At a recent members’ meeting, the church were happy to appoint
Rich Smith as a deacon at Rehoboth. Here is a testimony from him:

One of the greatest blessings I have had in my life is a continuous, lifelong exposure to the gospel. By God’s grace, I have had limitless opportunities to pray, meditate and contemplate his glory and majesty. While there have, inevitably, been extended times when my faith in God has been sideswept or smothered by pressures and distractions of life, there has never been a time when I have not believed. There has also never been a time when I can remember not knowing Rehoboth.
My foundations lie first and foremost in a strong and loving Christian family. I have had consistent involvement in church life from under the table at Sunday School at Abbey Baptist Church in Abingdon, to youth clubs at Whittlesey Baptist Church, baptism at Dorking Baptist chapel in 2003, a larger church experience at Chessington Evangelical Church and now a blessing to join the deaconate at Rehoboth.

I gave my life to Christ in 2001 at Pioneer Christian Camp after hearing a talk on the joys of heaven. Throughout my school years, those ten days were in hindsight a much-needed pool of Christian fellowship and teaching in what could be very arid times spiritually in school. After nine Pioneer Camps, the Lord led me to Royal Holloway Chris-tian Union where I was handed the role of Prayer Secretary which took me back to basics on un-derstanding prayer and leading a strong prayer life. At that time, I also linked up with Christ Church, Virginia Water. These were particularly blessed times as April was at university only an hour away and was able to join me at Christchurch on a regular basis and started to integrate herself into Christian fellowship for herself, culminating in her conversion at Rehoboth on a rainy New Year’s Day in 2012. How’s that for a start to the year…

April and I joined Rehoboth in 2016 and were blessed from the outset with a loving church family with whom we felt we could not only worship the Lord but also serve with and work amongst. We are particularly grateful that we have managed to find our own grooves to serve in the church via piano, pulpit, PA and pottering in the kitchen (I had to make that four ‘p’s).

With a background in music, Steve invited me to join the piano rota, and this set me in a more public, up-the-front presence in church. I do believe that regular worship involvement gave me a strong foundation for being at the front of the chapel and led to serving the Lord from behind the piano to behind the pulpit. I am acutely aware of the need for consistent service and for working with the church body tending the vineyard.

I am most blessed and humbled to be elected as a deacon. I pray that I will be able to take the tools that the Lord has blessed me with and bring them to a deaconate level and serving the people of God at Rehoboth.

Rich
May 2026

Do you sometimes feel that your Christian service – including your efforts to share the gospel and obey the Great Commission – is yielding little fruit?
Missionaries can struggle with such doubts as well. The world seemsso Hard; the task so big; the workers so few and fragile. Yet God’s victory is sure! The Lord Jesus Christ has conquered death and broken the power of sin. Our enemy the devil is a defeated foe. How can we be certain? Because Jesus has been gloriously raised from the dead and is seated at the Father’s right hand!
Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labour is not in vain. ! Corinthians 15:58

Please join with GBM during their Week of Prayer—Sunday 7 to Sunday 14 June, to pray with this great hope in our hearts. Each day will focus on the work of different missionaries in a Zoom prayer meeting.

Sunday 7 June – 4pm – Andrew & Marea Cook – Serving Today radio ministry
Monday 8 June – 1pm – Calix & Bea Furus – preparing for Madeira
Tuesday 9 June – 3pm- James Hammond in Bordeaux, France
Wednesday 10 June – 8am – S & A in Belgrade, Serbia
Thursday 11 June – 12pm – Aries & Jodith Liboro in Valenzuela City, Philippines
Friday 12 June – 4pm – P & S in Central Asia
Saturday 13 June – 9am – Adrian & Abigail Yeboah in Amsterdam
Sunday 14 June – 4pm – Andrzej & Monika Kempczyński in Legionowo, Poland

You can register to join the prayer meetings at:
https://www.gbm.org.uk/week-of-prayer-zoom-prayer-meeting-registration/

You can find out more about the week of prayer in GBM Herald Magazine or on

The GBM website https://www.gbm.org.uk/events/week-of-prayer/

Rachel

Mission Secretary

The testimony Jacob Polson gave at his baptism on Lord’s Day 12th April 2026
As most of you know my faith journey began with growing up at Rehoboth, and this gave me a great groundwork of faith and knowledge of the right way to go. I remember think-ing “why can’t I get baptised” (or if that was something I should do) at a young age. I also enjoyed Pathfinders and the different things we did and enjoyed learning through that. But then I grew up and my priorities changed, and an opportunity to play football for Horsham on Sunday mornings meant I stopped coming to church.

I remember during the initial period, where I’d stopped coming, feeling a darkness in my life, that I was only able to see the cause of clearly, looking back. After this period of my life I moved on, and although I never stopped believing in Jesus and what I had been taught, I gradually got more caught up in the world. I always knew when I was doing something wrong, but I did it anyway. I would come to God when things felt tough, and was still guided by the Christian principles I had been brought up with. I also still felt God in my life, and relied on his comfort in difficult moments.

Over the next 6 years or so, I was gradually feeling further and further from God however, with the passing of time. I remember thinking that my faith was something I would sort out later in life. Fast forward, and after some tough moments that had caused me to begin to think about the direction I was headed, I found myself at home during Covid, which gave me time to think. A few months had passed, and I was watching apologetics videos with Isaac, as that was something he was keen on. Not long after that I felt the prompting of the Holy Spirit, that I should give my life to Jesus.
I knew who Jesus was and why he came, after growing up in the church but was yet to take that step of receiving the forgiveness he has to offer. At this point I was feeling further from God than at any point before, and had begun to feel the weight of my sins. This then culminated in me calling upon the name of the Lord on 16th September 2020, during a work shift delivery driving, and I was saved. I knew instantly that I had been forgiven. I was so overcome with emotion in the moment and i’m glad that not long after I was sent out on a delivery run, so I was on my own.

