friday, and we’re now in a process of working through to the next stage. We’ll share more information when we’re ready to do that, but please be reassured that the process is ongoing.

Please be praying for wisdom and for God’s guidance for all who are involved in the process, and for all who have applied – we want to find God’s person for this role.

Church Gate

Our Church Gate project (click here for information) is continuing to move forward, and over the last two weeks a number of contractors have been on site as part of preparing their quotes for the work to be done. These quotes will be coming in over the month ahead.

Please be praying that we get some great quotes, and for wisdom to pick the best possible contractor so that the work is done well and delivered on/ahead of time and on/under budget.

Community Grocery Grants

The grant team are continuing to apply for various grants to help fund the Community Grocery set up, and also some to help with the ongoing running costs. There is a lot of excellent work being done by this team.

Please be praying for successful applications, and for the release of lots of finance.

Guest Speaker

This Sunday Natalie Williams, who leads Jubilee+, will be preaching for us. Jubilee+ is a UK-based Christian charity, dedicated to equipping churches to effectively support and transform the lives of those experiencing poverty in their local community. They provide resources and training to empower churches to integrate mercy, justice and community renewal into their outreach plans.

Natalie is a gifted speaker and author, and we’re blessed to have her with us – especially as we work towards the launch of our Community Grocery in the autumn.

Please be praying for a great meeting on Sunday and for God to speak to us powerfully as a church and as individuals, laying in a great foundation for the future of all we do.

Easter Services

We have two big moments over the Easter weekend:

Good Friday, 6pm to 7.30pm: We’ll have an evening of extended worship, with a short talk, and we’ll also take communion together. Kids are welcome, though please be aware that there won’t be any separate groups for them, so we’ll be worshipping together as families.

Easter Sunday, 9am and 11am: Easter is one of those great moments in the year: it’s joyful, meaningful, and accessible, and it’s a brilliant time to invite someone to church. I want to encourage you to think especially about people who perhaps used to be part of church life and have drifted away, although this is definitely an invitation suitable for everyone.

This coming week is a natural moment to extend that invitation – gently, thoughtfully – and we’ve got invitation cards available to help with that, if you’d like them – you can pick them up on Sunday.

Please be praying for many guests to join us on Easter Sunday and for God’s wisdom about who YOU could invite. Please also pray that the presence of God is all over everything we do.

Please Pray For All Of These Things!

We believe in a God who answers prayer, so please bring these requests before God. And lastly, here’s a quick reminder that we’ll be gathering in person to pray on Sunday 11th May at Welcome Church from 6pm to 7pm – please put that in your diary now.

Stay connected with everything happening at Welcome Church by subscribing to this blog for weekly updates sent straight to your inbox

Church Gate – latest updates and prayer requests

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Our plans for Church Gate are continuing to move forward. In case anyone is unsure, Church Gate is the three storey office block next door to our current site. We’ve bought it and are in process of redeveloping it for use as a Social Action Hub with a Community Grocery on the ground floor, and also to serve our Children’s and Youth work each week too.

This week an inspection of the roof was carried out, so I took the opportunity to take a closer look myself – courtesy of the cherry picker. Well… why not?

For clarity, I don’t know much about roofing but I enjoyed the ride despite an innate fear of heights. I also took note of how much higher the cherry picker at the Hilton Hotel behind me was – I don’t think that’s a job for me!

Progress Update

In terms of a progress update, things continue to move forward on track:

  • Various building surveys have been carried out (such as the one on the roof)
  • Some grant applications have been submitted. Benefact Trust came back very quickly with a grant of £80,000, and we are now waiting to hear back from some others, including our biggest application which is to Your Fund Surrey
  • The floor layouts have been finalised
  • The architects drawings are in
  • Planning Permission for a new entrance has been submitted, and we expect to hear back during April (we are not expecting this to be a problem)
  • A thorough refurbishment of the lift has been commissioned
  • Various other quotes are coming in
  • The main part of the project is going out to tender next week, with quotes expected during April, and building work expected to begin over the summer for completion during the autumn
  • The Grocery team are in process of finalising an agreement with The Message Trust who we will be working with for the grocery
  • Outstanding Gift Day pledges continue to be fulfilled, alongside a few extra gifts too – so a big thank you for that. By the way, it’s still not too late to give to this amazing project!

