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Philippians

Power of Prayer, Luke, November 2020

Philippians 4:6-7
Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Over the last few weeks, things in Cihei have been further disrupted by Covid. We have had some cases in Cihei which has meant for safety reasons the people who normally work in the office, Adi, Corina, Nina, myself and others have been working more from home.

Obviously, this was the correct thing to do, but it is strange not seeing our colleagues on a daily basis and not going out and about on the projects for me! I have managed to avoid cabin fever I think, but it is very repetitive being inside all the time.

Moreover, once the work has been done, the emails and the phone calls etc, there is time to fill. Now, I’m not saying I successfully fill it all with prayer, that would be great, but I have managed to include more quiet time in prayer as part of each day and the peace that is mentioned in verse 7 is an amazing help at this time.

It can even help with the ‘do not be anxious’ statement! Which sounds ridiculous because saying don’t be anxious at the moment is almost impossible in human terms. But it transcends all understanding, we can’t understand exactly how it works but it does, and all we have to do is pray to the Lord!

A wonderful group of us gathered recently on Zoom for the first Smiles Prayer meeting and for me the feeling of peace during and after that meeting was fantastic. We covered lots of prayer points across the projects and for many people with health or family issues and other topics. Thank you to everyone who was involved! The whole atmosphere was one of support and care for everything and everyone that was included on the list for prayer and that is such a blessing.Prayer meetingThere will be more Zoom Prayer meetings in the future so please keep an eye on the website and monthly updates for more details because we want to try and gather more of the amazing Smiles family to bring their prayers and be part of the peaceful experience.

CountdownI’m hoping that the same wonderful people, you and others essentially, will get involved with the Smiles Countdown Fundraiser that we are doing. Many of you will know the TV favourite programme that challenges you to make words and solve conundrums and this will be the game we play together on Zoom.

Here is a short video showing how the rounds will go so that you can see what it will be like on Zoom:

What we need at the moment is for you to sign up to be a contestant and invite any friends or family that love word games to play too. My hope is to get enough people to create a knockout tournament structure that we can use within regions of the UK.

Possibly, a regional tournament in England, one in Scotland, one in Wales and in Northern Ireland. That way, lots of people can play and we can invite people who haven’t been involved with a Smiles event before but perhaps this would be something they’ll enjoy. Moreover, we can get some competition going between the regions as the winners from each one would go into the Grand Final and compete against the other winners!

Does it sound like something you could do or recommend to someone? If so that would be brilliant so please email me, or Dawn at the Leeds office, to confirm that you would like to compete.

To close, I’ve saved the best until last! A massive thank you and well done for the amazing fundraising effort by these 4 girls – Bethany, Rachel, Stacey and Courtney. They had a coffee morning and also did a sponsored Skydive to raise money for 2 charities – Southern Area Hospice and The Smiles Foundation. The total raised was just over £10,000 ($13,000) meaning they were able to present a donation for £5,020 ($6,552) to Smiles.
Team Benburb
Thank you so much for your fantastic efforts and incredible bravery. We are all hugely grateful for your commitment to supporting Smiles!

Look forward to keeping in touch and seeing you at one or more of the various Zoom events coming up this month.

Luke Wathen
Smiles Ambassador
luke.wathen@thesmilesfoundation.org

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