October Welcome to St John s. Roughtober is Here! Bring, Share, Donate, Celebrate!

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1 October Welcome to St John s Welcome to St John s today. If you are visiting with us, we hope you enjoy your time here. If you fill in the Communication Card with your details, we would love to keep in touch with you. Roughtober is Here! Roughtober is our month of fundraising for Rough Edges, and now Roughtober has officially begun! inside the bulletin. There is more information inside the bulletin, but here are some highlights: You can get involved by sleeping rough with us on Friday October 20. Now is also the time to set up your sponsorship page and to get people to start supporting you. Go to - more information Or you can make a (tax deductible) Donation to Roughtober: Go to and select "Donate Roughtober". Get into Roughtober now! Bring, Share, Donate, Celebrate! As part of Roughtober, there will be a lunch after the 11am service on Sunday October 29. Bring some food to share, make a donation to Rough Edges, and help us celebrate the outreach ministry of our church.

2 It s Roughtober! Here's how you can help: Prayer: In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps. (Proverbs16:9) If you would like to receive weekly prayer points for Roughtober over the next 5 weeks please write your name and address on the communication card. This week's prayer: "Thank you Heavenly Father for Your faithful provision to Rough Edges. Please prepare generous hearts in our community throughout Roughtober. Help us to be wise and bold in raising funds and raising awareness of homelessness. Let Your light shine in us as we connect with the local community throughout October and beyond. Amen". Sleep Rough: Registration and our GoFundraise page is now open and ready to start fundraising and sourcing sponsors for Sleep Rough Help the Homeless annual sleep out event on 20th October. Go to - you will need to open an account if you don't already have one and then create an event by searching "Rough Edges" to bring up St John's Community Services as your cause. If you need assistance in setting up your GoFundraise event page contact paula.darwin@stjohnsanglican.org.au or Sponsor someone to Sleep Rough: If you are unable to sleep rough, please consider sponsoring someone who is - we have people registered looking for sponsorship. If you would like to sponsor someone from St John's Paula. Donate to Roughtober: Go to and select "Donate Roughtober" Hit the pavement: We have boxes of postcards to be distributed to local businesses and residents in Kings Cross, Potts Point, Darlinghurst, Paddington, Surry Hills - anywhere really. Please grab a bundle of postcards today and letterbox drop in your street, block or within a 1 km radius of home. Ask your favourite cafe/restaurant/shop/business/school if they could display the Sleep Rough postcards on their counters/reception desks. Donation Boxes: We have 40 clear perspex charity donation boxes with a lock and key for congregation members to take to their place of work, hobby/ sporting group, local school or your favourite cafe/restaurant/business during Roughtober. If you would like one - first in best dressed! If you take a box it will need to collected at the end of Roughtober, and dropped back to the church office for banking. Happy fundraising everyone! Please continue to pray.

3 Christian Responses to Gay Marriage As a nation, we are in the middle of the Same Sex Marriage Postal Plebiscite. The Centre for Public Christianity published a helpful document last year, which outlines Seven Christian Responses to Gay Marriage. For each response, the paper outlines both the strengths and the weaknesses of that particular position. Copies of this can be found on the back table of the church. Disability Access Project Completed Work has been completed on improving disability access in the church. It will be finished this week. As part of this we are looking at replacing the external handrails at the entrance to the church. What s Going On? Here s an update on some things which are going on at the moment, for your prayers. The Synod of the Diocese of Sydney begins tomorrow. There are a range of really significant matters which are being discussed this year, including issues like Domestic Violence and Gender Identity Issues. There is also a proposal to introduce a tax on money that parishes receive from property, which has the potential to have a significant impact on St John s. At the beginning of each session, there is a Bible talk given. This year Ed has been asked by the Archbishop to do this. He will be preaching on 2 Corinthians. We have some staffing issues. At the moment we are looking for a new student minister for next year, and also a chaplain for Rough Edges. Both are proving quite challenging to fill. Would you pray that we are able to locate the right person for both of these roles?

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5 Bible Reading: 1 Corinthians 15: But someone will ask, How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come? 36 How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. 37 When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. 38 But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. 39 Not all flesh is the same: people have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. 40 There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendour of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendour of the earthly bodies is another. 41 The sun has one kind of splendour, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendour. 42 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; 43 it is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; 44 it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 So it is written: The first man Adam became a living being ; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. 46 The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. 47 The first man was of the dust of the earth; the second man is of heaven. 48 As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. 49 And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man. 50 I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: Death has been swallowed up in victory. 55 Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? 56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 58 Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labour in the Lord is not in vain.

