In March, we will be praying especially for the outreach work at church (including the coffee morning, badminton evenings, Parent & Toddler group and youth club outreaches.) We will also be praying for the church mission trip to India.

Eight people will be going on the mission trip, with Garry and Julie staying for one week and the others staying for two weeks. We leave on Palm Sunday (9th April) and arrive in India at 7:50 a.m. on the Monday morning. Prayer for travelling mercies and for smooth entry to the country is appreciated! Garry and Julie will be back in church for the evening service on Easter Sunday (16th April) and the others will return on 23rd April.

We have a preliminary itinerary from Fredrick:

• Monday 10th April – settling in and speaking at a church revival meeting in the evening
• Tuesday 11th April – meeting with local pastors and being involved in the slum children’s ministry (working with children on the streets of Bangalore)
• Wednesday 12th April – a sightseeing day visiting Mysore (Mysuru)
• Thursday 13th April – visiting the tailoring programme run by Reeba and attending a gospel meeting in the evening
• Friday 14th April – taking part in Good Friday services
• Saturday 15th April – a shopping day and taking Julie & Garry back to the airport
• Sunday 16th April – involvement in Easter Sunday meetings
• Monday 17th April – a drive to the forest to spend time sightseeing there
• Tuesday 18th April – visiting Ooty (in the next state, Tamil Nadu)
• Wednesday 19th April – ministry at Ooty
• Friday 21st April – youth ministry at church & visiting people in their homes in the evening
• Saturday 22nd April  – a shopping day before going back to the airport to return home (arriving at London Heathrow at 7:30 a.m. on 23rd April)

Please pray for us as we continue to make arrangements for this trip. We are all having the regulatory vaccinations and will soon be sorting out visas for the trip. Fredrick is working hard behind the scenes sorting accommodation and transport for us while we are there. Please pray for him and Reeba as they make all the necessary arrangements and for each one of us as we prepare, continue to save money for the trip and make all the arrangements we can at this end. We are very grateful for the church’s financial support in providing for the visas and transport while we are in India, but we do still need to see God provide for individuals and we know He is able to do this!

Pray for:

• all arrangements still to be made to go smoothly, especially organising visas, and for God’s provision for individuals
• travel arrangements to go smoothly
• the health and safety of all before, during and after the trip
• Fredrick & Reeba as they make arrangements for accommodation, transport and ministry during the trip
• each member on the trip to be a blessing, encouragement and help to the people we seek to serve
• unity and encouragement for each member – many of us feel we will be very much out of our comfort zones on this trip, so we need God’s help, guidance, provision and protection in practical ways!
• God’s anointing and blessing on all we say and do while in India and on the ministries involved (tailoring programme, children’s slum ministry, church services, church outreaches, work with local pastors etc.)
• Dave and Stephen as they look after the church in Goldthorpe while we are in India

In the Islamic world, the muezzin’s call to prayer rings out five times a day, calling people to prayer. In the Jewish faith, traditionally, since the Second Temple period, three prayer services are recited daily in the morning, afternoon and evening. In the monastic tradition, prayer services were (and still are) held on a daily basis: Matins (during the night), Lauds in the early hours of the morning, Prime (at six a.m.), Terce (at 9 a.m.), Sext (at midday), None (at 3 p.m.), Vespers (at 6 p.m.) and Compline (at 9 p.m.)

Prayer is an essential part of a faith life, and whilst this involves personal, individual prayer, it also involves corporate prayer: coming together at fixed times to seek God’s face, to listen for His still, small voice and to present our petitions and requests to Him in the confidence that He is a God who hears and answers prayer.

Tonight at 7.30 p.m., we will be holding a prayer meeting at church. We do this regularly, yet it is often largely ignored by the majority of our congregation. I fully understand the busy lifestyles many have and the fact that no time or day can suit everyone’s schedules. I fully understand not all can attend this meeting for perfectly legitimate reasons and may well set time aside at home to pray with us. Yet still it grieves my heart beyond words that so few see the need to set time aside to seek God’s face in prayer with other Christians. One hour a week is surely not too much to give back to the Lord.

The needs we see all around us, even in our locality, are great. When we consider the wider world, the situations are desperate and can only be changed through God’s intervention and help. There is great power in the fervent prayers of God’s people, committed to each other and to God, but we cannot expect to sit back and do nothing when it is clear in Scripture that we are called to pray without ceasing and to seek God’s face in repentance, humility and intercession.

Even within the meetings we hold on Sunday, we need to be bold in approaching God in prayer and in pouring out our hearts before Him. God is calling for people who will pray fervently, unstintingly, confidently and persistently. All He asks is that we keep watch with Him and learn from the One whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light.

A few weeks ago we looked at ‘wrestling in prayer’, seeing how Jacob wrestled with God. (Gen 32) Wrestling involves exertion, considerable physical effort. It’s a tussle; it’s a struggle. Even if we’re not thinking of wrestling as a competitive sport, it’s not an easy thing to do.

The battle of the mind is a lonely battlefield. We don’t have the visible comradeship of other soldiers, sharing our fears and woes. We wrestle with thoughts on our own, often too ashamed to admit to others the things that invade our minds.

