Thanks to everyone taking part in today’s service.
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“Big and Strong” is written, performed and recorded by Saddleback Kids.
It’s this one here and if you need to go back it’s quite sensitive so well just a tap should do it if you Good morning everyone good morning to you here sitting on Lovely comfortable seats and good morning to those at home who are sitting probably on even more comfortable seats but who knows um you’re very welcome to join us in worship this morning and we are here to
Praise and worship our lord Jesus um if you’re new here relatively new and you’ve only just started recently coming to bunan we give you a special welcome and if this happens to be your very first time at one of our services don’t worry I am not going to ask you to put
Your hand up um we welcome you especially we Welcome to our guest speakers Paul goodliff who was once Pastor here um in the ’90s and his wife Jill and they will be with us um throughout our service and Paul will be delivering God’s message about the Good
Shepherd um as we uh go through the service later on so everybody are you ready to sing you are that’s good you’re in good voice we’re going to stand and sing it is an oldie and it’s Praise My Soul the king of Heaven let’s raise the roof as we praise God this Morning praise my Soul Like PR praise him praise him praise him praise him Praise His great father his For praise him praise him praise him praise Him s his Like in his us us all him praise him praise him praise him His him [Applause] to us praise him praise him praise Him pra him PR [Applause] him please stay standing as we as we pray we are here Lord to praise and to worship you and however we feel you are worthy of our praise you are worthy to stand here and for us to worship you and
We welcome you into our presence Lord this morning we ask that everything that we say and do everything we sing the words that are read the message that is delivered will be pleasing to you and bring glory to your name thank you Lord for being here you have promised that
You will be with us and we claim that promise now and ask that your presence be made really really well felt Among Us here today meet us at our point of need we pray in Jesus name amen and we’re going to sing about the presence of the Lord be still for the
Presence of the Lord we still for the presence of the [Applause] Lord [Applause] CH still the presence of The for the glory of the Lord [Applause] The he bur with GL Glory of the Lord sh All still the power of the Lord ising And to the H his To the power of the Lord Is Please take a seat um it’s become quite customary for us to have uh a reading which we do responses I read the first bit and then you read the second bit the bits in bold and that so here we go and I I know what I’ve chosen is actually going to be the
Lord is my shepherd we’re singing this later um but I do wonder sometimes if we get so involved with tune uh and it’s such a common and well-known piece of scripture what I really want us to do today is to as we say the words together
Give a real thought to it to what it means to us and um I must admit every time I hear someone uh preach about uh Jesus as the shepherd I always learn something new I don’t think today is going to be any different but let’s read
This together it’s a Psalm of David and David of course himself was a Shepherd boy the shepherd boy who became king the Lord is my shepherd I have all that I need he lets me rest in Green Meadows he leads me beside peaceful streams strength even when I walk through the darkest
Valley I will not be afraid for you are close beside Me you honor Me by anointing my head with oil my cup overflows with blessings surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life and I will live in the house of the Lord forever amen that was my grandfather’s favorite scripture he was a preacher he died in
1956 uh and I only remember him as a small boy but the Lord’s my shepherd was just the the tune the song If if ever he was preaching bless him I think it was always on on the uh on the order of service and uh I learned to play it was
In those days the tune was crimmin and I bet some of you know the tune crimmin here now and um I I learned to play it on the piano for Grandpa anyway we have some notices now everybody likes notices and we have two notices to come up today and um SU D is
Going to give us the first notice and Paul felon is going to give us a notice about something completely different over to good morning everybody um I’m here to talk about prayer week which is coming up from the uh next Sunday the 18th of February till the following Saturday the
24th uh the lounge will be open for prayer during the week that week and there will also if those of you have read your notices already be um those that have the prayer chain will get a a message each day as well so even if we’re not here we can be praying um
Along with um themes and scriptures of course really we’d love to see everybody in the prayer room um and why I’m standing here rather than uh our sister Titi to give this message is because she’s asked me to repeat really what I said in the church meeting um
Recently so with the whole church prayer meeting uh that’s on the Monday the 19th part of uh it falls within the prayer week uh that’s our whole church meeting and I know the issue of our new Minister looking for a minister is really important I hear so many people
