CAPE PENINSULA REFORMED CHURCH (CPRC)

A CONGREGATION OF THE DUTCH REFORMED CHURCH

55a Aloof Street
Gardens Cape Town 8001
Kloofstraat 55a
Kaapstad 8001
Tel. 423-3529
Minister: Francois Wessels 99-5903

CPRC Newsletter

September 1999

Thanksgiving Sunday - 29 August

Yes, it is Thanksgiving season again! This coming Sunday, 29 August is Thanksgiving Sunday.

Thanksgiving is not your ordinary Sunday.

The church will be full of flowers, baskets of fruit and vegetables. Bags of potatoes. Bundles of carrots. Tinned food. Sugar. Fresh bread. Milk powder. Groceries. Tubes of tooth paste. Soap. Towels.

There will be no Sunday School - everyone will remain in the church. But it is not going to be a problem if little children start crying. There will not be a long sermon. In fact, there will not be a sermon at all! Not one given by the pastor. But there will be a different kind of sermon - the congregation will provide the sermon.

You will provide the sermon.

• With your prayers, thanking God for his blessings.
• With you words, as you tell us why are grateful to God.
• With your words from Scripture, as you bring praise to God for his goodness.
• With our songs and hymns, as we sing God's praises. Please….

Join us in thanksgiving and worship Sunday!

Come and tell us why you want to thank the Lord. This can be done in a few sentences, by praying a prayer or in reading a thanksgiving Scripture. Please think about that and join us in giving thanks. A special invitation to those who have never shared with us before. If does not matter if you have not given your name to Adré Wessels before. If there is anything for which you would like to thank God, come and share it with us. If you are really thankful, say it in public!

Historical Places of Worship tour - Saturday 18 Sept 1999

Organised by our Mission Committee, as part of their fundraising for the ministries & missions we support. One of them is our missionary in Harare, Cecile Perold. Cecile, a student counsellor on the campus of the University of Zimbabwe in Harare, has a special ministry in counselling and discipling.

The cost of the tour is a donation of R30. Our tour ends Saturday at St Stephen's (est 1824), where their Ladies' Guild invited us to tea.

Programme:

13h00: Coach departs from Cape Peninsula Reformed Church (CPRC), 55a Kloof St. Passes Jewish museum and historical Gardens synagogue.

13h20: Group visit St Mary' Cathedral. See the flower and music festival.

14h00: En route to St Andrew's Presbyterian Church, Somerset Rd, the coach passes Groote Kerk, St George's Cathedral, Palm Tree Mosque, Owal Mosque, several mosques in Rose Street, Bo-Kaap.

14h20: Visit St Andrews' Church, Somerset Rd. Step-on guide to guide us through church. This "Scottish Church" is the oldest Presbyterian Church in Cape Town

15h00: Visit Lutheran Church, Strand Street. The second oldest church building in South Africa. Just the Groote Kerk is older.

15h40: Visit SA Sending Gestig, Long Street. This church was started in 1799. Our step-on guide is is Rev Dawid Botha, expert on the church history of Cape Town in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

16h30: Visit St Stephan's Riebeeck Square. The old slave church. Come and hear the story about this church which was stoned! Tea/cofee by womens' guild of St Stephen's. A small donation for their ministry will be appreciated.

Please book your places and pay your R30 as soon as possible. There are only a limited number of places available on the bus.

• Transport: Bus
• Tour guide on bus for guided tour as we travel
• Three step-on guides at the historical places.

Contact: Else Levin 794-3344.

Programme for September

• Sunday 5 September: Walk and picnic - Immediately after church, an easy walk along the contour path. The normal procedure is: an hour walk/ picnic/ hour back to the cars. Names should be given to Heston Terblance. (If no-one wants to go, we will obviously stay)

• Sunday 12 September: Visit to CPRC by the Diensjaar Youth Team (of which Irinke Berkó is a part). During the morning service they will present the gospel in a contemporary way by song, dance, drama, witnessing from the Word and testimonies. Please invite your friends, especially those who never go to church to be part of this happening! Evening service: The Team will conduct an outreach service.

• Saturday 18 September: Places of worship tour, Saturday 13h00 - 17h00

• Sunday 19 September: Joint Prayer Service against Crime and Violence will no longer be held next Sunday evening 15 August in the Baptist Church, down the road, but a month later, on Sunday 19 September at 19h00. The venue remains the Baptist Church, and not the Strand Street Lutheran Church, as reported last week. The iniative for this service came from the City Bowl ministers' fraternal. Its purpose is to stand together as a Christian community in this area of Cape Town and pray that God would restrict the wave of crime and violence sweeping our city.

2000 - Whose birthday?

We are planning a series of outreach services for the last 10 Sunday evenings before 6 December, when we will have our Christmas programme.

The format will be like the outreach services presented at CPRC by Straatwerk during December 1998 - informal series, targetting those seeking spiritual meaning. Since so much false expectations have been created as we are moving towards the end of the millenium, it would be an opportunity lost if we don't make do something around the 2000 theme. The target starting date is Sunday 26 September. Pray that we will get praise & worship teams to help us for 10 Sundays.

Our Giving is Thanksgiving

The apostle Paul made it quite clear to the congregations which he planted in Asia Minor (Turkey) and Macedonia and Achaia (Greece) that they were responsible to support the ministry of the gospel.

This was their duty, their responsibility and also their privilege. By doing that they could be co-workers of Paul.