6 World News If one part of the body suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honoured, every part rejoices with it. 1 Corinthians 12:26 TAJIKISTAN: Three-year sentence confirmed for Pastor Bakhrom Kholmatov Bakhrom Kholmatov (42) is pastor of the Sunmin Sunbogym (Good News of Grace) Protestant Church in Khujand, capital of the Soghd region of northwest Tajikistan. He was arrested and imprisoned in April 2017 after secret police officers raided his church. In July he was sentenced to three years in prison for singing extremist songs in church and so inciting religious hatred, and on 18 August the Soghd Regional Court upheld the sentence. On 10 April 2017, National Security Committee (NSC) secret police raided Pastor Bakhrom Kholmatov s church and found song books and Christian literature. They reportedly harassed and beat church members. The police summoned Pastor Bakhrom for questioning and then arrested him and charged him with criminal charges related to extremism. Officials claimed that Christian songs found on his computer and the book More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell are extremist materials. They alleged that religious experts recognised the songs Praise God, O Unbelieving Country, Army of Christ and Our Battle is Not Against Blood and Flesh as extremist and calling people to overthrow the government. Local Christians believe the secret police used the songs and literature against Pastor Bakhrom because they could not find anything illegal in the church. In Tajikistan, religious literature must undergo state censorship before it can be printed or imported and distributed, and anyone who violates this is liable to punishment. As in other countries in Central Asia, Tajik officials often use accusations of extremism against unregistered churches and also to put pressure on registered churches to cooperate with the state. Sunmin Sunbogym Church was officially registered with the State Committee for Religious Affairs in 1993 as a missionary centre, and under the terms of 2009 s Religion Law, which required all registered religious communities to re-register, it re-registered on 23 October Affiliated congregations in the church network are also registered. People close to the pastor have suggested he was arrested because the authorities want the building owned by his church. Several months before the raid, the pastor was called to a meeting and asked to sign documents transferring the building to someone else, but he refused.

7 There were rumours in the past that some officials wanted to expropriate enterprises linked to the church members of the network had built a modern hospital in the city of Buston, operated gyms teaching taekwondo and ran a secondary school. Church members reported that during interrogations after the raid they were told, The purpose of conducting inspections is the closure of churches in Tajikistan and the confiscation of their property. After Pastor Bakhrom s arrest he was held in secret police custody before being transferred to the Investigation Prison in Istaravshan. It is not known whether he remains there or has been transferred to serve his sentence. Forum 18, a human rights organisation that promotes religious freedom, reports that in February the NSC, along with other law enforcement agencies and the State Committee for Religious Affairs, raided affiliated churches in the Soghd region, and that in March officials closed down an affiliated church in Konibodom, 80km east of Khujand, after interrogating and torturing church members. NSC officers also pressurised employers into dismissing members of Konibodom s congregation from their jobs. Family Pastor Bakhrom and his wife Gulnora have two sons, Firdavs (21) and Firus (19), and a daughter, Gulnoza (14). His family and church members do not know where he is currently being held, but previously Gulnora was able to visit her husband and said he was strong and calm, and that while he hopes for early release he is prepared to serve the whole three years. Officials have threatened members of the family and church, telling them to remain silent about the case, the court and the prisoner s condition. TIMELINE February 2017 Tajikistan s National Security Committee, along with other law enforcement agencies and the State Committee for Religious Affairs, raided churches in the Soghd region affiliated to Sunmin Sunbogym Church. March 2017 Officials raided and closed down an affiliated church in Konibodom in Soghd. 10 April 2017 NSC secret police raided Sunmin Sunbogym Church and arrested Pastor Bakhrom Kholmatov. They charged him with extremism and imprisoned him. July 2017 In early July, Pastor Bakhrom was sentenced to three years in prison for singing extremist songs in church and so inciting religious hatred. 18 August 2017 Soghd Regional Court upheld Pastor Bakhrom s three-year sentence. (Forum 18, Open Doors, Release International, Voice of the Martyrs, World Watch Monitor)

8 Supporting St John s Support the ministry here by setting up a Direct Deposit with your bank to: St John s Anglican Church BSB Account Number Weekly Offertories Budget 2017 Actual Surplus (Deficit) 27th Aug 17 $1,680 $2,716 $1,036 27th Aug 17 YTD $58,800 $68,475 $9,675 Rosters Service 8th October 15th October Celebrant Martin Robinson Martin Robinson Deacon Martin Robinson Martin Robinson Communion Assistant Edward Vaughan Jenny Coleby Edward Vaughan Joanna Knight Speaker Michael Dean Mark Woodhouse Reader One Joanna Knight Liz Illingworth Prayers Martin Robinson Martin Robinson Welcomers Ian Coleby Jenny Coleby Joanna Knight John Schiffer Morning Tea Joanna Knight Katharine Parsons Our Sunday services 9.30am - Our Family friendly service 11am Communion - A classic Anglican service 6pm - Contemporary Worship Getting in touch St John s Darlinghurst 120 Darlinghurst Rd., Darlinghurst NSW 2010 PO Box 465 Kings Cross 1340 Parish Office Tel: admin@stjohnsanglican.org.au We acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation, the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet. Elizabeth Warren Brough Warren To use the Hearing Loop, sit in the pews on the right hand side of the aisle (as you face towards the front) in the area in front of the sound desk.