In summary, things are moving ahead well and I’m looking forward to seeing the hoardings go up and the building work begin.

Prayer requests

Please be praying about this project as it goes ahead. Here are some specific prayer requests:

  • For a simple ‘YES’ to our planning application. As I said above, we’re not expecting any issues, but let’s not be complacent
  • For the release of significant grant funding, especially from Your Fund Surrey
  • For good quotes for the work to be done, with prices we are happy to pay
  • For wisdom as we pick the best main contractor to work with
  • For a great relationship to be formed with The Message Trust
  • For the whole Grocery Team – especially Helen who will be leading a lot of this through in the months ahead
  • For God to release all the finance we need to do this well
  • For no unexpected surprises – talking of which…

What about the state of the roof?

We knew there were a couple of leaks from the roof when we bought the building, and this week was the moment the situation was assessed properly. The outcome was not as positive as our best hopes, but nowhere near as bad as it could have been either.

In summary, repairs are needed to the flashing around the gutters, and some of the metal panels you can see from below need to be replaced or overlaid too. It’s a bit more work than we’d hoped for, but not outside our range of expectations, and with what we’d seen inside it could have been a whole lot worse.

We can’t call this an unexpected surprise, since we knew this was a real possibility from the start, but please be praying that there are no unexpected extras across the rest of the project as the work goes forward.

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Time To Have Your Say

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Hello! It’s Dub Everitt here, Outreach Pastor at Welcome Church, and I’m excited to be guest-writing Steve’s blog this week!

I want to update you on the renovation of our new building – the ‘Church Gate’ office block – and invite you to take action today to help make a huge difference in our community.

An Incredible Journey So Far

Many of you played a vital role in our gift days in November 2023 and June 2024, helping us raise an incredible £2 million toward the £3 million purchase of Church Gate, which we completed (with the help of a mortgage!) in May 2024. Of the money given so far, £400,000 has been set aside towards the renovation costs.

One of the key ways we’ll use this space is to launch a Community Grocery – a project that will provide affordable food and essential support services to those who need it most.

What Is A Community Grocery?

A Community Grocery is a ‘social supermarket’ designed to help families struggling with the cost of living. It’s an initiative founded by The Message Trust in Manchester, offering deeply discounted food while preserving dignity and choice for members, who can select the items they need to best support themselves.

For just £5 per year, people can sign up for membership, and then they can shop for between £5 and £12.50 a week, saving up to £50 per week—that’s £2,500 a year!

But it’s more than just groceries. Members can also connect to our other initiatives such as debt advice, money coaching, cooking courses, mental health & wellbeing groups, job clubs, and more. In 2024, we helped 169 individuals through these services, and this new space will allow us to expand our impact to reach 1,000 grocery members in our first year.

This is a project that will change lives in our community.

Where Are We Now?

We’ve been working closely with our architects, Plan A – the same team who were behind the design of our chapel, which we opened in 2020. The renovation plans for Church Gate are now complete, and the costs for redevelopment and for fitting out the building have been estimated at £1.2 million.

We have the first £400,000, and we’re now working hard to secure the remaining £800,000 through grants. If all goes to plan, we’ll start construction in June or July and open the doors before the end of the year.

It’s Time To Ask For Your Support!

We recently submitted our first grant application to a Christian Grant Funder, and the feedback was amazing:

“Hi Dub, just to let you know I’ve read your draft and it’s EXCELLENT! Honestly, brilliant. I have no doubt our trustees will want to make a contribution. I wanted to congratulate you on such a well-planned project that is clearly going to change (and probably save) lives.”

This funder will confirm their decision by mid-February, so let’s be praying for a positive outcome!

The largest grant we’re applying for is £497,000 from Your Fund Surrey, part of Surrey County Council. We’ve had great conversations with their team, and we’re preparing our application ahead of the February 28th deadline.

But we now need your help to get it across the line.

Here’s Your Call To Action!