But apart from supporting the full-time apostles and prophets, there was another kind of giving. When Paul in his second letter to the Corinthian congregation encourages them to contribute money to a gift which would be sent to the needy believers in the mother congregation of Jerusalem, he mentions two reasons for giving:

First, he says that such a giving serves to bring about equality:

Second, he says that such a giving is a thanksgiving. It is part of expressing our thanks, gratitude and praise to God, from whom all good blessings flow:

What is done with the Thanksgiving gifts?

Gifts of food etc - will be given to the Straatwerk ministry and Alta du Toit School.

Straatwerk has different kinds of ministries - to people frequenting clubs and streetwalkers, to the homeless, to prostitutes and to street children. Their ministry at the Koffiekamer in the basement below St Stephen's Church, Riebeeck Square reaches out to many homeless people. On Sundays, immediately after the CPRC service ends, Hannes van der Merwe, Japie Fischer, Henry Farao and their team leave for the Koffiekamer, where they first hold a short worship service to people living on the street. After that they provide them with a plate of food. Those who are committed to a cell remain behind for a cell meeting. After some time of sharing and praying for one another, they go out and do hospital visitation.

Some of the gifts in kind you bring will be used to Straatwerk to reach out to street people.

Alta du Toit School for mentally handicapped children you all know. They visited us two Sundays ago. They are not a state institution, but a church school. They do get a subsidy from government, which at present is just enough to pay staff salaries. The rest of the running cost of the school and hostel should come from their parents and… people like you and me.

Gifts of cash - One offering will be taken. Money in ordinary envelopes will go to our congregation’s Benevolent Fund, and money in "thankoffering envelopes" will go to our congregation’s ministry. In the past few months we had to draw on quite considerably on the resources in our Benevolent Fund. From this fund people within our congregation, as well as outside, who are in financial need, are helped. The policy for this fund is to use the available funds. We trust that on Thanksgiving Day the fund will be blessed again, so that we may be in a position to help people in need. If you want to give cash to Straatwerk or Alta du Toit School, please put that in an envelope clearly marked "Straatwerk" etc.

* Birthdays * BBUS Birthdays * BBUS Birthdays *

We apologize to those people whose birhtdays we have not put in the Sunday announcements, due to the fact that we do not have their names and dates in our birthday book. Included in this newsletter is a Birthday Book Update Slip (BBUS). Please complete the slip and put in the collection plate….Please!

Missions & Ministries

Jewish Ministry

Leadership - Beit Ariel Messianic Congregation has not yet called a pastor after Bruce Rudnick left at the beginning of May. Elders and deacons have been elected in June. It was decided to submit leadership for the time being in the hands of elders Herschel Raysman and Francois Wessels.

We are approaching the Jewish festive season - always a great opportunity to strengthen the ties with Jewish friends and family, and to expose them to the good news that Yeshua (Jesus) is the Mashiach (Messiah).

With Rosh Hashanah - the Jewish New Year - the festive cycle starts. This year Rosh Hashanah falls on a Friday evening, so it will coincide with the usual Friday Shabbat service on 10 September.

The Day of Atonement services start with the Kol Nidrei service on Sunday night 18 September. The service will start at 18h00 at the hall of the DRC Three Anchor Bay. The next day, Yom Kippur (the actual Day of Atonement) will be a of day of fasting and prayer at the house of Roy and Jean Krossynski, Table View.

Sukkoth - the Feast of Tabernacles - will be celebrated by a Yeshua March through the streets of Cape on Sunday 26 September from 11h30 - 13h00. This will culminate in the building of the sukka on the Sea Point lawn opposite the Winchester Mansions Hotel in Beach Road.

You are most welcome to join us at any of these events.

English classes for foreigners

Heidi Pasques, the wife of Pastor Louis Pasques from our neighbours down the street, the Baptist Church, is the director of a project to teach English to the foreigners who come to Cape Town. In so doing, they can share the good news about Jesus to these immigrants, some who are from Muslim countries.

They need people who can help them teach these courses. Classes are on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, and Monday, Wednesday, Friday mornings. They are also in need of soup, which they freeze and then give to students before the class start.

The teaching course is a very simple one, and Heidi says that any English speaker can teach the course. For information phone

My Muslim Neighbour and Me

A course on basic knowledge of Islam and how to share one's faith with a Muslim neighbour is presented by Pastor Ashley Cloete on Tuesdays 7, 14, 21 September and 5,12,19 October from 19h30-21h15.

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Is it for good - or bad?

A man in China raised horses. When one of his prized stallions ran away, his friends gathered at his home to mourn his loss. After they had expressed their concern, the man raised this question: "How do I know whether what happened is bad or good?

Two days later the runaway horse returned with several strays following behind. The same acquaintances came again to his house - this time to celebrate. "But how can I know whether it is for good or bad?", the old man asked them. That afternoon the horse kicked the owner's son and broke the young man's leg. Once more the crowd assembled - now to express their sorrow. "But how can I know whether it is for good or bad?", the old man asked again.

A few days later, war broke out. The man's son was exempted from military service because of his broken leg. Again the friends gathered

From our limited human perspective, we cannot know with certainty how to interpret life's experiences. For the trusting child of God, however, it is altogether different. God is working for our benefit through everything that happens. We don't need to ask, as did the old Chinese gentleman, "But how can I know whether it is for good or bad?" According to Romans 8:28. We know that it is always for good.

What the unbeliever calls good luck, the believer knows to be God's love.

We know that all things work together for good to those who love God (Romans 8:28).

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