Talking about it people are praying themselves people are praying in small groups but we don’t get a terribly good response to the whole church meeting and uh we feel a little bit challenged by that um many of you will have heard Titi uh give us the verse from two Chronicles
7:14 If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face then I will hear them from heaven and when I was um thinking about that and thinking about what what would God like to see asked him really what
Would you like to see how many people do you think should be here and the answer I got was 40 people on their knees and um that’s what I’d just like to share with you this morning 40 people on their knees it would be great to see
That and actually both our songs the Sun and Moon bow down to the Lord Our God the second song We sang about bowing down so that’s that’s all I have to say thank You morning everyone um so if you’re a church member you should had an email from Mike Price um probably in the last 24 hours or day or so regarding our special church meeting which is on Tuesday week the 20th of February if you’re a church member and you haven’t
Had that email then please do contact Mike and um he’ll put you right on that um as you know this um meeting is dedicated to discussing a prospective new minister at the church it’s a really really important meeting um and we will be voting on a proposal to invite the
Candidate to preach with a view um we therefore encourage all members to attend the meeting in person if possible but the zoom link will be available for those who are still unable to attend just want to ask you to do three things first please make sure you read
The documentation that Mike sent I know there’s a lot there but um it’s necessary because there’s a lot to consider with the candidate we are we are looking at and then please come with questions as well so we know we have answered as many as your queries as we
Can at that at this stage secondly just following on from what Sue said of course please pray especially for wisdom and guidance as we consider this candidate but also pray for the candidate as he continues to seek God’s Will and guidance regarding this huge decision the meeting as Sue says falls
In the week of prayer and we will be taking plenty of time to pray during that evening and lastly again please make every effort to attend we realize it’s half term and some of you are able to attend for differing reasons but we hope to get a really good consensus from
Church members of God’s Will and guidance at that meeting thank You couple of important things for us to put in our Diaries there um I’m going to ask Nicola to come up now and to lead us in a children’s song and the children will go out after that but we dedicate just a a few minutes to singing a song
Particularly for the children and um I don’t know if you know it if you do that’s great um if you want to stand up and do the actions and follow Nicola that’s fine you can do that as well don’t hit anybody okay be nice um that’s it so I hand over to
Nicola now and uh let’s listen to the Song my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone everyone my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone every God cares for me he says I’m Special God stands with me he’s there when I’m in trou my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone everyone my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone [Applause] everyone [Applause] hey Hey God cares for me he says I’m special God stands with Me he’s there when I’m in trouble my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone everyone my God is big and strong big and strong he loves everyone Everyone y here we go it’s good the children and young people are now going to their groups and we say uh goodbye to them for the moment until the end of the service so young people children if you’d like to go to your groups you know
Where to go I think by now so please do and uh we’ll continue with our service here pray that God will bless you and that your leaders will too be blessed we’re going to have a reading now I’ll ask Jillian to come up and give us A reading from John chapter 10 vers 11 to8 and I’m reading from the New Testament for everyone the shepherd and the Sheep I am the Good Shepherd Jesus continued the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the Sheep but supposing there’s a hired servant who isn’t himself the shepherd and who doesn’t
Himself own the Sheep he will see the wolf coming and leave the sheep and run away then the wolf will snatch the sheep and scatter them he’ll run away because he’s only a hired servant and doesn’t care about the Sheep I am the Good Shepherd I know my
Sheep and my own know me just as the father knows me and I know the father and I lay down my life for the sheep and I have other sheep too which don’t belong to this Sheepfold I must bring them too and they will hear my
Voice then there will be one flock and one Shepherd that’s why the father loves me because I lay down my life so that I can take it again nobody takes it from me I lay it down of my own accord I have the right to lay it down
And I have the right to receive it back again this is a command hand I received from my father amen thanks J now I’m going to invite Paul to come up and give us the message that God has given him thank you Jeff well good morning