To help our application to succeed, we need to show strong local support – and that’s where YOU come in. We are now looking to gain at least 1,000 comments on Surrey County Council’s “Have Your Say” webpage to demonstrate how much our community supports this project.

At the time of writing, we have 692 comments, which means we still need 308 more.

Can you take 2 minutes to help?

If so, it’s very quick and easy to do, and fairly self-explanatory. Here are the four steps:

1. Click on this link to go through to the Have Your Say webpage

2. Hit the big smiley face on the page.

3. Leave a short comment about why you support the Community Grocery and any other comments you may want to make, and then add your email address when prompted to do so

4. Check your e-mails for a link to click on to confirm that the comments you made are yours. If the link doesn’t arrive do check your junk box too

That’s it—you’ll be done before your kettle boils!

Your endorsement, along with others, could help to secure nearly £500,000 to support people in need across our town.

One Last Thing: Please Spread the Word!

Once you’ve shared your comment, please pass the link to the Have Your Say webpage on to others: to your friends, family, colleagues, neighbours, or anyone who cares about making a difference in our community. Please feel free to share it on your social media feeds too.

The more people we can get behind this, the greater the impact we can have together.

Thanks in advance for all your help

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Welcome Church Staff Team Updates

/ Steve Petch / 1 Comment

Happy New Year!

I know it’s a bit late to say it, but this is my first Welcome Church blog post of 2025! Thanks for reading this far 🙂

We had a great Christmas and New Year season at Welcome Church. I talked about our Carol Services in a previous post, and this year we also introduced a Watchnight Celebration as a brand new event on New Year’s Eve. It was a lot of fun, and I’m looking forward to next year already. Put it in your diary now!

New Year’s Eve at Welcome Church

Staff Team Updates

We have some important changes happening within our church staff team this year.

As the church grows, so do the demands on our team, and we’ve certainly felt the strain of being understaffed in 2024. If you haven’t worked for a church I know it’s hard to imagine what people do all day, but believe me: we are incredibly busy.

For clarity, Welcome Church has more than doubled in size since I arrived 7 years ago, but the employed team is smaller now than it was back then. Everyone is running flat out, and we’ve only survived thanks to some very kind and committed office volunteers who we appreciate so much.

I’d like to share four updates:

First: Jonathan and Sabrina – Leadership Trainees

Jonathan and Sabrina’s time with us will come to an end in June this year, giving us roughly five more months to enjoy and appreciate their contribution. They’re currently praying about their next steps, which are complicated by some VISA challenges. Let’s support them in prayer as they seek God’s will for the future.

Second: Dean – Pastoral Care

Dean, one of our elders, has been working full-time on staff for more than 10 years now. Starting from January 20th, he’ll reduce his hours to three days a week, returning to his passion for architecture on the other two days. In time, he may step out of his staff role entirely. This creates a gap in pastoral care that we’ll need to address.

These first two changes further stretch an already understaffed team. Recruitment will be essential this year, and details on that will follow at the right time. Watch this space 😮

Third: Organisational Leadership

To help the church thrive into the future, we need to strengthen our organisational leadership, which is all about how we steward and align all of our resources to fulfil our vision effectively. This will require some big-picture thinking and also some adjustments to some of our policies, procedures, and ways of working.

To address this, after discussions with the Eldership Team and Trustees, I’ve invited Robin W to step into a new role on an interim basis. Starting immediately, Robin will work two days a week over the next year, focusing on reshaping our organisational leadership. His work will also help us define the future shape of the staff team and help to refine how we operate as a growing church. Part of Robin’s success will be that he replaces himself at the right time and steps back out of the role.

This is an unexpected but exciting step for Robin, and he feels God has been leading him to this role for a while now. I’m eager to make the most of this opportunity to prepare us for the future. It also means he’s stepping back from being a Trustee for the next season. In a business this role might get called Chief Administrative Office, but as a church we’re giving it the title ‘Executive Pastor’ – which leads into the fourth update…

Fourth: Christopher Hawes – New Job Title

Christopher has held the title Executive Pastor for a couple of years, although his role was very different from the one Robin will be taking on and we used the title in a completely different way. To better reflect his actual responsibilities, Christopher’s new job title will now be Teaching Pastor. While his job role remains unchanged, we feel this title better captures his primary focus, and he’s fully supportive of the change.

