Have you ever gone to a restaurant and asked the staff there what dish they recommend? Sometimes this intimate knowledge of the menu can open up opportunities to try a new dish you would otherwise have ignored or been reluctant to try.

Or have you ever had a friend recommend an author or a film or a new place to you? Based on your trust in that person’s judgment, have you followed their recommendation and been pleasantly delighted to discover a new friend you might otherwise have ignored? This has happened to me so many times and it remains a source of unexpected joy to find new allies in exploring life…

Recommendations are only really helpful if you trust the person making them and that person knows you, for the things recommended can be highly personal and tastes vary enormously. It is not that there is anything wrong with some authors or films or places, but they may not be to our taste, and disappointment will come when recommendations fail to deliver the promise they suggest. However, the joy that results from recommendations which delight and which open for us new vistas cannot really be underestimated!

I have been meditating on John 1:35-51 for most of this year and I see this as one of the classic descriptions of evangelism that is accessible to us all. People who met Jesus essentially recommended Him to others: to their family, friends and acquaintances. Andrew, one of the first people to follow Jesus, told Peter: ‘the first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, “We have found the Messiah.”‘ (John 1:41) Later, Philip found Nathanael and told him, ‘We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law and about whom the prophets also wrote – Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.’ (John 1:45) Nathanael’s response was sceptical, but Philip’s reply was ‘Come and see.’ (John 1:46)

Essentially, evangelism involves recommending Jesus to people around us. We cannot force them to accept Him: salvation is a spiritual work of the Holy Spirit and will involve their response to God’s personal invitation. But our role is to recommend Jesus, for we know that in Him are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (Col 2:3) Just as many of our friends’ recommendations to us enrich our lives beyond words, this ultimate recommendation will lead to other people’s joy and salvation. Let’s not be shy in recommending Jesus!

We also had a birthday to celebrate!

This month’s prayer topic is looking at the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Pray that God will pour out His Holy Spirit on the churches in Goldthorpe and the surrounding area, giving us the power to be effective witnesses (Acts 1:8) and to live lives that are pleasing to the Lord.

Pray that we will be continually filled with the Spirit (Eph 5:18) and will be led by the Spirit in our everyday lives. (Rom 8:1-17)

Pray that we will see the gifts of the Spirit used in our meetings (1 Cor 12:1-11) and will seek to receive all that God has for us, stepping out in faith as God leads us.

Pray that we will seek God for all that He has for us and will hunger and thirst for His righteousness and kingdom above all other things. (Matthew 6:33)

Pray that God’s Spirit will lead us to those who do not know Him and that we will have boldness, wisdom and compassion as we minister to people. (Acts 8:26-40)

You might wonder why we spent time looking at bricks, brick bonds and the topic of walls at our family service! Well, the evening was inspired by the verse found in 2 Samuel 22:30 and Psalm 18:29: ‘With Your help I can advance against a troop; with my God I can scale a wall.’ We all know the expression ‘it’s like talking to a brick wall’ and anyone who is involved in long-distance running knows the expressing ‘hitting the wall’ for that feeling that we cannot go any further. Life can seem like a whole series of obstacles which are insurmountable, and most of us identify more with Danny’s approach to fences and barriers than Sergeant Angel’s in this clip from ‘Hot Fuzz.’

David was no strangers to enemies, opposition and hurdles. We see him killing the giant Goliath in 1 Samuel 17 and he even knew about enemies who had once been friends (many of the psalms being written as he was being hunted by Saul.) Later on in his life, he was to experience the betrayal of his own family, for his son Absalom conspired against him, wanting to oust him as king. (2 Samuel 15) These passages in 2 Samuel 22 and Psalm 18 show us his secret for overcoming high walls, however, for they are full of praise to the God who delivers.

Eph 2:1-22 shows us our desperate plight without God, but also reminds us that Jesus himself ‘is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.’ Sinful man could not approach a holy God and the curtain which separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple was a visual reminder of this fact. Matt 27:51 reminds us that this veil was torn in two from top to bottom when Christ died on the cross for our sins, thus reconciling us to God. The biggest wall of all has been broken down and with God’s help now we can scale any wall, confident that we can approach the throne of grace and find mercy and help in our times of need. (Heb 4:16) God is our deliverer and our help and with God, all things are possible. (Mark 10:27)

Tonight’s family service looked at the topic of walls. It was quite an education in types of bricks and brick bonds!

Did you know, for example, about stretchers, headers and soldiers in brick terms?! These relate to the position of the bricks:

A soldier is a brick laid vertically with the long narrow side of the brick exposed; a stretcher is a a brick laid with its long narrow side exposed and a header is a brick laid flat with its width at the face of the wall.

Then there are all different kinds of bonds (how the bricks are joined together), such as Flemish bonds, English bonds, Sussex bonds and so on. The game we played involved looking at these different kinds of bonds and then trying to reproduce them using Lego bricks!

Some people got carried away to be first to finish!

The first prize was a Lego kit:

… which was completed by the end of the evening!

It’s not often that one sermon reminds me of two songs! The other song I thought of whilst listening to John’s sermon this morning was Phil Wickham’s ‘Holy Light.’

‘We have come
And now we will wait
For Your love to move
For Your light to break

Start a movement here
As we call Your Name
Let Your glory fall
Like a holy rain

Dead arise
Hearts be awakened
In this life
Earth will be shaken.

God who reigns over earth and sky,
Flood this world with Your holy light;
Start a fire that will never die;
Flood this world with Your holy light.’ (Holy Light’, Phil Wickham)

One of the most powerful songs I have ever heard based on the passage featured in this morning’s sermon (John 8:1-12) is Michael Card’s ‘Scribbling in the Sand.’ The Bible does not tell us what Jesus wrote in the sand; this is obviously unimportant from the point of view of understanding the story, though many have speculated on the topic! It is interesting that Jesus took the time to write before He spoke and that when He did speak one simple sentence (‘Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’), this was enough to cause people to slink away. In the song, however, Michael Card talks as well about how the arts create a space and time when we can hear God.

‘It was silence; it was music;
It was art; it was absurd.
He stooped and shouted volumes
Without saying a single word

The same finger
Of the strong hand
That had written ten commands
For now was simply scribbling in the sand.’ (Michael Card, ‘Scribbling in the Sand’)