It had been roughly a year at that point that I had started to think about things more, and had become aware of how in the world I was, although it hadn’t necessarily been at the front of my mind. I think God slowly walked me to that point. I’m thankful for Covid, in hindsight as well, as I think only something like that happening would have given me the chance to slow down and think. Once I felt the weight of my sins, I knew that it was only Jesus who I could call upon to save me.

From the point of receiving his forgiveness onwards, it has been a slow process of change, as God has been working in my life. Some of that has involved drifting back to the world at times, and expecting things to change quicker than I would like, but God has been exceedingly gracious and merciful in walking with me and helping me to understand certain things, and comfort in moments of distress.

He has shown me his faithfulness. I hope that me publicly declaring my faith in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour today, and the mercy, love and grace God has shown me, if you haven’t already, prompts you to put your faith in Jesus and be saved too.

Jacob Polson

Baptism it is a joy to be able to announce the baptism taking place for Jacob Polson in the morning service on 12th April. Jacob will be briefly sharing of how the Lord brought him to salvation, and the desire to obediently follow the Lord Jesus in the waters of baptism.

May we be prayerful for that witness and invite others in to join us in hearing the Gospel afresh. And if you love the Lord Jesus, but have not yet taken that step of obedience to the Lord, do speak to Calix or one of the elders about it.

Fellowship Prayer Hour - it was good to have a number of folk in the Fellowship joining for the hour of prayer on the 1st of this month. If you haven’t managed to get along to one of these times on the first Wednesday of the month, do make it a point of importance to pray together and plan to join us next month on the 6th May. To quote an old hymn, it is a ‘sweet hour of prayer’!

Praying & caring for the Community – Clarence Road, St John Close, Moons Lane

Preaching out this month: 3rd & 5th D Ansell – Copthorne am;
19th C Furus – Dunstable am & pm; DA – Slinfold pm; 26th CF – Funchal am (Zoom); S Piggott -Redhill am; Wed 29th CF – Clevedon

We enjoyed a visit from Jonathan Parkinson, Erin & Steve Hudson from Caring for Life on March 8th. As a result from both church giving and in-dividual donations, they received from us £502 for the valuable work un-dertaken at Crag House Farm, Leeds. We have received this letter of thanks:
Dear Sandra, Steve, Karl and friends at Rehoboth Grace Baptist Church
On behalf of everyone at Caring For Life, I am writing to thank you so much for your re-cent generous donations at the presentation visit by Jonathan Erin and Steve. They were so encouraged and blessed by their time with you all and your gifts will be a huge help as we take practical care and the good news of Jesus’ love to some of the most isolated and ‘at risk’ men and women here in the city of Leeds.
Steve, our agriculture project leader, wrote in the latest bulletin
“Spring has sprung at Caring For Life… with the arrival of our first two calves. It always amazes me how cow and calf know what to do instinctively without any help or interfer-ence. After calving the cow is faced with a wet, slimy thing which they lick clean, encour-age to get up within minutes and then stand for it to feed. We are merely bystanders in this miracle of creation which God has designed… It is very special when the cows calve during the day and so we can observe the whole process. It’s especially exciting for some of our newer beneficiaries who have never seen anything like it before. “
We do thank the Lord for all the opportunities that we have to share the wonder of crea-tion with those we support and the way such special events can lift them out of their trou-bles for a while. Thank you for your support which is enabling this to happen.
Please pray with us for opportunities to point them to the Creator this spring and that many will entrust their lives to the Lord and cast their burdens on Him.
We look forward to staying connected and you will be in our prayers.
I am yours in Jesus’ love,
Pam Parkinson
CFL Support Coordinator

Christ our hope in life and death As we approach Easter, our thoughts turn to the Cross where Jesus died. It is still such a powerful image even in our society today, displayed on many of the churches where Christians gather and for some, as a personal reminder in the form of a chain worn around the neck. As those who regularly read and listen to God’s word spoken from the pulpit, whatever the passage we are studying or listening to – it points to the cross. It points to the necessity of Jesus dying there, to take upon himself the multitude of our sins. From the very first chapters of Genesis through to the final verses in the book of Revelation we are directed to the one who would go to the cross to die a sinners death.

Yet in Jesus Christ we have one who was without sin and who was able to defeat death in glorious resurrection which we celebrate on Easter Sunday and every day thereafter!. Not only that, but also the promise that He will come again to judge the living and the dead. Our bibles end with that verse in Revelation 22:20b ‘Yes I am coming soon’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. It is always a time of great sadness when we hear of the death of someone in our family, our church fellowship or a close friend. It is we who remain here who are left to grieve and mourn their passing whilst we can say for those who have put their trust in Jesus they are now with Him. The bible expresses it beautifully in 1 Thessalonians 4:14 For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.

So as we look towards Easter, it is a powerful reminder that we mark not only the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus, we also can look forward to that seal of eternal life with Him that he graciously grants to those who have fallen asleep in Him. There is an old hymn that opens with this verse; What joys will crown that happy hour When in the air the Lord we meet And triumph o’er infernal power With Satan bruised beneath our feet. (J Swain) I pray that as you come to worship this Eastertime, you will be able to give thanks to our Lord Jesus Christ not only for sins forgiven but for death defeated and the promise of eternal life.

Stuart
Elder

May 2026