New Children and Family Worker

After much prayer Gosport URC decided to engage a Children and families Worker in September 2021 – just as we were coming out of the first Covid restrictions! With a grant and help from Synod – especially Ruth White – we drew up the job spec, advertised the job, interviewed candidates and appointed Stephen. And what a blessing we have had. Take a look at a piece from Stephen’s Newsletter just 12 months after he started, and see how God is truly at work in Gosport.

Little Tugboats Friday morning stay and play group for toddlers and their carers has been going from strength to strength. We’ve seen amazing answers to prayer and now have regularly 20 families attending. The relationships and conversations within this group are becoming a real source of joy. We have also seen families from this group transition to attending Dad and Kids Breakfast and Messy church. Thank you so much for your prayers for this group.

 Pilots our Tuesday evening youth group for Junior School age children is becoming a highlight of my week. We now regularly see 12 young people who are engaged, asking questions and making strong friendships. They have great fun and learn lots about Jesus. We’ve recently purchased an adventure Bible for each of the pilots and will be presenting them to the young people after half term.

 Trailblazers is our Tuesday evening youth group for those in senior school. We are now seeing ten young people come to this group, they are from a range of backgrounds and sometimes this group can feel more like herding cats than a church youth group(they are great kids just very lively at times). However relationships are starting to grow and the challenge of the gospel seems to little by little be having an effect.

Dads and kids breakfast is starting to take shape we have a good core of Christian dads who attended (thanks so much if that’s you). We have seen several Dads and the children from our outreach groups attend the breakfast. This is a real answer to prayer from my last newsletter.

Messy church: at October’s Messy church we had 44 people in attendance. For us that was such a huge answer to prayer. We had a great time of fun worshiping together and hearing that Jesus is the light of the world, a key message given the darkness of Halloween. For November’s messy church we will move from preparing for 50 people to be ready for 60.

And you’ll be amazed at what we have in store for 2023 . . . . but that’s another article!!

Gods love and Blessings to all involved with Youth work in Wessex, from the Team at Gosport URC.                   

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