Everybody lovely to be here uh with you you uh all uh I say again because I I think it was back in October when I was here after many a long year and uh it’s very great to be with you again this morning for those who don’t know me um
And there are so many familiar faces why does no one ever leave this church I mean it’s just a wonderful Church isn’t it that’s why you don’t uh but there are some who I don’t recognize um uh I was Minister here from 1992 uh until about
1998 8 I think 99 Joel tells me uh and um when I became general superintendent of the area but we stayed in membership here and then we moved away to stevenage uh stevenage to bista in oxer uh when um uh I became head of Ministry for the
Bapis union so uh that’s when we left in about 2004 uh the same week that our eldest son Andrew got married and many of you will know Andrew as well because he was on staff here for a while uh after I left uh I’m now retired Jill would laugh at
That um but I am retired uh although I’m doing quite a lot of teaching at Spurgeon at the moment but um one of the things I’ve done for your encouragement is uh I’ve been moderator of a church called pachc Christian Center in Abington I’d been minister of Abington
Baptist for three years and knew of the church and so when it went into pastoral vacancy the uh uh Regional team said could I go and moderate this because my last job being paid to be a whatever was um ecumenical lead for for England so this is a an Anglican
Methodist Baptist United Reformed Church single congregation local ecumenical partnership and you thought that might be tricky but let me tell you for your encouragement on Thursday of last week after I read that reading from John 10 uh about the Good Shepherd because I knew I was preaching it this sun Sunday
Um we had a church meeting and the church uh almost unanimously called their next minister so Brothers and Sisters in Christ there is light at the end of your search for a new Minister uh and if it’s anywhere as unanimous and as joyful as it was at petc Christian
Center on Thursday we just heard yesterday the ministers accepted so they’ll be hearing it about now um in uh in their church that they’ve called and that call has been acknowledged by their next Minister who is a Baptist this time around that will be a great joy for you
Fairly soon I pray as you uh look for your next Minister but that’s not where Jill and I are in membership we worship at uh bista in bista at the orchard Baptist Church there where Jill is the Church secretary so um she’s she she’s got a week a Sunday
Off you see uh be to be able to come with me which is wonderful uh so uh we bring you greetings from our church in bista which is um Church doesn’t have its building it meets in a School drama studio um and uh there will be in the
Middle of their Sunday morning service just now shall we pray May the words of my mouth and the meditation of all our hearts be be acceptable in your sight oh God our strength and Our Redeemer amen I have a newish car um well it’s
New to me it’s new to us and the leaping communication between me and it has been somewhat challenging my old golf GTE which I think I drove here last time I was preaching taught told me what mileage I was achieving from both petrol and electric motors and had a rather simple
Cruise control that admittedly did slow the car down to about the same speed as the car in front which is always useful but it’s observations on my driving was limited to telling me that I needed a coffee break every so often my new GTE nags me if I don’t
Drive in the middle of the lane nudges the steering wheel to enforce that observation if I don’t pay attention to it tells me to take my foot of the accelerator when I approach a roundabout that I didn’t even know was coming up or or even a bend in the road and flashes
At me when a car is on my Blind Side that’s quite useful uh and overtaking me it automatically slows the car to the uh speed limit even in normal driving uh and it seems one step away from telling me to set up straight uh brush my hair and stop growling at all
Those other drivers who drive too fast or too slow who tow a caravan apologies for caravaners or speed past me at well over the limit bossy doesn’t begin to describe it we sometimes think of the Bible in that way it’s there just to keep us in the
Straight and narrow not going too far off the lanes it gives us a shedload of facts about God and acts as a highway code for living but this statement that Jesus is the Good Shepherd takes us into a whole new world what the great Swiss 20th century Swiss Protestant Theologian car
Bart called The Strange New World of the Bible we’re called not into a relationship with a book but we’re called into a relationship with a Shepherd we hear a voice speaking to our hearts not just a list of what we must or may not do now of course we’re reading a gospel
Text about the Good Shepherd so the Bible is clearly a vital part of how how we meet the shepherd and how we hear the shepherd’s voice but the reason we read scripture and I do hope you read your scripture every day the reason we read it is order in order to encounter Jesus
Who here we meet as the Good Shepherd we’re not reading our Bible just to amass uh some facts about God we’re reading the Bible in order to meet God himself s The God Who is the Eternal son of the father who is describing himself in Our Gospel reading as the Good
