CC Bible College York

Dear friends, I hope this update finds you well.  We’ve just wrapped up yet another great Bible college semester with a wonderful group of students.  The Lord did a good work in all of our hearts this semester.  Covid protocols were eased for the most part up until the end and we were able to do many of the things we normally do including Speaker’s Week in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales.  Four students were baptized in the River Ure during our week there.

Baptism in the River Ure

 We put on a full Thanksgiving dinner for the students and Bible college family followed by a (secret turkey) gift exchange.  This semester we also had a time of weekly worship and waiting on the Lord on Wednesday evenings in our coffee shop (Gatehouse Coffee) which is in a 15^th century building situated on the city wall of York.

 Please pray that the Lord will put together the student body for the upcoming spring semester as He sees fit and that we as a staff would be sensitive to His Spirit.

Bible College flats

CC York

Calvary Chapel York is doing well with a number of new faces in our congregation as we have emerged from lockdown.  Men’s and women’s meetings have resumed as well as our university student ministry.  York has 25,000 university students, many of whom are international, and we provide a monthly lunch for those who come to the church.  We have a unique facility between the Bible college and church where we’re able to host missionaries who are passing through.  It’s a gracious place that represents a gracious and great God.  It’s a blessing to serve the Lord wherever we have been called, and I am blessed to be a part of this ministry.  I’m in the worship leading rotation and have had some recent teaching opportunities in the church.

 Prison Ministry

Praise God we have been able to resume our prison ministry and have conducted monthly services at HMP Humber in October, November and December.  In December we took a group of 15 students and church members in and sang Christmas carols in all 16 wings of the prison.  It was an all-day affair and a great blessing for us (and hopefully them also!).  “Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.  For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To the one we are the aroma of death leading to death, and to the other the aroma of life leading to life. And who is sufficient for these things?” (2 Cor. 2:14-16). 

 Our Friend Rene

An unexpected sadness has come upon us at the Bible college as one of our fellow teachers and a good friend, Rene Etzold, has gone home to be with the Lord.  He was visiting family in Germany and had been ill for about a week and passed suddenly on Christmas Day.  We mourn the loss of him but rejoice in the truth that although he is absent from the body, he is present with the Lord ((2 Cor. 5:8).  Please pray for his mother and brother.  We will miss him around here.

USA Visit

Lord willing I will be in the South Jersey area from around January 7-25.  If you would like to meet up for coffee or have me share about what God is doing in England please contact me.

 

Wood-fired BBQ for students

 

About Me: 

I have been serving at Calvary Chapel York, England since 2016.  I teach at the Bible College and serve at the church in a variety of ways including teaching, prison ministry and leading worship.   If you'd like to follow my journey more closely, I have a blog (www.pfgoodwin.blogspot.com).  I can be contacted at pfgoodwin@hotmail.com.

 If you wish to support this ministry, contributions can be addressed to "Shepherd's Staff" with account #1454 in the memo section of check and sent to Shepherd's Staff, 6739 Academy Road, Suite 320, Albuquerque, NM 87109. Automatic EFT can be set up through Shepherd's Staff website: www.ssmfi.org. Prayers are also greatly appreciated.  The Lord bless you!

 

 

CC York/Bible College

Dear friends, I hope this update finds you well.  All is well in the Lord in York.  The leaves are beginning to turn a hint of yellow which means my favorite season is here.  It was a quick summer; the Bible College semester ended well and then we had our annual UK Pastor’s conference in late May.  It was a wonderful gathering, especially after having missed it in 2020 due to Covid.

Baptism in the North Sea

     Most lockdown restrictions have ended and the rhythm of the church is getting back to normal.  We had a baptism in the North Sea this past weekend with 13 believers getting baptized.  Praise God for that.  I’ve had some opportunities to lead worship and to do some teaching as well as a host of other practical things around the church over the summer.  It’s a blessing to serve the Lord and to be involved with a wonderful community of believers. 

     The Bible College students have arrived for the fall semester.  In-person classes begin this Monday.  The Lord is always faithful to put together a unique group.  This semester we have students representing England, Ireland, Switzerland, Israel, Canada, and the USA.  Please pray that their hearts and minds will be open to receive all the things the Lord has for them and that we as a staff would be sensitive to His Spirit.

Holy Island

I was blessed with the opportunity to spend some time this summer at a retreat house on Holy Island (also known as Lindisfarne).  Holy Island lies just off the coast of northeast England.  It gets cut off by the tide twice a day and is a quiet place.  There are less than two hundred residents and about the same number of sheep.

Sheep grazing on Holy Island

The island has a unique spiritual heritage.  In the 7^th century, King Oswald of Northhumbria became a Christian and desired that his subjects would turn from paganism and embrace Christianity.  To this end, he invited St Aiden of Iona to use Holy Island as a base for evangelizing Northhumbria.  Aiden was successful and much of Northhumbria embraced Christianity under his ministry.  The Lindisfarne Gospels were produced on the island by a monk named Eadfrith around 715AD.  This work is an ornately decorated illuminated manuscript containing the four gospels in Latin with an Old English gloss inserted around the 10^th century.  It is the earliest surviving translation of the gospels into English and is on display at the British Library in London.  We have taken our students to the library and British Museum in the past and plan on doing so in the future depending on the situation in London. 

