Care – Knox Presbyterian Church

God's love is expressed in our ministry to anyone who needs love and support.

Crisis & Hospital Care

At Knox we strive to be a caring community for our members, friends, and neighbours. Please call the church office when you are aware of a family member or friend that has been admitted or will be admitted to hospital. Rev Shirley Gale visits Guelph General Hospital twice a week even when we have nobody known to be admitted, just to be certain we haven’t missed anyone.

Any pastoral concerns or crisis please contact Rev Johan Olivier at the church office 519-821-0141 or by email at: Johan@knoxguelph.ca.

Pastor's Aid

What are the Pastor's Aid Visitors?

The Pastor’s Aid Visitors is a group of volunteers - women and men -whose ministry provides friendly and regular visits with the shut-in members of the Knox congregation – at home, in Seniors’ residences and nursing homes. Most of the visits are with seniors who are no longer able to participate in the fellowship of the Knox Church family by attending worship services and congregational events. These senior members remain, in spite of circumstances, important and valued sisters and brothers in Christ Jesus.

Pastor’s Aid Visitors Responsibilities:

Visit your shut-in members each month

Meet with the Pastor’s Aid Visitors group 4 times a year
- To support each other
- To share any concerns regarding the well-being of our shut-in members
- To discern meaningful ways of including our shut-in members in the Knox church family

The Pastor’s Aid Visitors at Knox – At a Glance:

This ministry at Knox has been ongoing for 107 years.
The number of members visited by the PAV is 62 and growing.
Currently the PAV group has 11 members
Each Christmas season the PAV deliver Poinsettias to our shut-in members.

Why the Pastor’s Aid Visitors are an essential part of the Knox Church family and its mission:

Frequently, those visited bythe Pastor’s Aid Visitors tell me they are most grateful for the time and caring-friendship these Visitors share. Likewise, the Pastor’s Aid Visitors frequently mention just how meaningful they themselves find these visits. One such report was submitted by Heather, one of our Visitors.

After a recent visit to a resident in a local nursing home, Heather wrote:

“I visited Mary (changed name to protect privacy of this member) again today. She doesn't want me to leave. She so hopes I'll stay for supper, and asks how soon I'll be back. She was delighted with the cookies I brought for her and sampled them immediately! We had a walk outside and then enjoyed a time of “tea and conversation” in the cafeteria. When I first arrived I had met a lady in the hall, and during a brief conversation with her I learned that she's an old friend of my mom's! So I'll visit her too. I'm telling you this because this experience of being part of the Knox family is giving me a family I didn't know I had.

Yesterday, at the “Seniors Connecting at Knox” luncheon, over and over, I thought that there's no place I'd rather be than here. Thank you for inviting me in, and including me as a Pastor’s Aid Visitor, and making all this joy possible.”

You Are Invited!

If you enjoy people, and would like to explore a compassionate and meaningful way to use your gifts and talents in the service of the mission of Christ Jesus then please prayerfully consider becoming a Pastor’s Aid Visitor.

You are welcome to contact Dr. Shirley Gale for more information regarding this ministry at:

519-821-0141 (Knox Church) or by email at: shirley@knoxguelph.ca.

Stephen Ministry

Facing Tough Times??

Need an ‘after’ caregiver??

stephens-ministry

Stephen Ministers are there...

After the doctors have said there is nothing more they can do
After the relationship ends but the wound is still raw
After you’ve received a pink slip with your final pay cheque
After you have been an accident victim
After family and friends have heard your story one too many times but you still need to talk
After it seems everyone has gone and you are all alone
After a spiritual crisis and you feel hopeless
After any loss that is important to you

Now is the time to email/telephone Arnold Bethune:

Email: a.bethune@knoxguelph.ca

Church Office: 519-821-0141

Stephen Ministers Training:

Stephen Ministers have 50 hours of training in active listening, responding to feelings, maintaining confidentiality, dealing with crises and many other topics important to care giving. They meet for supervision and take advantage of continuing education when available. Stephen Ministers have police checks. This service is free to members of the community of Guelph as well as members of the congregation.

If you feel you would like to serve as a Stephen Minister, please contact as indicated above.

For more information on this Internationally recognized care giving service, go to

https://www.stephenministries.org/

Church @ Home

Letters by Rev. John McGurrin

July 2, 2017

Romans 6: selected (NIV)

¹²Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. ¹³Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. ¹⁴For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.

¹⁷But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance.¹⁸You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.

Matthew 10:40-42 (NIV)

⁴⁰“Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me, and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. ⁴¹Whoever welcomes a prophet as a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person as a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. ⁴²And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”

Dear Friends in Christ Jesus,

Sorry I haven’t posted a devotional letter in the last two weeks. I finally made it home from hospital after six months and while I’ve been busy getting myself organized my computer crashed totally. I lost everything and now am working on a new laptop and having to slowly recover some of the programs and information that I had on the former machine. Hardest of all is the loss of all the email addresses of friends and businesses.

