Dear Friends,

Happy Christmas! After an extremely busy period of services at the English Reformed Church (ERC), I hope that you have been able to settle into the Christmas festivities. For some people, this will be a time of great joy; while for others, it will have been a challenging time. Please know that at the ERC there is a place for everyone….

Dear Friends,

Advent and Christmas is such a busy time of the year for most, ministers included! I am looking forward to the Carols by Candlelight, the two Christmas Eve services, and of course, the Christmas Day service at the ERC.

Dear Friends,

It is now a few weeks since we arrived in Amsterdam. We are grateful for the warm welcome. Amsterdam is very different from Rio de Janeiro. I will be locum minister until early February. The Church of Scotland asks locum ministers to oversee Sunday worship and provide pastoral support. I have enjoyed working alongside….

Dear Friends,

This week we welcome Rev Dr Graham McGeoch, who will be our locum minister until the beginning of February. Graham, a Church of Scotland minister, teaches Theology…

Dear Friends,

It’s been a wonderful treat for my wife and I to be in Amsterdam again, and to rejoin the ERC community. It felt sometimes that we had never been away as you embraced us and included us. That’s a wonderful feature of the community in the ERC and a delight for us to share again. We have also caught up with old neighbours and tried to polish up our rusty Dutch conversational skills….

Dear Friends,

One of the greatest delights of ministry has always been to welcome families and adults into the church through baptism. During our years in Amsterdam I took part in a little under 400 baptisms, and I’m delighted to add to that number on Sunday when we’ll welcome Madelief Pascoe for her baptism. She is just five months old and will ….

Dear Friends,

The weeks fly by and already our time back in Amsterdam is half way through. It has been a delight to make contact with so many friends, and despite the weather we have been enjoying our visits to the Beatrixpark with Molly….

Dear Friends,

It has been a great pleasure connecting with many people over the past couple of weeks - some old friends, some new ones. There are few congregations which welcomes the breadth of community that the ERC enjoys. One of my great joys in ministry, in Scotland, and now here again in Amsterdam, is the privilege of joining with others on the journey of faith. It’s been my privilege to share the great milestones of life, baptism, marriage and bereavement, but no less important is the daily challenge to be faithful. That is reflected in the vows we make when ….

Dear Friends,

My wife and I were delighted to be asked to come to be in Amsterdam and we’ve greatly enjoyed settling back into the manse and church life here.

It’s been wonderful to again lead worship in the Begijnhof and greet so many old friends. On the other hand I’ve noticed that the city and the congregation has changed. There’s a bit more walking to do now that the city authorities have eliminated so many tram stops, and the stairs are steeper than ever (or is that just me growing old)…

Dear Friends,

This Sunday we welcome Rev Dr. John Cowie and his wife Gillian back in our midst. John will be our locum minister until November 13. 

It is indeed “welcome back”: John and Gillian served our church for 23 years before John was called to Stockbridge Church in Edinburgh in 2013. In 2021 John retired, which gave him the opportunity to accept the ERC’s invitation to be a locum minister….