More changes to come

These are the first four changes for 2025, and several more will follow as we seek to grow and strengthen the staff team. Let’s all show our love and support to each of these individuals as they step into what God has both for them and for our church in this new season.

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Some Key Items For Prayer – December 2024

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We would love you all to be praying for our church and for our nation in the weeks ahead. Here are a few key items to pray for during this Christmas and New Year season:

Carol Services

Our Welcome Church ‘Carol Service For Woking’ is running on Sunday 15th December – please do invite your friends. You can book your free tickets by clicking here.

We’re running four services on the day, at 11am, 2pm, 4.30pm and 7pm. Tickets have been going fast, with over 2,300 people booked to attend so far this year. The 7pm meeting will also be live-streamed.

Please pray that the whole day goes well, that everyone involved in putting the services on would be fit and healthy, and that lots of people would connect to Jesus and come back to join us as a church again in the year ahead.

Alpha

The final night of our latest Alpha Course took place on Wednesday this week. Around 90 people completed the course with us this term, exploring the big questions of life and faith.

Please pray that we will see lots of these people connecting with us over the Christmas and New Year season, and coming back for the ‘Alpha Plus’ course in the New Year. Please also pray for many to find a personal faith in Jesus.

By the way, I want to say a special THANK YOU to all those who made this course possible, especially the kitchen and serving teams who have really gone above and beyond this term.

Church Gate

Although the actual building work has yet to begin on Church Gate, and may not start for a few months yet, lots of work is being done to get everything ready behind the scenes. We’ve had the first price estimate back on the renovation work to be done, and are now finalising what we will actually do, making sure we balance our ambitions against our budget!

The next stage will be to apply for planning permission for some of the changes, to get quotes from builders, and to apply for certain grants. Remember that our goal is to provide dedicated space for our children’s and youth work, alongside some extra social action space, and to open a Community Grocery to serve people in need in our town. We would like to see this work completed and Church Gate open in 2025.

Please pray for the all the items listed above, and especially that we would find favour with some of the grant funders, who have so far made positive noises, and please pray for the whole team working to deliver this project.

Staff Team

I would value your prayers for our staff team this Christmas. It has been a very busy term and we are currently understaffed in some key areas too. I would observe that there has been significant pressure felt by the team at certain points and everyone is tired.

We will be looking at the size and make up of our staff team again in 2025, but it will take a little time to do this well, and will also require more resource. In the mean time, please be praying for the team to be well rested and refreshed for the year ahead, and for God to provide all the finance and staff required to build the church well into the future. Please also pray for the many volunteers who give their time for free, week by week – we love and value all of you so much.

The Assisted Dying Bill

As you probably know, the Assisted Dying Bill was brought before Parliament in November, and was sadly approved. This represents a significant shift in how our society values and approaches the sanctity of life.

At this point it’s restricted to those with a terminal illness who have less than six months to live, but the pressure is already on for access to be widened, just as it’s been widened in every nation where it’s been legalised. In Canada, 1 in 20 deaths is now by this kind of assisted suicide, and in Belgium and the Netherlands it’s now legal to do this to children.

Of course this is not an easy or straightforward issue, and it stirs strong feelings on all sides, but as followers of Christ, our response must be rooted in the teaching of the Bible, and not in emotional stories. We believe in the God-given dignity and worth of every person, from the beginning to the end of life, and hold that life is a sacred gift to be cared for, even in the face of suffering.

Sadly our local MP’s in Woking and Guildford, both voted in favour of the bill. Whilst we would not expect people who don’t follow Jesus to hold a Biblical worldview, we should of course bear this issue in mind (along with the many other issues at stake!) when it’s our turn to vote again.

In the meantime I urge us to pray for all who carry the weight of making such decisions, as there are more stages to go in this bill. I encourage us to pray fervently for our nation, its leaders, and those most directly impacted by this decision. Please pray that our nation will turn away from this slippery slope towards the devaluing of human life.

