Guest speaker Yan Hadley brought a challenging message on ‘maintaining your motivation’ last night, looking at Col 3:23 which reminds us of the need to work at everything we do with all our hearts. ‘Candyfloss Christianity’, which, like the seaside treat, lacks substance, means that at times when put to the test, our testimony disappears; what we need is the substance that comes from ongoing intimacy with God.

Defining Motivation

Motivation is the thing that moves us to fulfil our goals, governing how we use our time, talents and opportunities. Rom 12:11 reminds us to never be lacking in zeal but instead keep our spiritual fervour. We want to be the kind of people who make a difference to our churches and our world, not those who simply passively watch things happen or who question in bewilderment ‘What happened?!’ We need to be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in grace (see 1 Cor 15:58), able to persevere through trials and difficulties (as William Wilberforce did when working to abolish slavery.) Heb 2:1, Gal 5:1 and Rev 2:4 all warn of the dangers of losing our motivation. We need to be like the postage stamp, which sticks to one thing until it gets where it’s going!

Caleb is an example of someone who kept going to the end, being of a different spirit to the other ten spies who only saw difficulties and who lacked faith. His attitude focussed on God, not on the situation, and his strength and vigour remained strong at eighty-five! (see Josh 14:11). Paul is another example of joyful perseverance (see 2 Cor 11:23-29 for a list of the trials he faced) and, of course, Jesus is the one on whom we should fix our eyes for He shows us how to endure opposition by keeping the long-term goal in front of Him (see Heb 12:1-3).

Mark spoke from Gen 47:13-26 this morning, continuing to look at the story of Joseph. Here, we see how Jacob’s blessing of Pharaoh (so incongruous in that Pharaoh was the most important leader in the world at that time and Jacob was a mere Hebrew landowner), coupled with Joseph’s growing wisdom, results in even greater fame and wealth for Pharaoh. As the famine continues in the whole world, Joseph sells food in exchange for money, and then in exchange for livestock, land and eventually people. The people are desperate, for they have nothing, but as Joseph has shown prudence and wisdom because of God’s fore-warning, there is still food in Egypt, even if the price people have to pay is their animals, their land and even their freedom.

In the midst of this difficult and desperate situation, Joseph gives seed to the people, telling them they will once more grow crops, four-fifths of which they may keep, with one-fifth being returned to Pharaoh. It would take hard work to break up the dry, barren land in order to plant seed, but as Hosea 10:12 reminds us, we have to sow for ourselves righteousness and break up our unploughed land if we are to reap the fruit of unfailing love and see God’s showers of righteousness. Sometimes, we have to keep on doing the right things even in hard times, even when the prospect of a harvest seems remote.

Joseph the dreamer has vision and faith for all the people, not just for himself, and he can trust God to bring an end to the famine, for his faithful God had proved Himself time and time again. The people were grateful for the salvation Joseph provided, but he knew that God was the real source of the salvation in providing the wisdom and skill to help the people. Joseph has become more than a dreamer by this time; he has grown in wisdom and become spiritually wise; he has become a doer as well as a dreamer. When we truly give our lives to God, He will use us to bring about His will in the world, giving us the gifts we need to do so much more than anything we can ever dream.

Casting Crowns remind us that God’s dreams for us are so much greater than anything we could ever dream on our own. Mary dreamt of being a wife and mother; she never expected to become mother to the Son of God. David dreamt about being a big time shepherd one day, but God had plans for him to bring down Goliath (‘Dream For You’, Casting Crowns). Joseph’s dreams never included the salvation of Egypt and the whole world, but God is able to take a surrendered life and do amazing things through us. We want to be a generation that sees God move in awesome ways. He needs pliable ploughers and planters for His dreams to come true.

Whilst the holiday season is upon some of us, there are still things happening in Goldthorpe in July! Apart from the usual meetings at church, there are special meetings at other local churches coming up. On Saturday 4th July between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., the Salvation Army will be hosting a special celebration to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Salvation Army. There will be activities for all the family and a chance to see the newly decorated prayer room as well as the opportunity to find out more about how the local corps is helping the poor and needy in our locality.

Please note that next Sunday morning (5th July), there will be no meeting at Market Street, but we will be joining with the Methodist Church at Furlong Road in Bolton-on-Dearne at 10.30 a.m. The evening meeting at 6 p.m. will be at Market Street as usual.

On Friday 10th July between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m., Furlong Road Methodist Church in Bolton-on-Dearne will be hosting ‘Prayer Spaces’, an opportunity to spend some time in quiet prayer, reflecting on God’s goodness and praying for His kingdom to come in the Dearne Valley and beyond. You can spend as long as you want there, so even if you only have a short time to spare, it is good to be able to join with other Christians in prayer.

As the school holidays start, we hope to start decorating the community room and other areas, so if you have a day to spare from 20th July onwards, let us know and we can join together on this practical and necessary job!

Ps 96:1 tells us ‘ Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth’ (a command repeated in Ps 98:1 and Ps 149:1.) This promises to be a great summer of new songs for the Lord. Matt Redman’s album ‘Unbroken Praise’ was released in June and on 17 July the new album from Tim Hughes (‘Pocketful of Faith’) is released (listen here for a previews of the tracks.) Later on in August, Rend Collective’s new album (‘As Family We Go‘) is also released, with promise of a new Aaron Shust album later this year…

We are grateful for every songwriter blessed of God to bring us new songs to sing to God, songs which express our gratitude, awe and wonder at the nature of God and which remind us of the awesome things He has done on man’s behalf.  We are grateful for the new songs Garry and others are bringing to our church, echoing the prayers of our heart (‘Holy Spirit, Come‘) and teaching us the truth that ‘we’ll boast/ in the King of Kings we’ll boast.’ But the challenge to ‘sing to the Lord a new song’ remains for each one of us, whether we feel particularly gifted in this area or not! We can all sing a song of praise to God, letting the overflow of our hearts speak out the thankfulness and praise within. Our songs may never make it onto a CD or reach a wide audience, but God delights to hear the songs of each one of us as we worship and adore our mighty Saviour.

And if you’re not sure about your ability to sing a new song, you can always make a joyful noise to the Lord! (Ps 100:1, Ps 66:1)

June is a busy month for birthdays at our church! On Sunday, we celebrated another birthday:

I learnt a new word at the weekend, and as always was very excited about this fact! That word was ‘bokeh‘, and relates in particular to photography, apparently meaning ‘the aesthetic quality of the blur produced in the out-of-focus parts of an image produced by a lens.‘ Bokeh has been defined as “the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light” and is often used for effect by photographers, rendering parts of a photograph blurry while keeping other parts sharply in focus:

Photographers often use this effect with lights:

It struck me on having this crash course in photography that life is rather like this effect: much of it seems blurry from our limited perspective, but is crystal clear to God. Often, our confusion in life stems from our inability to see the ‘whole picture’ at once. Fortunately, God has no such problem!

‘From where I’m standing,
Lord, it’s so hard for me to see
Where this is going
And where You’re leading me.
I wish I knew how
All my fears and all my questions
Are gonna play out
In a world I can’t control.

When I’m lost in the mystery,
To You my future is a memory,
Cause You’re already there,
You’re already there;
Standing at the end of my life
Waiting on the other side
And You’re already there
You’re already there.’ (‘Already There’, Casting Crowns)