1 / 12

A JOURNEY OF FAITH “Who with reason despises the day of small things?” Zechariah 4:10 (Amp)

CARING TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE. A JOURNEY OF FAITH “Who with reason despises the day of small things?” Zechariah 4:10 (Amp).

zubin
Download Presentation

A JOURNEY OF FAITH “Who with reason despises the day of small things?” Zechariah 4:10 (Amp)

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. CARING TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE AJOURNEY OF FAITH “Who with reason despises the day of small things?” Zechariah 4:10 (Amp)

  2. Healthcare Sunday has been established & co-ordinated by a group of Christian organisations involved in healthcare who want to encourage the whole church to be more involved in praying for health concerns • CARE • Carers Christian Fellowship • Christian Medical Fellowship • Christian Nurses & Midwives • Evangelical Alliance • Healthcare Christian Fellowship • The Christian Therapists Network

  3. Healthcare Sunday is held on the Sunday closest to 18 October, the day traditionally known as St Luke's Day. Each year we try to provide some resources to make it easier to mark Healthcare Sunday and give support and encouragement to Christians who work in healthcare. Resources are provided on our website:-www.healthcaresunday.org.uk

  4. Why Healthcare Sunday? • In the UK the National Health Service (NHS) employs more than 1.5 million people. • An estimated 100,000 of the staff employed by the NHS are Christians. • On average, it deals with 1 million patients every 36 hours - that’s 463 people a minute.

  5. Why Healthcare Sunday? • There are over one million people employed by the Health Service. Within the nursing and residential home sector there will many thousands of others. Every church is likely to have numbers of members who work in Health Care. By the very nature of the jobs they do, they may often have to work unsocial hours and be away from church on Sunday. Often the work is demanding and the rate of pay for those at the lower end of the scale, very low. • Increased politicisation of the Health Service has reduced morale among many and this, together with long hours, low pay and little acknowledgment has caused many to become very uncertain about continuing in their work. Yet, they often care for the most needy and vulnerable in our society. • Healthcare Sunday is an opportunity to focus on, and pray for and encourage these members of our Churches. The caring work they do is very close to God’s heart. Jesus always had special concern for the vulnerable and needy.

  6. WHY HEALTHCARE SUNDAY? • It is an opportunity to acknowledge and pray for the many Christians within Healthcare who have leadership responsibility and have the very difficult task of making decisions about the application of limited resources, helping to steer an ethical course among many differing demands and seeking to maintain the highest integrity in the care of each individual in need. • It is an opportunity to focus prayer and concern out beyond our church communities into a specific area of need in the hurting world that surrounds us. • Since 1992, Healthcare Sunday is celebrated around the world (e.g. South Africa now invite over 5,000 churches to mark Healthcare Sunday. It is generally the Sunday nearest St Luke's Day (18th October) however this is flexible as it may be necessary to choose another date to fit in with your Church's programme.

  7. AIMS OF THIS ANNUAL EVENT Awareness • to promote understanding among Christians of the value of all human life and the need for society to maintain Christian integrity in all issues relating to healthcare; Prayer • to promote continuing prayer support for good healthcare in our nation; Care and support of professional and voluntary carers • to stimulate Christians to continuing support for all carers; Community responsibility and action • to stimulate Christians to recognise that healthcare is a shared community responsibility and thus to take appropriate local and national action.

  8. CHURCH SERVICE IDEAS TO CELEBRATE HEALTHCARE SUNDAY • Introduction (drama) • Meet & Introduce Healthcare Workers • Overseas Focus • Ethical Focus • Information/statistics • Sermon • Intersperse with hymns/prayers/poems etc. to suit your liturgy. • Meet the workers • You can make this as broad as possible by including paramedics, social workers, administration & ancillary staff and those who are full-time care-givers for relatives or friends.

  9. OTHER IDEAS Healthcare Sunday through the year • The year is full of days-for-this and weeks-for-that but Healthcare Sunday can last all year! • It could help your church to have regular (small) reminders of what is going on and who is involved. e.g. • Identify the major health related sites within 1-2 miles of your church and pray for them in turn through the year, using anyone in the congregation who works there as a focal point. • Hold 6 short interviews during the year with people involved in healthcare; find out their issues and pray for them during the service. • bring along a Sunday Newspaper to the service and use the health related stories it contains to give focus and content to your prayers that day. • Encourage members of your congregation to ‘adopt’ a healthcare worker and find ways to encourage them in their work. Just taking an interest will make a difference.

  10. IDEAS CONTINUED Healthcare Sunday Drop-by • Lunch/tea/BBQ - arrange a flexible get together with simple (or elaborate!) refreshments. Invite all of the Christian healthcare workers you know in your area and send invitations to local churches to link up with others you don’t yet know. You could also ask to put up posters in the local hospitals, GP surgeries, Social Services e Invite healthcare workers to a thank you dinner. Mid Week meeting • If the Sunday slot is not available, you could offer to do a talk for the prayer meeting or home group on ‘A day in the life of...’ and talk about whatever it is you do! Offer prayers • A lot of churches have prayer diaries or use written prayers as part of their liturgy. Why not write some prayers down and offer them for use in an appropriate slot?

  11. MORE IDEAS Healing Rooms • Many Churches now have special meetings to pray for healing. Health Promotion • Community drop in - Saturday morning coffee with free health check and healthy living advice and literature • Keep fit evening or course • Cookery demonstration with healthy options for meals Parish Nursing More information on www.parishnursing.co.uk Start a specific focus group in the Church e.g. MASK (story on our web site)

  12. EACH YEAR MORE PEOPLE ARE PASSING THROUGH OUR LOCAL HEALTHCARE FACILITIES THAN THROUGH OUR CHURCHES

More Related