Shepherd uh the missing person of course in this is the holy spirit Jesus doesn’t talk about the spirit at this point in the gospel he does elsewhere and as we read the scriptures so the same spirit that inspired those who wrote the scriptures inspired John who was a
Disciple of Jesus to write this account of Jesus’s life The Same Spirit that inspired the writers of scripture draws near to us and makes those scriptures come alive to us so so that we’re not just reading dead words on a page but the Living Word of God coming aresh to
Us in the power of the spirit so these sayings of Jesus about being a good shepherd speaks to us first of all about how we might know Jesus and it has something to do with recognizing his voice and then something about who he is and understanding what his death
Means so first of all the shepherd knows his sheep if you watch Adam Henson on Country file you get the impression that being a Shepherd involves working with dogs and riding a quad bike but even in the fast turnover of a modern sheep farm in Britain the Shepherd gets to know the
Sheep but this was far more intimate in the first century Palestine and remains so to today the flocks on the whole are smaller and the role of the shepherd is to keep them safe and lead them to pasture in an arid landscape where there are wild animals that might attack
Them at night that flock of sheep would all be corraled with other flocks of sheep into a large sheep pen and the Shepherds would take it in turns to lie across the entrance to a keep the sheep in and B keep the wild animals out but in the
Morning when it was time to go and look for fresh pasture each Shepherd would stand up and call his sheep and the Sheep would recognize his voice now I don’t suppose the Sheep had a clue what he was saying but they recognized his voice and so when that Shepherd left his
Sheep would follow him and off they would go not being driven from behind or corraled by dogs but simply following this Shepherd who they knew would lead them to Fresh fresh pasture for that day it’s a whole different world from Adam’s Farm on Country file and in this Parable it’s more than
A parable but it is a parable Jesus says that his sheep recognize his voice and follow him while a stranger’s voice simply scares them away those strangers by contrast to the shepherd are only out for what they can get and they don’t really care anything for the
Sheep Jesus is echoing the Old Testament where the king of Israel is called The Shepherd of the sheep of course the greatest King as Jeff has reminded us already was David who began his working life not as a king or even as a prince but as a straightforward
Shepherd and there were plenty of characters around in Jesus’s day who claimed leadership who claimed to be those who were rightly shepherding the people of God Herod and his court was the nearest they had to a King he wasn’t really an independent King he was subject to Rome and his policies
Would do all that they could to pacify Rome to keep Rome happy and Rome was happy if Herod made his people calm because that meant everything could go on as normal there were others who thought this was outrageous and rebelled against the power of Rome and also of Herod and
Would sacrifice others lives in order to pursue their policy of Independence and throwing off the Roman yoke and becoming an independent nation again they had been independent about 200 years earlier under Judas macbes but that had all been lost I’m reminded of those Hamas leaders who plotted and planned the massacres in
Southern Israel over a 100 days ago now they plotted and planned we’re led to believe from various Middle Eastern capitals living in expensive hotel rooms and wearing the best cut suits and not really caring what was going to happen to the people of Gaza as a result meanwhile Israel is at the moment
Planning the final assault on Gaza has already been 27,000 people killed uh with nowhere knowing where the 1.5 million guards and citizens are going to go they’re waiting for some kind of plan to move them somewhere but there is nowhere else to go they’ve all
Been moved down as Israel is in in stage by stage uh uh sought to root out the Hamas fighters who it blames for the massacres of over 100 years ago what Jesus describes in his day where he says I’m the Good Shepherd not like these other Shepherds around about
I am the Good Shepherd is all too familiar in our world today these aren’t ancient stories of no relevance to us this is happening in our world at the very moment and to the world Jesus says I am the good Shepherd Jesus is implying that he is Israel’s true
King and of course that will be seen evident a week before his death as he rides in to Jerusalem on that uh ass that donkey the king who cares so much for his people that he will die for them and when Ezekiel prophesies that God will send a new
King to be the ruler of God’s people God first says in Ezekiel 34:1 15-16 I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep I will seek the lost and bring them back and bring back the Stray a little bit further on in verses in verse 23 God says through the prophet
Ezekiel I will set over them one Shepherd my servant David and he shall feed them and be their Shepherd well make your mind up Ezekiel which is it is it God or is it David’s ancestor David’s successor I mean who is it who is this person who’s going to
Shepherd God’s people well Jesus makes that very clear so when he says I am the Good Shepherd he’s making a claim not just to be Israel’s true king but to be the Fulfillment of the of ezekiel’s Prophecy when Ezekiel says God says I will Shepherd my
