The video is only going to be publicly available for a few days after the service, we’ll make the audio available but will let you know where when we’ve sorted it out.
The actual service starts at about 53:00:
The Thanksgiving service for Daniel Scholes will be held Fulwood Free Methodist Church on Monday 28th May 2012 at 4:30pm.
On Monday 28th May we will have a small private funeral for Daniel where we will lay his small and exhausted body to rest. Then in the afternoon, we will have a huge celebration. It will be the party he never had to celebrate his recovery – instead we will celebrate his life and the amazing eight years we got to spend with him here on earth. It will be at 4:30pm at Fulwood Free Methodist Church in Preston, and everyone is invited to come and join us.
If you have any pictures of Daniel, or have a specific memory of something he did or said, we would be really grateful if you could email them to scoobyscholes@gmail.com so that we can put them together to show many different aspects of his life, whether it’s poignant or funny.
Daniel’s life on this earth is over, but his story is not. We know that God has more to come.
We are hoping to live stream the thanksgiving service. If you come back to this page on Monday we will update it with the stream prior to the service.
The bible tells us in Luke 9:51 that “Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem!”
The cross is like a cut diamond! It has many bright facets which catch the light of God’s glory. One key facet is the story of atonement; how does Jesus take our sins so we are forgiven?
The Epistles were letters written to a person or a group of people in an area. Some of these letter are lengthy, but there are some that are so short that there length they are only counted in verses.
Despite their size these letters still have something to say to each one of us.
A leaflet for this series is available here.
The picture that we’ve used for the Focus on the Cross series comes from a recent visit to Lindisfarne. It’s a simple wooden cross that’s been erected on a small island just off the main island. This has been a place of Christian worship for centuries, and there right at the centre of it was an empty cross. Without the cross and the subsequent resurrection our faith is just like many other belief systems, with the cross our faith stands alone as one where we follow a living saviour.
1 Corinthians defines the importance of the cross more eloquently than I could ever manage:
For if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is useless. And we apostles would all be lying about God—for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave. But that can’t be true if there is no resurrection of the dead. And if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins. In that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost! And if our hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pitied than anyone in the world.
Sunday was his birthday and Amanda (Reuben’s mum) wrote this:
Today is Reuben’s 2nd birthday! He has had a lovely day seeing family and friends and is enjoying playing with his new toys. He is a fan of Thomas the Tank Engine – I don’t know any boys who aren’t! And this cake was amazing! Big thank you to Auntie Anya (Eats for Treats!)
And now I am finding it difficult to know what and how to write here, I am not great with words, I’m not eloquent and can’t express things easily to say how I feel to summarise the past 2 years. 2 years ago as I sat by the incubator in hospital looking at wires and machines I thought once we were able to bring Reuben home he would be ok and everything would be ‘normal’ etc.
Since then it has been always looking to the next appointment, sometimes up to 5 in the same week, doctors, nurses, paediatricians, neurology, urology, physio, occupational therapy, portage, health visitors, midwives, hospitals clinics and appointments have ruled and dictated our diaries and our phone bills.
In a way I feel sad that we have somehow been robbed of the baby stage, we haven’t been able to do a lot of the things that babies like to do, swimming, different toddler groups etc but we know that one day it will all be worth it to see him walk straight upright and maybe even to use a knife and fork.
We could be asking why, we could be questioning why Reuben isn’t like his brother and sister but that’s where faith comes in. Before he was born God knew how he was going to be and chose us to be his parents. I never thought I would be able to cope with a child with so many different needs which change all the time but God gives us the strength and faith to entrust him to His plan. Of course we have prayed for instant complete healing at every opportunity but just because he is taking time it doesn’t mean our prayers aren’t being answered. People ask how we cope – especially when Reuben is up every hour in the night and needs care or pain relief etc, and it’s not our own strength we rely on, we simply could not do this by ourselves. We know that it is by prayer and faith in God that we can love each day whatever we are doing.
This week we have been asking people, though the Prayer Points in the Bulletin, we have been asking people to pray through Psalm 23 for Daniel Scholes.
In a recent blog post talking about the situation Esther Scholes (Daniel’s Mum) wrote this:
I keep saying it, but I am absolutely BLOWN AWAY by the way people are responding to what we are going through. Friends who are spreading the word, and using their time and emotional energy to intercede on our behalf; churches who are allowing our situation to be the highlight of their prayer meetings and weekly prayer slots; strangers who are joining the Facebook group to pray and fast for us just because they’ve seen links and taken time to follow them; children who have decided to give up their favourite things (including eating pizza and wearing odd socks!) to remind them to pray for Daniel; and non-believers who are putting their own doubts aside to sneak prayers up to a God they’re not even sure about.
In the mornings as we move closer to the cross and the resurrection our title will be Focus on the Cross.
In the evening we’ll be looking at The Short Epistles.
If you want to follow along with Reuben’s story then the blog 
In 
