I wonder if you saw the massive pumpkin at Harvest and thought to yourself “what gifted farmer grew such a thing?” Well, it was no farmer, and he was and is not gifted at cultivating the earth. It was I who grew the monster and now have the joy of eating pumpkin soup throughout the rest of the winter.

I’ve been asked by many people how I grew it so big, and the answer always disappoints them. It was neglect and panic. I would forget about the pumpkin plants and then in a flurry of activity during the heatwaves in the summer I would drown them to make up for not watering the plants regularly. The fruit of this activity is the large pumpkin.

Yet, I’ve been reflecting on what I can learn from such an approach to farming and life.

Wisdom says that it was purely by coincidence that anything grew at all, let alone a 30Kg pumpkin. If I were to take that approach to anything else in life, I would not expect it to go well, a flurry of panicked activity will not yield the same result as what careful sustained effort will produce.

More so in our spiritual lives, we can neglect God, His Word, His Church, His gifts and go through a spiritual drought of our own making. Then when times become hard, we sprint to the proverbial hose and drown ourselves in religious activity only to relax again when the scorching sun has passed. Whatever growth may have been gained at that time will surely disappear as we neglect to read, pray, study, meet or serve. As we head into the winter and begin to look again at the familiar stories can I encourage you to not grow your faith the way I grow pumpkins. Daily, regular periods in the Bible and in prayer, weekly habitual worship, and study together in fellowship will see our faith grow strong, our love for Jesus deepen and our joy in each other abound over time.

We just celebrated our very successful ‘Light Party’ which saw up to 200 people come over to the Killaney Football Pitch to enjoy some warmth round a fire, hotdogs, games and crafts in the hall, a fire show from our very own Sam Shaw and fireworks to light up the night. It was great to fill the car park with people from throughout our community, to build new connections and meet some new neighbours. In this magazine you’ll get the opportunity to see some pictures from the event that really capture the warm atmosphere of that evening.

This is the beginning of our winter invitational events in the run up to Christmas. You’ll hear much more about them in the next few pages but each one presents an incredible opportunity to come and bring a friend along whether it be building gingerbread houses, gathering for a Christmas meal together, turning on our Christmas tree lights, or our Carols by Candlelight service.

Each one of these are wonderful moments to easily share the hope of the gospel and the light of Jesus as our days get darker in the winter.