People in a way this is one of the clearest sayings of Jesus where he identifies himself with God as God’s son I myself will Shepherd my people says God well Jesus does it because he is God I will send my servant David and he will do it well yes because God sent his
Son to be the Messiah and this is all deepened when Jesus says in John 17 the father and I are one you are in me and I am in you Jesus knows us and we know him as we listen to his voice and reading scripture is the foundation of that
Listening it’s where we come to recognize the tone of voice as those sheep recognize the tone of voice of their Shepherd so as we read scripture we begin to recognize the tone the the feel of what God says when it’s God speaking because there are so many other
Voices out there some of them in our head telling us what we should do or what we shouldn’t do how do we recognize when it’s God’s voice well as we read scripture we recognize the tone of voice by the spirit when it’s God speaking to us we need the
Spirit to illumin our hearts to speak the words of scripture to us so that for us they become the Living Word For Us pointing to that Eternal one who is the word of God Jesus so the Good Shepherd the most R image we read it already is of the Shepherd in Psalm 23
Jesus says I am the Good Shepherd what does Jesus mean when he says I am the Good Shepherd how many of you watch the great Pottery throw down some of you do uh they are attempting to make good pots and if they make a good pot I
Suppose you could say they are a good Potter uh a good Potter is someone who makes are good pots pots with Integrity pots that are beautiful pots that do what pots are meant to do but you could also say that a good Potter is a Potter who is morally good
Who’s an upright good citizen Potter um and the modern day understanding of virtue ethics says that these two things are connected if you devote your life to being good or what you do it has an impact on who you are and who you are has an impact upon what
You do so a good Potter because they’re good wants to make good pots and not pass off shoddy wear and as you develop the skills of being a good Potter I understand I’m not a Potter at all as you develop the skill to be a good Potter so it affects the
Way that you live the rest of your life and perhaps here is where we come to the current circumstances as you seek a new pastor which is just a fancy word for a Shepherd what makes a good pastor well it’s more than mere competence you’d expect that of anyone
Who is claiming to be a pastor they should be able to preach a half decent sermon and know how to conduct some past through visits and know how to do a bit of basic Administration and manage a diary and all that kind of stuff but when you’re looking for a good
Pastor you’re not looking just for competence you’re looking for someone who has been with Jesus uh What Glenn Marshall uh describes as someone about whom there is the whiff of Jesus and I pray that as you pursue the discernment process of finding your next Pastor you’ll not only
Find a competent pastor and you can tell that by uh by what they do but you’ll also meet someone and you’ll call someone and you’ll have someone as your pastor here who carries about them the whiff of Jesus because they’ve been with him and they are with him and Jesus is with
Them and that’s not about competence it’s about basic goodness a good man let’s encourage you again as Sue is done already to pray as you do in a couple of weeks time to pray that God will lead to you a good Pastor I pray that you want
It God’s people deserve it and God in his faithfulness will grant it so step into this next stage of your search process with confidence and with discernment and prayerfulness knowing that God is going to lead someone to you who will lead you on the next stage of your
Journey as they are with Jesus will help you to gather with Jesus to travel with Jesus on the way that Jesus wants you to go isn’t that what you want and that will take you out into your community where others need to know about Jesus I have sheep
From are they not in this flock says Jesus and I need to reach them too how does Jesus do that he does that through you and he does that through this church and churches throughout the world Jesus will literally lie lay down his life for the sheep and take it up again in
Resurrection Glory laid down willingly his life will be given that we might live and that’s the Jesus whom we follow that’s the Good Shepherd who calls us to follow him this Jesus the Good Shepherd shows us what God is like for he and the father are one he doesn’t cling to power
Like Herod or exploit others like those Warlords of Jesus’s own day he doesn’t oppress those who have little value like the Great Empire of Rome did no When Jesus dies on the cross we see in the most Vivid and perfect detail what God is like he is The God Who pours himself out
For us and for the whole world something of pouring out and caring is true of anybody who claims to be a pastor but it’s true also of a whole church as you give yourselves to one another in Grace and love and prayerfulness as you want to move
Together Our Lives come to reflect that character of Jesus as we hear the good Shepherd’s voice as we follow after him as we listen to his voice through Reading scripture and as that happens so our lives get shaped so that we’re no longer shaped like the uh the the the