Of course, we also need to consider how we, as individuals and as a church, can be a tangible source of support and hope to those navigating end-of-life challenges, and we must also show lots of love and grace to those who disagree with the Biblical viewpoint on this issue. Thank you for standing firm in your faith and for being a community that reflects the love of Christ in all circumstances.

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EAT, PRAY, LOVE: A Simple Strategy for Impacting Lives This Autumn

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Hi everyone! This is Dub Everitt, Outreach Pastor at Welcome Church. I’m jumping in on Steve’s blog this week to share our exciting Autumn outreach strategy:

We’re currently in the middle of a powerful preaching series titled “Loving People Towards Jesus.” Throughout this series, we’ve been reminded that Jesus is passionate about reaching people who don’t yet know Him—and He calls each of us to play a part in that mission. We are called to reach out in love, on His behalf, to the people around us.

In previous years, our church has hosted incredible invitational events like Fun Days, Firework Nights, Carol Services, and our special Invite Sundays. These “Hop, Skip & Jump” events connected hundreds of people to Welcome Church, with many deciding to explore faith further through Alpha or by attending our Sunday services.

This year, however, we’re shifting gears. Instead of large invitational events, we’re focusing on empowering each one of you to engage personally with the people in your world through a simple and memorable approach:

EAT, PRAY, LOVE

No, we’re not talking about the book or the movie! These three memorable words are designed to help us all focus on a clear, three-step outreach strategy for this term.

1. EAT…

… at A Taste of Alpha and during our Autumn Alpha Course
This year, we’re inviting everyone at Welcome Church to experience Alpha for themselves at a special event called A Taste of Alpha. It’s a fantastic opportunity to enjoy a mocktail, watch an episode from the new Alpha Film Series, and discuss it over a delicious two-course meal.

This event gives you firsthand experience of what your friends will encounter if you invite them to Alpha. We’ve already seen hundreds attend, and if you missed it, there are limited spots available for Wednesday, October 2nd. Click here to book your place for 2nd October

Once you’ve experienced A Taste of Alpha, we’d love for you to invite a friend to Try Alpha on Wednesday, October 16th—the first week of our eight-week Alpha Course. Your friend can check it out and, if they enjoy it, they’re welcome to continue for the remaining weeks! Click here to book for Try Alpha

2. PRAY…

… for your friends
Many of us have already made a list of three or more people we’re praying for daily. If you haven’t done so yet, take a moment now—ask God to bring to mind three people He wants you to pray for daily, and write their names down.

It’s a powerful thing to remember that God not only hears our prayers but also moves in the lives of the people we lift up to Him. Before you speak to your friends about God, speak to God about your friends!

3. LOVE…

… your friends towards Jesus
Sometimes, sharing Jesus with others can feel like a daunting task. But perhaps a better way to think about it is this: Jesus has given us people to love towards Him.

During His time on earth, Jesus poured out love, kindness, mercy, and compassion to everyone He encountered. Now, He asks us to reflect that same love to those around us, showing them what His love looks like in action.

In fact, He’s equipped us for this! As Romans 5v5 reminds us,

“God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us“

This promise is true for each one of us who follows Jesus—including you!

So, let’s live lives of compassionate love and kindness towards the friends, family, neighbors, colleagues, and anyone else God places in our path. Let’s trust that through us, they will experience Jesus’ love—and that this love will be a step toward their own encounter with Him.

Jesus is deeply passionate about our town and the people around us. He’s placed you and me in their lives to be a blessing and a signpost toward Him.

Let’s all commit to EAT, PRAY & LOVE this autumn, and watch as God does amazing things!

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Getting A Taste Of Alpha

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As part of our Autumn programme this year, we’re inviting everyone in Welcome Church to attend one of our ‘Taste Of Alpha’ evenings.

I attended the first one last night 🙂

These evenings are a chance for us all to experience what the first evening of an Alpha course is like, building our confidence to make invitations to our Autumn Alpha course which starts with ‘Try Alpha’ on October 16th. (In case anyone is unsure, Alpha is an 8 week course that we run, and is intended for people who want to explore what the Christian faith is all about)

What I experienced

On arrival the front hall was packed with people from Welcome Church who’d signed up for the first Taste of Alpha experience. We were greeted with ‘Mocktails’, before being seated on pre-arranged tables, finding our name on a wedding style seating plan. Dub then welcomed us all and introduced Nnamdi, who led us through the full experience of the first night of an Alpha course.