These thoughts are not always rational, though they may be dressed in fine-looking clothes. They are persuasive, dripping with honey. They urge us to do things that are contrary to God’s Word, but they are plausible liars, leading us astray. They give us reasons to justify wrong behaviour, seducing us with tones silkier than Alan Rickman’s. They undermine God’s Word and authority in our lives. They promise rewards and blessings connected with self-indulgence. ‘You will not surely die‘ is their reassuring mantra to us. ‘God will not do that…’

In order to defeat these thoughts, we must be dressed in God’s armour and must be skilled in using the sword of the Spirit, which can slice through lies and expose the hollowness within. (Eph 6:10-18, Heb 4:12) Using this sword is tiring, for it involves daily exposure to the living Word whose strength enables us to lift the sword and ‘punch above our weight.’ This battle requires daily courage and determination; as Rend Collective remark, ‘Celebration so often is a confrontation. We challenge our doubts, fears and disappointments with the joyful truths of scripture. Dig deep!’

God’s Word is able to bring direction, freedom and light to us, setting us free from the weights of the thoughts which trap us in wrong behaviour and endless circles of doubt and fear, but we must build our lives on its solid truths, rather than standing on flimsy foundations.

Life

The life God gives us is different to simply existing on earth. He gives abundant life (Jn 10:10), eternal life (Jn 11:25-26) and even supplies the power to live a new life! (Rom 6:14, 22) The Duracell advert reminds us of the ‘superiority’ of Duracell batteries because ‘no ordinary battery looks like it; no ordinary battery lasts like it.‘ The life God freely offers us is far superior to any Duracell battery!

Life is about more than existence; it’s about more than marking time on earth and then fading away into oblivion. Life is about more than biology or breathing; it’s about the vibrancy and creativity that God brings through His very presence.

Light

Life is described metaphorically as light in many parts of the Bible and is often contrasted with darkness to emphasise the purity of God in comparison to the evil in the world and of the enemy. John tells us ‘God is light; in him there is no darkness at all’ (1 Jn 1:5) and this inevitably must overflow into our relationships (see 1 Jn 1:6-7, 1 Jn 2:9-10). God is radiant with light (Ps 79:4); He ‘wraps himself in light as with a garment.’ (Ps 104:2) We have to be willing to open the doors of our hearts to allow God’s light access to every dark corner, transforming us from the inside out.

Light is about more than the absence of darkness; it’s more than the physicists can describe. Light is the brilliance of God, the dazzling sight of His presence which exposes our failings, shows us our shortcomings, welcomes us into His presence nonetheless, cleanses and guides us in our daily living.

Love

To be committed daily to loving others with the selflessness and kindness that Jesus demonstrates is a lot to ask. Nonetheless, this is the challenge that we face daily, a challenge that can only be met as we are rooted and established in God’s love (Eph 3:17-18) so that we can grasp how high and wide and long and deep is the love of God and to know this love that surpasses knowledge. (Eph 3:19-20) Love is the heart behind everything God is and does and needs to be the heart behind everything we are and do.

Tonight’s sermon continued the ‘A-Z of Christian Faith’ series, looking at essential ingredients in our faith journey. From Jn 1:1-14, we concluded that there are 3 essential Ls: life, light and love.

Life

Life is a theme which runs throughout the Bible, and especially in John’s writings. He calls Jesus not only the ‘Word’, but also the ‘Word of life’ (1 Jn 1:1) and reminds us that this word of life really did come to live on earth: ‘The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us.’ (1 Jn 1:2) For us, all life has a beginning and an end, but for God, He has no beginning and no end. Jesus not only has life; He is eternal life and therefore has the authority to grant eternal life to all who believe in Him. (Jn 3:15-16); ‘For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom he is pleased to give it.’ (John 5:21) The fact that Jesus has life in Himself is one of the proofs that He is God (see Jn 5:26) and He gives life to us too so that we may share in this life.

Light

Jesus is the Light of the world (Jn 8:12) and His light shines into us so that we too become the light of the world. (Matt 5:14) We don’t always appreciate light, for it exposes everything that is hidden and messy and unclean (see Jn 3:20), but God’s light shines into our hearts so that we can be drawn into His presence and receive forgiveness and cleansing. His light must influence how we live and gives guidance in all aspects of our behaviour and plans. The unfolding of God’s word gives light (Ps 119:130), enabling us to live a completely different kind of life that is characterised by light and not darkness (see 1 Thess 5:5, Eph 5:8).

Love

Just as life and light multiply, so God’s love multiplies as we are recipients of divine love and are then charged with passing that love on.

Love is the yardstick by which we will be judged and becomes the means by which our discipleship and love for God is measured (see Jn 13:34-35). Love is a verb, because God is love in action, demonstrating His love by sending His Son to save us (see Jn 3:16, 1 Jn 4:10) Love has to be sacrificial (Jn 15:13), the visible demonstration to the world of God’s character.

Today’s morning service was a dedication service. In our church, we don’t christen or baptise babies, believing that a personal decision to follow Jesus is the basis for baptism. In a dedication service, we give thanks to God for the life of a child and ask for His blessing and guidance on the whole family.

Garry spoke about how a parent’s love is sacrificial and giving, wanting the best for the child, often at great personal cost. Parents are involved in the special occasions, but are also there in the everyday and the mundane, changing dirty nappies, wiping snotty noses and caring for children through thick and thin. The love a family has for each family member is great through all generations, but no matter how strong our love, it is not enough. We are all human and fallible and need a love that is stronger than we are capable of giving. God is our heavenly Father, able to love unconditionally and through every circumstance of life.

God has promised us freedom (Jn 8:32) and fulness of life (Jn 10:10) and abundant hope (Rom 15:13), but these things are accepted by faith. Each one of us has to make that choice; our prayer is that each child that is dedicated to God will grow to know and love Him as they mature.

Praying for Oliver:

Enjoying food and fun after the service:

A special cake: