Eastbourne Hub Christmas Newsletter
Merry Christmas from Eastbourne Hub
Hello All,
The Eastbourne Hub began the new school year with a meal. We were celebrating reaching the halfway point of our It’s Jesus Collective Worship assemblies, which means, by the end of the school year in July 2024, we will have delivered all 39 assemblies to 15 Infant and Primary Schools in and around the local area (380 children each week!)
So, what better story to focus on than The Wedding at Cana; Jesus celebrating love and togetherness with an entire community! We explored how Jesus was present at the wedding celebration, how he helped and blessed the couple when they unexpectedly ran out of wine by doing what he did best – meeting their need in the most beautiful, selfless way! The children loved this simple miracle story, particularly when Sam wowed them with his water-to-wine magic trick.
The Isaiah Prophecy became the focus of our next Worship, in contrast to the Wedding at Cana, Jesus now takes centre stage and says to his hometown “This is ME!” (The Greatest Showman song helping us out immensely!) We thought about Brands and taglines, mottos and manifestos, before finally asking the children to think up a motto for themselves and ultimately one for Jesus. Some children responded with suggestions like “The Miracle Man” and “Jesus the man who gives Hope and healing”. The tagline we all agreed on in the end was “Jesus - Good News For Everyone!”
Our third and final Worship before the October half term was a harvest-focused story of Jesus Feeding the 5000. Some schools in Eastbourne celebrate Harvest Festival, others run a Foodbank collection, some do both, and others do neither. We found it was a warmly welcomed Collective Worship and teachers especially were grateful for the conversation around food; where it comes from and who is involved in growing, harvesting and preparing it for us. The story went down a treat as the children listened to the re-telling of an amazing miracle with the generosity of a child at the centre! We encouraged them to say thank you for food, just like Jesus did, and to believe that even when they feel that all they have to share is something little, that it can make a really big difference!
Term 2 also started with a party as we shared a wonderful lunch with leaders and representatives of churches from across Eastbourne, hosted by New Hope church. We were celebrating 10 years of Spinnaker in Eastbourne and took the opportunity to update and inspire fellow Christians who are hearted towards the Primary Schools in our town. It was also the chance to launch the next collective worship - “Jesus Heals” re-telling the story of Blind Bartimaeus and bringing the beauty of Jesus’ compassion and care to the forefront. Exciting first day back!
The second half of this term is always a hectic and exciting time in schools, as the teachers and children ready themselves for Christmas. Chrissie, along with our wonderful new volunteer Gill, have started a Countdown-to-Christmas afterschool drama club in one of our Infant Schools, which is going really well!
“Thanks so much to Chrissie for running the club, the children absolutely love it and are so excited by it.” Teacher at an Eastbourne School
The children have been exploring the Nativity Story from different characters perspectives – so far, I think the children have most enjoyed the week we looked at the different animals involved in the story and made masks to help with our characterisation!
We continued with our next It’s Jesus Worship - “Jesus Gives Hope” presenting God’s Beautiful Attitudes to the children from The Sermon on the Mount. This Worship gives the children a glimpse of the completed picture of God’s Kingdom, seeing each Beatitude as a piece of the puzzle which gives hope and points to something bigger than their isolated feelings or situation.
Before we know it, we will be full speed into Christmas! We will be visiting some of our schools with interactive Christmas RE lessons for KS2, where we will lead the children in exploring the syllabus learning objective of “Why do Christians believe that Jesus is the Messiah?” We will also be delivering our It’s Jesus “Christmas Promise” Worship to each of our 15 schools, reminding them all of God’s promise to Abraham, to Mary and all of us, that he will bless and rescue the world through Jesus, the baby born in a stable, and celebrated at Christmas!
Our 2023 card is inspired by the beautiful illustration 'Christmas Promise' by artist, Sarah Horne, from the 'It's Jesus' assembly: A Christmas Promise, we have been using in Eastbourne Hub this term!
The price of £6 is for a pack of 10 cards and envelopes.
Find out & order now at the link below!
Please join with us in prayer and praise as we thank God for all that he is doing and for the opportunities that we have to share this good news. Our vision is to be able to feed the 5000 with God’s word. We would like to be able to increase the number of schools that we regularly visit and reach even more children, school staff and households with the inspiring, thought-provoking, life-changing words and actions of Jesus. We would love your support in praying for your local schools or perhaps making a small, regular financial contribution to help us achieve this goal. We would also love to hear from anyone considering volunteering – there are lots of opportunities to get involved in various ways!
Many thanks and a very happy Christmas from,
Sam, Chrissie and Gill