Tonight’s Bible study looked at 1 John 2:15-17, verses which talk about not loving the world. Clearly, here we are not talking about the world simply as God’s creation or as the people whom God loves (John 3:16), but as the world under the evil one’s control. All of us have followed the ways of the world before we knew Christ (Eph 2:1-3) and there is stark contrast between the Light that Jesus brings into the world and the general reaction of the world to that light. (see John 1:6-10; John 3:19, Eph 2:11-13)

When Jesus died on the cross, judgment was spoken on the devil (see John 12:31). His authority and rule in the world, causing mankind to follow patterns or routines which are not of God, has been destroyed by Jesus; we now no longer have to live under the devil’s authority and influence. The world lives in a way that is anti-Christ (see 1 John 4:1-3), but those in whom God’s Spirit lives have overcome all that is against God. (1 John 4:4) The whole world is under the control (or sway) of the evil one (1 John 5:19), but we are children of God in whom God’s word dwells and so we can live according to a different pattern, being transformed by the renewing of our minds (Rom 12:2) so that we no longer love the world (with ‘the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life‘) but have love for God as our priority and overarching motivator. This is not to say that Christians should never have nice possessions, but we recognise that life does not consist in the abundance of our possessions (Luke 12:15) and keep ourselves from anything which comes before God. To do otherwise is to allow idols into our lives, which John warns against in 1 John 5:21, the Amplified version reminding us that an idol is ‘anything and everything that would occupy the place in your heart due to God, from any sort of substitute for Him that would take first place in your life.’ The challenge before us is to seek God above everything else and allow love for Him to squeeze out love for anything else that would distract us from the pure worship He deserves.

Hope House School in Barnsley (situated on Blucher Street, near the Post Office) is hosting a fund-raising event on Tuesday 1st April from 7 p.m. until 9.30 p.m. to raise funds towards the refurbishment of an outdoor play area. This is a ‘Pamper Evening,’ so if anyone likes the idea of a little luxury time, having their nails painted or a hand, feet or back massage by professionals or wants to buy beauty products from the Body Shop or homemade jewellery or candles from Party Lite, this is the event to go to!

Tickets are available from Julie at a cost of £3 (which includes refreshments), with items then being individually priced. Nail painting, hand & feet massages will all cost £3.50 and a back massage will cost £7.50. There is opportunity to purchase items beforehand, even if you cannot attend the event itself. Only the massages need to be pre-booked.

So if you want to relax and treat yourself or other people, this is an event to consider!

The Women’s World Day of Prayer was held last Friday, the local service being at Furlong Road Methodist Church in Bolton-on-Dearne. The meeting was attended by a good number of people from a variety of local churches.

The service was written by Christian women from Egypt, with the theme ‘Streams in the Desert.’ One portion looked at the exchange between Jesus and the woman at the well (John 4):

Ladies representing different people in Egypt (a student, a Muslim, an Orthodox Christian and so on) spoke about the situation in Egypt and about God’s promises to that nation:

Our thanks to all who took part and attended and to the Methodist Church for hosting the event and the lovely refreshments after the service. An offering of £120 was given to Women’s World Day of Prayer, which is then distributed to a variety of Christian organisations and charities.

This evening, Stephen spoke from Matthew 6:9-15. The Lord’s prayer is a template for us to follow in how to pray (communicating with God verbally and spiritually), but this also forms a pattern for living. It starts by setting the King in glory in our lives (‘our Father in heaven, hallowed by Your name’), for knowing the difference our heavenly Father makes and accepting the difference that this makes is crucial to our wellbeing.

Often, we have recited the Lord’s prayer collectively, but this prayer is important in answering key questions in life to do with our purpose and identity.  As we pray ‘Your kingdom, Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven’, we come to understand that our purpose is to honour God and advance His kingdom through who we are and in everything that we do through our cooperation with God’s Spirit who is at work in each and every one of us. We grow to the point where what we want is aligned with what God wants so that we think, speak, act and relate to people in a Christ-like way. We are inwardly connected to Jesus (see John 15:1-8) and can then live our lives pursuing the interests of God’s kingdom.

Often, we want to know our specific, individual purpose with certainty, wanting to know our unique purpose in life . Sometimes, perhaps, our search for the specific is misguided and our need for certainty may reflect our addiction to control. God wants to teach us to trust Him, rather like when we learn to abseil and have to lean back and lean out and ultimately let go! Focussing on God will centre us squarely in God’s plan for our lives.

We also had two birthdays to celebrate:

This morning saw us hold the first service from our church at Cherry Tree Court in Highgate. This is a residential complex for older people and we were privileged to be able to take a church service there. We sang some hymns and Dave brought a short word from Luke 13:10-17, looking at the crippled woman whom Jesus healed. This woman had been crippled for eighteen years and is not even named in this account; she must have felt discouraged and depressed and had low self-esteem as a result of her many problems, but the encounter with Jesus restored her to health and wholeness, reminding her of her true identity as a ‘daughter of Abraham.’ Jesus is able to meet our every need and to care for us, no matter what situations weigh us down. He is the One who has the power to break every chain in our lives.

It was good to see old friends reunited:

After the service, we enjoyed a drink in the lovely restaurant and chatted with residents:

In future, we will hold a service at Cherry Tree Court on the 2nd Sunday morning of each month, starting at 10:30 a.m. The next meeting will be on 13th April.

At the concert, Michael Card sang (at times with his daughter, Maggie) a range of his 423 songs on a variety of themes, playing both piano, guitar and banjo. You can click on some of the links to listen to some of these.

The songs were:

1. Could It Be?
2. Love Crucified Arose
3. God’s Own Fool
4. That’s What Faith Must Be
5. Soul Anchor
6. Come Lift Up Your Sorrow (his own personal favourite from all the songs he has written)
7. Tennyson Poem
8. A King In a Cattle Trough
9. A Better Freedom
10. Jubilee
11. El Shaddai
12. The Things We Leave Behind
13. Why?
14. Never Will I Leave You
15. The Sunrise of Your Smile
16. I Will Not Walk Away
17. Shut Your Lamps (an Irish lullaby, the term meaning ‘close your eyes’!)
18. Galilee (instrumental, from his new album ‘The Penultimate Question’ on Matthew’s Gospel)
19. Lost in the temple (instrumental)
20. Sea of Souls
21. Born in the flesh (title may be different from the opening line)
22. This Is Who You Are (from his new album ‘The Penultimate Question’ on Matthew’s Gospel)
23. In Memory of Her Love
24. Immanuel
25. The Basin and the Towel
26. Benediction

If you are interested, Michael Card will be performing at Maltby Full Life AoG church on Wednesday 12th March at 7:30 p.m. Tickets (costing £10) are available online here.