The the world’s shape an ugly pot of of of of deception or or or or anger or violence it gets shaped into something which is beautiful bit like those pots that you can see in the picture those pots uh are pots that J and I have I took them down to Abingdon
Baptist Church and that’s where that photograph is taken they’re on the communion table uh the 17th century communion table in Abington Baptist Church arranged and I took a photograph because they needed a cover photo for a book that I’d written that was being published shaped for service is the title of the
Book brothers and sisters we are being shaped to serve the king as we follow the Good Shepherd can I ask you to pause a moment and if you want to renew that following of Jesus the Good Shepherd in a moment I’m going to pray for
You and I would like you to just pray that in your own heart I’m not going to ask you to stand up or lift your hand or anything like that but just to pray Lord let me follow you aresh today let’s pause for a moment you are the Good Shepherd Lord Jesus
Christ you’ve called us to follow you and this morning here and now we ask that you would shape Our Lives aresh into something that is beautiful and useful because you are the Good Shepherd and a good Potter as well and Lord we renew aresh this morning
Our desire to follow you as we hear your voice as a whole church grant us we pray the ability to hear your call upon someone who will be our pastor that we might recognize it and be obedient to it we ask that for him too
But Lord more than that we pray that we may be those who are fresh today determined to follow Jesus the Good Shepherd help us to hear your voice to recognize it and to follow out to wherever you may lead for you are the one who’s laid down
Your life for us and we gladly give our lives aresh to you this morning in the name of Jesus shepher and King amen some sometimes we um we say let’s reflect on that and someone who’s leading a service actually says let’s um let’s remember that bit can I just say
I’m not going to dilute that message in any way shape or form um it is just so important and the very first point I think that that Paul made was that reading the Bible is not um about learning about God it’s it’s learning to really understand God and and the message goes
From here the the sort of intellectual through to the heart if you want to listen to that message again you know that you can do it’s available on YouTube and I’d encourage you if you felt that there was something there for you today um listen to it again and uh
And you I guarantee every time we listen to something somehow something else crops up and we learn even more so thank you Paul for the message and for delivering it the one that God gave to you and it blesses us um I like your taste in pots incidentally it’s very similar to
Rachel’s and mine we love L um when you are leading worship it’s always good to get in touch with the person who is going to be speaking and say are there any songs that you might particularly like included now that can be very dangerous especially if it’s someone
Who’s coming in and doesn’t you know know us at least in in this time of the century I know it was last century that Paul um so I did ask and inevitably um quite expectedly the Lord’s my shepherd came up and we are going to be singing that
In in a moment but he came up with one that I didn’t know and I thought I don’t think think we know that one either now he did graciously say look hey look if it’s too much don’t worry about it I listened to it on YouTube and I loved
It absolutely loved it and we are going to sing it we practiced it this morning and it’s called yet not I but through Christ in me after we’ve sung that one please remain standing because then we will sing another song So join us you’ll you’ll catch on it’s quite easy to learn okay
Promise yet not I but through Christ in Me of Praise is Jesus more for heaven Might is my joy my rightous and my Might I my hope is Jesus Oh My Is sing Is I by my side the he Will in weakness and re for my this power is to this my sheer will through the he will has been oh the not but through [Applause] CH no f i I know the future strong the ch it has been for Jesus for my he was rais to [Applause] our this I my has Been [Applause] Jus is my oh the chains are Rel I can sing I [Applause] am [Applause] [Applause] CH with every breath I long to follow Jesus who he has said that he will bring me and day by day I know he will re until I stand with joy before the [Applause] ground I hope my hope is always all the Glor not Christ in the gra is complete till my lips show not but Christ yet not die [Applause] butr quite a few of you knew that didn’t you well I know you did yes you chose it that’s that’s wonderful um I I think there was a little bit of skepticism on Richard’s part as to whether or not this was you know gonna g to be a good song
At the end of the practice I was very encouraged to hear him say that looks like it might go on our regular list that’s good that’s good I’m absolutely certain it’s going to go on our regular list it’s already been added actually Matt Smith has added it to our our list