The evening consisted of:

  • A excellent two course meal, with every table hosted by friendly table leaders who quickly got us chatting (my thanks to Edward and NG on my table)
  • A game of ‘Kahoot!’ – an interactive quiz, which our table sadly didn’t win
  • Some contemporary live music from Steve B on guitar and vocals
  • A screening of the new style week 1 Alpha video
  • Some table discussions built around two thought provoking questions

We then finished with a short chat from Dub about what we’d just experienced, and the chance to pray together on our tables and to provide feedback on the evening.

My observations

As someone who’s been very familiar with Alpha over a number of years, and who’s even spoken on several past courses, I wondered if I really needed to be there – after all, I already know all about Alpha, right???

Wrong!

I came away with three key observations:

First: I’m incredibly proud of our team. The evening was well run and brilliantly organised in every aspect. There was high quality food, the seating had been well thought through and the whole ‘production’ was great. Everything was designed to put you at ease. I want to say well done to everyone involved in making it happen. If you’d brought a friend along, you really would be proud to say that this was your church.

Second: The Alpha videos have changed A LOT, and all for the better. They were always good, but no longer is it Nicky Gumble preaching at you for 30 minutes. The videos are bright, clear and well put together with a variety of people (including Nicky) communicating the message in different ways, with regular pauses for discussion on key questions. I found myself quickly drawn in and would have been comfortable for any friend I’d invited to watch them. This change of the style to the Alpha course’s content is the biggest thing I spotted, and it’s very positive change.

Third: It actually made we want to do Alpha again! It made me feel like, if I wasn’t a Christian already, I’d definitely have wanted to book in for the actual course. I even found the questions and discussion times to be personally thought provoking again, and I went home with a few things to think about – I really didn’t expect that!

In summary, any friends that we bring along to the ‘Try Alpha’ evening on October 16th are almost certainly going to want to sign up for the whole course. In fact, the biggest takeaway for me was this:

we can safely invite people to our church’s Alpha Course with confidence that they will have a positive experience and we won’t regret bringing them

To be honest, I think I knew that anyway, but now I’ve seen it and experienced it for myself.

What’s next?

There are 3 more chances to experience A Taste Of Alpha, on each of the next three Wednesdays. If you haven’t signed up yet, please follow this link to do so. One quick warning, the final evening is almost full.

And let’s keep on praying for our friends so that we’re ready to make lots of invitations to the actual Alpha course which starts with ‘Try Alpha’ on Wednesday 16th October.

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    What Did You Read This Summer?

    / Steve Petch / Leave a comment

    The new term is well under way, our prayer week is almost over and the summer holidays are starting to feel like a distant memory, especially with this recent cold snap. Before I forget I wanted to mention three books I read this summer that I would recommend to us all:

    1. “Jesus Through The Eyes of Women” by Rebecca McLaughlin

    In this book Rebecca explores some of the life-changing accounts of women in the Bible who met Jesus, and what we can learn about Jesus from them. It’s easy to read, very encouraging and the chapters have great discussion questions at the end. This could actually work well for a Life Group to read chapter by chapter and discuss the questions together, or just read it yourself like I did.

    2. “Tis Mercy All” by Natalie Williams

    Natalie runs Jubilee Plus and is based in Hastings UK. She is well known to some of us at Welcome Church. Her latest book is on the topic of God’s outrageous mercy and what it means for us to love mercy and to be mercy bringers in a world that lacks it. It’s thoughtful, practical and very applicable to our daily lives and our work places. When I’d finished this one, Jo read it too and she also loved it. I’m hoping Natalie will come and preach for us at some point in 2025.

    3. “Born Again This Way” by Rachel Gilson

    In this powerful and personal book, Rachel describes her own unexpected journey of first ‘coming out’ and of then coming to faith in Jesus, and what came next. She addresses the questions this raises for every Christian, but most especially for Christians who live with same sex attraction. Christopher and I heard Rachel speak recently at an event we attended and, to be honest, her session was the highlight for us both.

