Why there's no faith without doubt

The Lent Course organised by the Seven Kings Fellowship of Churches is featured in the current edition of the Ilford Recorder.

Our Lent Course this year is entitled Build on the Rock: Faith, doubt - and Jesus! Based around Matthew 7.24 (Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock), the course starts by looking at faith and doubt. Is it wrong – or is it normal and healthy – for a Christian to have doubts? Is there any evidence for a God who loves us? We will hear from many witnesses. At the heart of a Christian answer stands Jesus himself. We consider his ‘strange and beautiful story’ and reflect upon his teaching, his death, his resurrection and his continuing significance.

The Course has five sessions: (1) Believing and doubting; (2) Jesus - our teacher; (3) Jesus - our saviour; (4) Jesus - conqueror of death; and (5) Jesus - Lord and brother. Produced by York Courses, the course comes with a good choice of wide-ranging questions designed to involve all members in lively discussion and also brings the thoughts of prominent Christian leaders into our own discussion group.

The Course Booklet has been written by best-selling author, Canon John Young. The Course CD contains five 14-minute radio-style starters for group discussion, with former BBC broadcaster Canon Simon Stanley putting questions to the participants: Bishop Richard Chartres (Bishop of London), Dr Paula Gooder and Revd Joel Edwards. Each session closes with a Reflection by Methodist minister David Gamble. Former Archbishop of York, Dr David Hope, introduces the course.

Why do a York Course? Tens of thousands of people study a York Course each year:

"I like the format. Listening to the speakers on the CD helped to clarify my own thoughts as well as inspiring me with new ideas… The questions were challenging and well thought out. Altogether a very enjoyable course."

"York Courses are by far and away the best thought-out house-group material that I have come across. Excellent notes, a really useful range of questions, and stimulating audio contributions."

"Along with thousands of other Christians I have benefited greatly from participation in York Courses over the past few years, mainly as a group leader."

The Lent courses are organised by the Seven Kings Fellowship of Churches (SKFC) and will run at:

· 2.00pm on Tuesday’s at St John’s Seven Kings (11 March, 18 March, 25, March. 1 April, 8 April)
· 11.15am on Wednesday’s at St Peter’s Aldborough Hatch (12 March, 19 March, 26 March, 2 April, 9 April)
· 8.00pm on Wednesday at St John’s Seven Kings (12 March, 19 March, 26 March, 2 April, 9 April)

Our SKFC Lent Service will be at 8.00pm on Monday 14th April at Seven Kings United Free Church.

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The Call - I Still Believe.

International Crime Writers' Panel

St John's Seven Kings is to host an Interational Crime Writer's Panel on Wednesday 12th May from 7.15 - 9.00pm. Organised by Redbridge Library Services, this is an evening spent with Crime Authors Michael Stanley, Barbara Nadel and Matt Lynn as they discuss Crime Fiction worldwide!

Michael Stanley is the writing team of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip. Both are retired professors who have worked in academia and business. Sears is a mathematician, specializing in geological remote sensing. Trollip is an educational psychologist, specializing in the application of computers to teaching and learning, and a pilot. They were both born in South Africa. They have been on a number of flying safaris to Botswana and Zimbabwe, where it was always exciting to buzz a dirt airstrip to shoo the elephants off. They have had many adventures on these trips including tracking lions at night, fighting bush fires on the Savuti plains in northern Botswana, being charged by an elephant, and having their plane’s door pop open over the Kalahari, scattering navigation maps over the desert. These trips have fed their love both for the bush, and for Botswana. It was on one of these trips that the idea surfaced for a novel set in Botswana. A Carrion Death was their first novel.

Trained as an actress, Barbara Nadel is now a full time writer. She has worked as a public relations officer for the National Schizophrenia Fellowship’s Good Companions Project and a mental health advocate in a psychiatric hospital. She has also worked with sexually abused teenagers and taught psychology in both schools and colleges. Although no longer working in mental health, she is still passionate about the rights of those with mental health problems and is the patron of a mental health charity in Shrewsbury. Born in the East End of London, she has been a regular visitor to Turkey for over twenty years.

Matt Lynn writes, "For the last few years, I've been ghost-writing military thrillers. You might well have read one: they sell by the truck load. I wanted to create my own series of books, making use of some of the experience I had in writing military stories. Every SAS guy you meet these days is off fighting in Iraq for one of the Private Military Corporations. And it struck me that as small PMC unit would make a great theme for a series of books tracking a group of hardened fighters as they make their way around the world." As a journalist, Matt Lynn has worked for the Sunday Times for many years and now writes a column for Bloomberg in the US and is a regular contributor to the Spectator.

Free tickets are available from the Parish Office, by phone from 020 8708 2737 or by email to mina.rehman@redbridge.gov.uk.

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Elvis Costello - Watching The Detectives.