Of songs we’re going to sing um one more quickly now before Eric comes and lead us in in inter sessions the Lord’s my shepherd it’s the modern version the steuart town in version so let’s remain standing and let’s sing the Lord’s my shepherd The Lord my sheer the He still Still my soul and I will trust I will trust I will TR I will inless Mery Follow Will in rightous and heo my head with And all Jo my Is and I will trust I will trust I will trust I will I will TR I will TR your goodness will me and know I walk and his I will not be the evil one for you your Will I will trust I will trust I will I will TR I will trust you your goodness Will your goodness will [Applause] me please do sit down let us pray Lord we thank you that you are our Good Shepherd keeping us safe when needed driving off the Predators who would chew us up leading us along good paths even when we want to wander off and go our
Own sweet way healing our wounds and our sicknesses we pray for our church Community here in bunan we thank you that despite not having a minister an unders sheeper you have still guided us on we pray that you would keep us on the right path and root out any of us who
Might lead the flock astray or cause division or harm Lord encourage and discipline our leadership as may be necessary for continued blessing through us and raise up new people to work alongside us as needed we pray that as we seek and Minister you will G guide our decision
Making and give us and potential candidates such wisdom as to know when to push forwards or when to pull back we pray for those who are ill within our church community and families in particular we remember Joan King David Bachelor Melia ingeri and Charlotte beach if there are others you wish us to
Remember please call out their names we lift those who are grieving the loss of a loved one both those for whom this has been recent but also those who may be a year or two down the line and for whom it is still quite raw we pray in particular for the card
And Humphrey Cooper families we also lift Jeff and Judy and Noah as they settle down in Corall if there are others that you would wish us to remember please call out their names yeah we pray for our town and the leaders of the government agencies that
Work to keep us safe and secure our local authorities our health services our emergency services our schools and colleges Lord we pray for those who lead within those agencies and as we have prayed for our church we ask you to encourage those who are doing a good job
But root out those who are corrupt or misusing their office those only in it for the money or the power or those who are just plain incompetent please please replace them with men and women who have wisdom integrity and sound judgment we pray the same for our national government we pray that they
Will be Bringers of justice and shared wealth and good health irrespective of their party affiliations we pray that you would protect us from those who put party or other affiliations or ideology in head ahead of justice and mercy make us once more to be known as a country where mercy and jusful Justice
Are plentiful like Still Waters ready to be drunk lastly we pray for those from this flock who are working to lead other flocks for Ruth hola The Smiths and the pews we ask you that you would lead them in Green Pastures providing them with the resources they need to work
Effectively may they save lives and souls and bring health and well-being to all they come into contact with Lord may your kingdom come and your will be done on Earth as in heaven give us this day our daily bread forgive us our wrongdoings as we forgive those who wrong us amen
We’re nearly at the end of our service and um I remember seeing a notice once on a church it was a Baptist Church and it said um as you go out I I don’t actually totally agree with it but you get the gist the worship is over the service begins
And um as we go out of the door today um the rest of the week for us as Christians should be exactly the same Our Lives should be led in worship to Jesus and in letting others know about him and the Good Shepherd we’re going to
Sing our final song now um it’s too a tune that we may associate with another hymn um we had a little bit of a chuckle about it when we were practicing um it’s go forth and tell so will you please stand with us as we sing go forth and Tell a church on God singing to all the nations myor Lord and King let all his worthy Praise we will gra one to all If they never the grait his still the [Applause] dark in the the son of And the doors are open [Applause] take as Christ the Lord Shall GL a Church of streng Christ Your Love All Nation Please do take a seat uh our service is over we will be saying Cheerio to those at home in a moment but let us just have a word of blessing as as we depart from them or they depart from us Lord we thank you for being here with us this morning we
Pray that the power of your message the Good Shepherd will ring true for us and that will it will really mean something to us and we will see perhaps you in a new light over the coming weeks so the blessing of God Almighty the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit
Bless us and remain with us as we leave here we ask it in the name of Jesus Amen so feel free you don’t turn around and wave but just say goodbye to everyone at home thank you for joining us we hope that you have enjoyed worshiping Jesus worshipping God with us
And that you will join us again so thank you and goodbye everyone at home Heart by day all my night Sence and th true And father th And Praise th Iner heart I of Heaven Tre King Of Heaven Viory may he reach Heavens to his all and my Heart still our R the great he has so the world