Aunt Margaret

Aunt Margaret a few years ago

When I moved to England in 2016, I was able to reestablish a relationship with my Aunt Margaret (my mother’s sister) and some other relatives.  She went home to be with the Lord just the other day after having suffered with dementia for about a year and a half.  I was able to visit her in Blackpool with my cousin the week before she passed and read Psalm 23 and put my hand on her head and prayed over her.  I almost didn’t make the trip but am so thankful that I did.  The Holy Spirit has a way of giving us a sense of urgency at the right time.  The funeral will be on September 22.  Please pray for the Gospel to go forth.  Also please pray for my cousins Jim and Charlie.

        

                    About Me:

I have been serving at Calvary Chapel York, England since 2016.  I teach at the Bible College and serve at the church in a variety of ways including prison ministry and leading worship.  I can be contacted at pfgoodwin@hotmail.com.

If you wish to support this ministry, contributions can be addressed to "Shepherd's Staff" with account #1454 in the memo section of check and sent to Shepherd's Staff, 6739 Academy Road, Suite 320, Albuquerque, NM 87109. Automatic EFT can be set up through Shepherd's Staff website: www.ssmfi.org. Prayers are also greatly appreciated.  The Lord bless you!

Paul's Spring 2021 Update from CC York

 

CC York

Hello friends, praying that this update finds you well.  After a winter visit to the USA, I made it safely back to England and after the mandatory quarantine and Covid tests, all  negative, rejoined society.  England is slowly emerging from lockdown number three with more rules set to be relaxed in the next few weeks.  Praise God the church at York has been able to meet in person since last summer.  We were one of the few churches in York that reopened for in-person worship as soon as we were permitted.  Technology and the ability to connect remotely is a blessing but there is nothing like it when the people of God are gathered together and He is in their midst; the “shout of a King is among them” (Num. 23:21).

York Minster at Dusk

      It’s a great blessing to serve at CC York.  I am in the worship leading rotation and also had the opportunity to guest teach for Pastor Dave on a Sunday morning a few weeks ago.  I gave a message from Ephesians 5 on being light in the world in these peculiar days we are living in.  There’s really nothing more fulfilling in this life we’ve been given than to be used by the living God for His purposes.  It’s interesting the way that the Lord orders our steps; I remember visiting York as a 13 year old boy some years ago with my mother who was English and having no idea that one day the Lord would call me to live in this city.  A helpful piece of advice for one moving to England is to buy a good raincoat and make friends with the weather.  There are some beautiful, sunny days but we get our share of rain as well.  One of the things I love here that goes along with the rain are the incredible cloud formations and sunrises and sunsets.  Sometimes when clouds come into our lives we get to see the beauty of the Lord in new ways.  His glory illuminates the “problem clouds” and brings beauty out of them with radiant colors and light.

The Yorkshire Dales

CC Bible College York

This is my 6^th year teaching at the Bible College and it’s been one of the greatest blessings of my life.  Even in the midst of lockdown, the Lord has blessed us with another great in-person semester with students from the UK, Ireland, Israel, and the USA.  We’ve been having weekly worship nights with times of waiting on the Lord.  Lord willing next week we will be heading to the Yorkshire dales with our students for a modified Covid-friendly version of Speaker’s Week.  Please pray that the Lord will speak and also for good weather as we will be in a beautiful part of England with lots of sheep and stone fences.

 

 UK Pastor’s Conference

We are planning on having a smaller version of our annual UK Pastor’s conference in late May; please pray for the Lord’s wisdom and favor as we put the details together.  We weren’t able to have the conference last year and there is a yearning among the churches to be able to come together in fellowship in the manner of Psalm 133:

 Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brethren to dwell together in unity!
It is like the precious oil upon the head,
Running down on the beard,
The beard of Aaron,
Running down on the edge of his garments.
It is like the dew of Hermon,
Descending upon the mountains of Zion;
For there the Lord commanded the blessing—
Life forevermore.
Running down on the beard,
The beard of Aaron,
Running down on the edge of his garments.
It is like the dew of Hermon,
Descending upon the mountains of Zion;
For there the Lord commanded the blessing—
Life forevermore.

Do we ever need to dwell in unity and to experience His Spirit in our midst!

Other prayer requests:

That we would be able to resume our prison ministry at HMP Humber; we have not been allowed to go in since the initial lockdown over a year ago.

 That each of our students would finish the semester well and hear the Lord’s voice concerning their next steps

 For the Lord’s will concerning summer outreaches in the UK

 Pastor Dave Sylvester’s daughter recently had twins.  One of them (Wesley) required open heart surgery which he had last week (at age 5 weeks) and has not been able to breathe without a ventilator.  Please pray that they will be able to remove the ventilator soon and that he will be able to breathe on his own.  The heart surgery helped but he is not in the clear yet.

About Me:

I have been serving at Calvary Chapel York, England since 2016.  I teach at the Bible College and serve at the church in a variety of ways including prison ministry and leading worship.  I can be contacted at pfgoodwin@hotmail.com.

If you wish to support this ministry, contributions can be addressed to "Shepherd's Staff" with account #1454 in the memo section of check and sent to Shepherd's Staff, 6739 Academy Road, Suite 320, Albuquerque, NM 87109. Automatic EFT can be set up through Shepherd's Staff website: www.ssmfi.org. Prayers are also greatly appreciated.  The Lord bless you!