Garry continued his series on Joseph this morning, looking at Genesis 41:56-42:1-5. This period shows us how Jacob and his sons had to come to terms with the famine – and the need to get food from Egypt. Jacob was wiling to send ten of his sons there to buy grain, but he was not willing to let Benjamin go. Benjamin was his youngest son, another son of Rachel, Jacob’s favourite wife. Once more, Jacob showed preferential treatment to one of his sons (as he had done previously with Joseph, giving him a multi-coloured coat.) He still valued one son above the others; he had not changed at all.

Showing favouritism is never a good thing (see James 2:1-4). God does not show favouritism (Rom 2:11).There is no room for favouritism in His kingdom; we must not follow the way of the world in preferring some people to others or giving preferential treatment based on personal feelings, race, gender or wealth. Instead, we must be aware of our sinful tendencies and not be infuenced by the world’s values or way of doing things.

Jacob’s intransigence to change signalled a fundamental refusal to change. All of us need to be open and willing to change. God will speak to us through His word, through His Holy Spirit and through other Christians to highlight areas that need change. This can be very subjective and therefore difficult at times to discern, but the truth is that we must be changed to become more like Jesus. We should not change for change’s sake or to be more in tune with the crowd, with popular opinion. Instead, we must change to be conformed to the image of God’s Son, so that we become more like Jesus in how we live, what we say and what we do. That kind of change is essential to all Christians.

Here are some dates for the diary:

Saturday 2nd July will be our ‘Take Back the Streets’ prayer meeting (where we walk around Goldthorpe and pray for our community), leaving GPCC at 10 a.m. Our coffee morning is also on Saturday 2nd July between 10 a.m. and 12 p.m., so do come along for a cuppa and a chat. We are selling raffle tickets to help Goldthorpe Railway Embankment which suffered vandalism recently; we want to help restore this beautiful outdoor space so we can continue to enjoy the area. We’ll also be decorating quilt squares for the GPCC Jubilee Quilt which will be displayed at the Dearne Community Arts’ Festival on Saturday 24th September. Here’s one done by Hannah Cooper already.

On Wednesday 20th July at 1.30 p.m. we’ll be hosting the ‘Churches Together’ prayer meeting at GPCC. Come along to pray for your local community and be involved in all that God is doing locally!

The Parent & Toddler group meets every Wednesday and Friday between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. until Wednesday 20th July. We are taking over 100 people to Gulliver’s Valley in Rotherham on Friday 29th July as our summer outing, so please remember that final payments for this are due by 15th July at the latest. We’ll be leaving GPCC at 9.30 a.m. that morning.

In August, we will be holding Family Fun Days on 1st August (Thurnscoe), 10th August (Goldthorpe) and 17th August (Bolton-on-Dearne). It’s free to attend, but please contact Julie on 07729 421405 or email julie@gpcchurch to book in. We’ll be looking at ‘God’s Wonderful World‘ through crafts and activities and are providing lunch at these eventgs.

We’ll also be at the ‘Bounce Into Summer’ event on Wednesday 24th August (12-4 p.m.) at the Welfare Grounds in Goldthorpe, doing crafts and also fund-raising for the Dearne Community Arts’ Festival. Entry is £4, but there is loads to do at this event (organised by Goldthorpe Development Group), including inflatables, stalls from local groups and much more.

Barnsley M.B.C. has the slogan ‘Love Where You Live’, which seems to us here at GPCC to be an accurate reflection of God’s command to us too!

As part of this campaign, hanging baskets have just been put up in local villages and we have sponsored two of these (one for our church and one for Dearne Churches Together). For us, this is a visible sign of our presence in the local community (reflecting our commitment to be ‘with God in the community, with God for the community‘) and also reflects our belief that God wants to bring beauty from ashes in our area. (Is 61:3) There are few things more beautiful than colourful flowers and so we are grateful for this opportunity to bring beauty to our high street!

Garry spoke tonight from Eph 4:14-16, focussing especially on verse 15 which urges us to speak the truth in love. The two aspects emphasised in this verse are truth (we need to know how to deal with truth, apply it to ourselves and live the truth in our own lives) and love (we have to understand what is and is not God’s love, experience that love, live in it and share it.) If we do this, then we will grow.

Truth

Truth is something of great value (see Prov 23:23). Ultimately, truth is brought to us by Jesus (‘grace and truth came through Jesus Christ’ John 1:17) who is full of grace and truth. (John 1:14) He himself is the truth (John 14:6) and therefore everything He says and does is true. Truth is what lines up with reality, as opposed to the lies of the enemy (see John 8:43-44). He has many ways to mislead us and lead us in wrong directions, but God wants to lead us into all truth (John 15:26).The Holy Spirit is our gude into truth. He teaches us about God and salvation (there may be many Christians denominations, but ultimately we need to be sure these are teaching truth and accept there will be differences of opinion, but this does not mean we are not following God.) Other religions may have elements of truth in them, but they lead us away from God’s truth as revealed to us in the Bible.

God also gives us truth about how to live and we should stick to this, seeking to follow Christ in all we do.

Love

Truth on its own without love can be hard and hurtful. James 5:19-20 reminds us that we need love to help those who wander from the truth. We should love people not just with words but with actions and in truth (1 John 3:18).Oor motivation needs to be to build people up, to heal and not to hurt. Then we can speak the truth in love and from that position of integrity can grow.