Skip to main content

March of the Penguins

Image
By
At Wilsden Trinity, our Soupermums Group has celebrated its third Christmas and we are bursting at the seams. It seems incredible, but only just over two years ago we were sitting in our side room, soup ready, bread warming in the oven, baby blankets on the floor, eagerly awaiting our first ‘’customers’’ and none came. This situation continued for some weeks and we were beginning to wonder if we had got the message right. Was this really what the Lord wanted us to do? I suppose Noah must have felt very much like that when he built the Ark on dry land. Now our numbers are regularly in the high twenties or low thirties. You have no idea how much noise 33 crying babies and chatting mums can make. Another experience Noah might have identified with!

We have settled into a pattern: Official start 11.00 am. Tea or coffee on arrival, time to chat and then soup from about noon, ending with an action song ‘Our God is a Great Big God’ which we now understand is top of the Baby Hit Parade. We volunteers look after the babies whilst the mums enjoy a peaceful lunch. A bit of a challenge with so many but we love and treasure every mum and every baby. The amazing thing is that each mother recognises her own infant’s cry and responds by crossing the room to comfort.

This always reminds me of the film ‘’The March of the Penguins’’ which follows the journey of Emperor penguins to their breeding grounds. The female penguin lays a single egg which she carefully transfers to the male who then huddles together with thousands of other male penguins keeping the egg safe and warm on his feet under his body. The female then travels many miles to the sea to feed and bring food back for the hatching chick. When she returns, she finds her chick and her mate amongst the thousands of penguins by singing her own unique song, to which the chick replies with its own unique song and in this way they are reunited. This is like the unique song which God sings to each of us and requires a response from us which is also uniquely ours. Someone once said – each of us has a verse to sing in the song of the universe and if we don’t sing it, it will remain unsung.


Di H, Wilsden Trinity

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Message from the Link

By
D ISSUE 16 OCTOBER 2012 ear Friends How many times have you heard people say in your church ‘Well, I didn’t know about that!’  Quickly followed by, ‘Well, if you read the notices …’ Communication within churches can be wonderful, it can be a little frustrating and it can be never quite what we had hoped.  The same is true across the Circuit, and very soon we will be reviewing methods and means of communication.  Part of this review may include looking at ‘The Link’ and ‘Outlook’ in the light of our focus upon Mission.  For example, it may be that we move more towards what has happened and how it worked to encourage churches to think about the stories that they have to share, rather than being a notice sheet of things to come. Which leads me to ask, have we ever wondered about who it is we are trying to communicate to, and about what?  For example, there have been many adverts in ‘ The Link’ about coffee mornings and cake....
Post a Comment
Read more

Fairtrade Summer Fair - 31 May 2014

By
Did you know that it is Fairtrade ’s 20th birthday this year? Yes, 2014 marks 20 years since the first Fairtrade product was sold in the UK. In that time, Fairtrade supporters have helped make huge progress, so that millions of farmers, workers and their families now have a brighter future. To celebrate this milestone, we will be having a: Fairtrade Summer Fair at Calverley Methodist Church on Saturday 31st May from 10 a.m. to 12 noon.  Please come along and give your support. There will be refreshments, Fairtrade tasting, a quiz with prize and lots of lovely Fairtrade products for sale.
Post a Comment
Read more

The Spirit of the Christmas Truce of WW1 Relived

By
The Spirit of the Christmas Truce of WW1 Relived During the 1st World War on Christmas Day1914 an amazing thing happened. There was a truce just for that day. Germans and the British stopped fighting and started singing carols. They came out of their trenches and shook hands with the enemy. Photographs of families were shown to each other, small gifts were exchanged. Then they played a game of FOOTBALL! Just for that day it was PLAY not WAR! In remembrance of those men, and, their hopes for the Peace to come: Football Match 1.30 pm - 4.00 pm Sunday 10 November 2013 Bradford's Centenary Square Reflections, Poetry and Music on the theme of peace and war 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm The Delius Centre, Great Horton Road Come and join us!
Post a Comment
Read more