February 12th 2010 - Cross-cultural Evening

Edna Owens writes, "A big thank you to all who prayed, gave of their time, cash and food to make the Cross-cultural evening held on the 12th of February a great success.

"The annex was comfortably full with people from 14 nations, Wales, England and Scotland being 3 of them. We think 68 chairs were occupied. There were a number of first timers and we were aged from 1 year old to the "golden oldies". The ice breaker worked so well it was hard to bring it to completion in order to have a welcome and message. Malcolm Cheesman's message was spot on and we enjoyed singing in many different languages.. There was more than enough food, games and programme to fill the evening well. It would have been disastrous the other way around. Pray that there will be a lasting effect. The next International Ladies Bible Study is on the 25th of February."

February 2009 - Dafydd Job's blog

The Revd. Dafydd Job is the minister of Capel y Ffynnon, our Welsh language sister church. You can read about his recent visit to Riga in his blog.

December 13th 2009 - Overview of the New Testament

David Finnie has completed his series of overviews of selected books of the New Testament. Today's sermon was on the Book of Revelation. Other sermons in this series are to be found on our Sermon Archive page.

November 25th 2009 - Creation or Evolution?

2009 is an anniversary both of Charles Darwin's birth and of the publication of 'The Origin of Species'. Lyn Davies gave an illustrated talk showing the lack of compelling evidence supporting the general theory of evolution, which postulates that all life derived spontaneously from one, or a few original life forms. He did however support the special theory of evolution, that is that originally created 'kinds' have become more specialised as a result of environmental pressure selecting those genetic characteristics best fitting them to cope with changing environments. Ultimately the theory that all life has evolved by natural processes is based on metaphysics rather than scientific evidence.

November 5th 2009 - Islam: at war within itself?

Thoughtful Christians must be disturbed by the persecution suffered by many of our brothers and sisters throughout the world. Barnabas Fund documents many incidents and supplies much needed succour to believers in many countries. Much of this persecution comes from Muslims; and it seems that persecution of non-Muslims is pervasive and systematic in the Muslim world. However it appears that not all Muslims are happy with all is done in their name: see this article on the BF website.

October 25th 2009 - Sermon on 2 Kings Chapter 10

Our pastor, David Finnie, preached an informative and challenging sermon on this difficult passage describing the reign of Jehu. This forms part of his series of Sunday evening sermons on the 2 Kings. This and the other sermons on 2 Kings can be found on our sermons archive page.

October 17th 2009 - Tearfund day

Congratulations to Rachel, David, Hannah and Jonathan Retallick upon their annual Tearfund day. They write, "Thank you very much to those who supported the Tearfund Coffee Event last Saturday. It was a lovely time. Over £600 of Tearcraft products were sold and £215.10 was raised from gifts, the collection of people's coppers (£80.70), and profits from the sale of books (£16) and Philip Snow's prints.
Many people looked at the information about problems of water and sanitation and signed leaflets to send to the Prime Minister, as well as a toilet seat! In the evening we had a short break from chatting, eating cake and making purchases. Keith and Steffan joined us to play pieces on cornet, trombone, tuba, piano, violin and cello. It was fun!"

October 15th 2009 - Lecture on the 1859 Revival

Dr. Gwyn Davies, formerly lecturer at Aberystwyth and part-time lecturer in church history at Wales Evangelical School of Theology gave a lecture in English in Ebenezer chapel. This was a winsome, balanced and enthusiastic account of a great work of God's Spirit in Wales. He described the effects not only on the life of the church - a greater sense of the presence of God, a deeper commitment to prayer and an enthusiasm for evangelism - but also on the wider society - for example a reduction in crime and drunkeness. He described, too, less satisfactory aspects, such as attempts by men to produce effects which only the Spirit of God can achieve. Sadly, it does not appear that the lecture was well publicised and the event was not well attended; but those who came had a memorable and challenging evening. The lecture is available on CD or as an MP3 file (12MB).
PS - Michael Walters has written a fuller account in the December 2009 edition of Grapevine.

September 19 & 20th 2009 - 40th Anniversary Celebration

‘Thus far has the Lord helped us.’ On the Saturday evening we had a celebratory meal and a presentation: the history of the church was remembered in word and picture. On Sunday, Dr. David Norbury, one of the founder members and current General Secretary of the Evangelical Movement of Wales preached at both services. More information will be posted on the 40th Anniversary page. There is, also, an Anniversary Edition of the church's bi-monthly magazine Grapevine now available as a PDF download.

August 2009 - Beach Mission

This month we have welcomed the United Beach Missions Benllech team to our services. They have kept us abreast of their activities, given us topics for prayer and led Junior church during the sermon. It has been heart warming to hear their account of people ready to listen to their message.

July 2009 - Public Address/Recording System

Following the theft of two radio microphone receivers (but not the microphones!) and a digital recorder, we have struggled somewhat with our sermon recordings. We are currently recording directly to computer, using a USB audio to digital converter to digitize the line voltage output from the amplifier. We use the laptop that controls the projector as our main recording tool, and an ancient iMac as a backup recorder.

Another challenge is the loud range of volume, from the very quiet to the very loud, experienced with some speakers. We have introduced a compressor into the chain to maintain the amplitude of the quiet passages but to prevent the loud passages from overloading the system. It may take us some time to tune optimally this complex piece of gear.

July 14th 2009 - Lecture on John Calvin

Our former minister, Geraint Morgan, delivered a lecture on the life, ministry and influence of John Calvin. This was held just a fews days after the 500th anniversary of his birth on 10th July 1509. The lecture was a winsome account, with flashes of humour, of the life of Calvin and his commitment to proclaiming the word of God. The church hall was filled by an attentive and appreciative audience. The lecture is available for download, or may be obtained by request on CD (See Tim). The duration is 1 hour and 10 minutes.