    Don’t forget you can get all of these from Origin Books in Woking.

    Happy reading!

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    Welcome Back

    / Steve Petch / 1 Comment

    September is here and a new church year has begun – WELCOME BACK!

    Despite it being a quieter time overall, lots of fun things happened over the summer including Newday (for the youth) and Commission Festival (for us all), and of course the final parts of our preaching series on the book of Exodus. I also heard about Life Groups having fun with BBQ’s and various trip to beaches and parks. Whatever you got up to I hope you had some time to relax.

    Most of what’s coming up at church this term can be found in the new purple book that you can pick up on a Sunday morning, and it’s also all in the online diary on the website and in the ChurchSuite app, but I wanted to highlight three things as the new term begins:

    1. Commission Festival

    We had a fantastic time as a church this summer at Commission Festival. The weather was kind to us overall, and it was great chance to hang out together and spend time with people we often only see in passing on a Sunday. We cooked and ate together as a church this year, and the food was truly amazing, so I want to say a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who helped to make it happen. I loved the Karaoke and the Silent Disco and, although my team didn’t win this year, the Quiz Night was a lot of fun too.

    On the more ‘spiritual’ side of things there were several helpful messages preached at the Festival, most especially by Ranjit from India, but for me the outstanding element of it all was the worship times, led in large part by our very own Jo and featuring a few other familiar faces too.

    I want to say thank you to everyone who was there and, for those who couldn’t attend in person, I hope the live stream was useful.

    At the end of the Festival we discovered that it won’t now be back until 2026 so, with that in mind, in 2025 we will be holding our very own…

    … Welcome Church Big Weekend Away!

    It will be held over the Bank Holiday weekend at the end of August so do put that weekend in your diary now. We’ve already booked a venue for this event, in The New Forest, and details on how to book your place will follow soon – watch this space.

    2. Prayer Week

    Next week will be our prayer week to kick off the new term, and all the details for getting involved with that are in the pictures below. Do join us for as much as you can – there’s no better way to start the new church year.

    The week will culminate in a Prayer and Vision evening at 7pm next Sunday (15th September) so do join us if you can. We’ll be talking about all that’s coming up in the year ahead and sharing our hopes and aspirations for Welcome Church, all in a context of worship and prayer.

    3. Loving People Towards Jesus

    Our new preaching series is now also underway, and I’m looking forward to preaching part 2 this coming Sunday. To tie in with our prayer week I’ll be talking about The Power Of Prayer – so make sure you don’t miss it.

    Outreach and evangelism is going to be a focus this term as we run up towards our Carol Services on Dec 15th. Let’s all get on board with what God is doing at Welcome Church – I’m looking forward to another great year together.

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    Church Gate Gift Day Results

    / Steve Petch / Leave a comment

    On Sunday we announced the results of our latest Gift Days for our Church Gate project. It was an incredible result, and in case you missed it here’s the figure as it stood on Sunday morning:

    Since Sunday morning I believe it has gone up a little higher, but I’m still waiting for the full details on that.

    Thanks

    The main thing I want to do in this blog is say a very big THANK YOU, on behalf of the whole Eldership Team, to everyone who gave a gift, large or small. It was a joy to see people of all ages taking part, from across the many different nationalities that make up our church. I also loved seeing people who’ve been part of the church for many years joyfully giving alongside others who’ve only just joined us. Wow!

    100% of the money given will go towards the purchase (now completed) and the delivery of Church Gate, and when we add this to the money raised during the Gift Days that we held in November, it means that what has been given and pledged now reaches our initial target: to raise £2m in 2 years – except we’ve done it in just 8 months 😮

    Moving forward

    On Sunday September 15th we will hold a Prayer and Vision evening to kick off the new term (details to follow). We’ll give a full update on that evening about where we’ve got to and how we plan to go forward. For now though, let’s give glory to God for all He’s done for us. It’s a joy to be part of such a generous church and to be on this great mission together.

    Stay up to date with what’s happening at Welcome Church by subscribing to this blog to get it straight to your inbox each week.