Summer time is upon us and hopefully most if not all of you will find it a time of renewal. Let’s leave behind our faults and old sins and find renewal in the love and grace of Jesus. I can think of no better activity

than this. Welcome Jesus anew into your life and be ready to share all that He means to you with others. This would be the most refreshing cup of water you could offer to a friend, a neighbour, or a stranger. Pray for those of us who will be working at VBS the second week of July that we might in kindness and love share something of what Jesus means to us personally with each of the children who comes to learn.

Father give us an overflowing of your love and grace that we may share with those we meet each day. AMEN.

June 4, 2017

Acts 2:1-21 (NIV)

The Holy Spirit Comes at Pentecost

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?” Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”

Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: “‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.And everyone who calls
on the name of the Lord will be saved.’

Dear friends in Christ,

What a wonderful opportunity we are given to speak the truth in love and with clarity so that those who do not understand will hear, understand and believe. God himself through his Spirit dwelling within us will teach use this truth and will give us the words to use for he has chosen you and I these present days, to carry his message to the people around us. We have been chosen to be his messengers in this modern day. The dreams and visions will become clear that we may share them with our neighbours that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’

For this reason it is good also that we daily open and read scripture so that we may be taught and have a word of truth to share.

Jesus came to usher peace into our lives and into our world. There s a great need for such a peace today.

In the midst of terrors, and political instabilities and confusing daily troubles he will come again to infuse his peace. There is no greater blessing than this. This constant peace filling our every moment with joy that surpasses every trouble and every difficulty that might come our way. Thank you Father for this truth and peace delivered by your Son Jesus for our needy world and troubled lives. AMEN.

May 23, 2017

Acts 17:22-31 (NIV)

Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’

“Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

Dear friends in Christ Jesus,

“In Him we live and move and have our being.” What a joy!

Yet there are many around us every day who do not know him. His name is love and if we are in him then his love should shine in us so that all around us might see him.

What makes you so happy? What makes you so kind? What makes you so loving?

These should be the questions of all those who we meet daily.

This is the opening we may then use to share the fact that the joy, goodness and love we are filled with come into us from our loving God who loves then as well and wants to get to know them as well.

As we know and acknowledge that He lives in us and is the wellspring of our joy we may just pique their curiosity enough that they want to get to know him as well.

Remember, as God provides the opportunity, so He will provide the presence of the indwelling Holy Spirit to lead us as we share his love and peace with any He places in our path.

Father use us to spread this good news of your love and indwelling presence that we may glorify your Holy name in all we think. say, and do, and thus bring others to rejoice as new children or your family. AMEN.

May 14, 2017

Isaiah 32:1-8 (NIV)

See, a king will reign in righteousness, and rulers will rule with justice. Each one will be like a shelter from the wind and a refuge from the storm, like streams of water in the desert and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land. Then the eyes of those who see will no longer be closed, and the ears of those who hear will listen. The fearful heart will know and understand, and the stammering tongue will be fluent and clear. No longer will the fool be called noble nor the scoundrel be highly respected. For fools speak folly, their hearts are bent on evil: They practice ungodliness and spread error concerning the Lord; the hungry they leave empty and from the thirsty they withhold water. Scoundrels use wicked methods they make up evils schemes to destroy the poor with lies, even when the plea of the needy is just.

But the noble make noble plans, and by noble deeds they stand.

Matthew 7:7-14 (NIV)

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

2 Thessalonians 2:13-17 (NIV)

But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers and sisters loved by the Lord, because God chose you as first fruits to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. He called you to this through our gospel, that you might share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So then, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter. May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.

Greeting Friends and neighbours in Christ,

God’s purpose and promise from the very beginning of time has been and still is love. It was because of this that He made all of creation and made sure that it was all good. It was because of this that his plan even before creation was to come in the form of a human being and live with us and die to show his eternal forgiveness of our sin and thus to reunite us with himself and thus open the door to all eternity.

He calls to us every day, inviting us to enter through the narrow gate that leads to himself and to life eternal. Matthew and Paul both remind us of these truths and so we ought to remind one another and indeed ourselves that the door is love itself, opened by love himself (Jesus) and remaining open to all who will put their faith and trust in him. God rested at the end of his seven days of creation yet continues to work the work of loving to this very day and calls us to continue this wok in our lives becoming one with him for the salvation of all creation and all creatures including the human creature.

Father God as you are a verb and constantly at work help us to so model our lives after yours that others may find their salvation in you through our witness. Let this be our constant praise. Amen.