This week Jon continues our sermon series ‘What is Church?’ with ‘Serving’ – Mark 10:35-45.
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e e [Music] it’s the song of the redeemed rising from the a it’s the song of the forgiven drowning out the Amazon right the song of Asian Believers filled with God’s holy [Music] fire it’s every tribe every town every nation Love Song born of a [Music] grateful it’s song Children singing Glory Hallelujah All Children singing Glory Glory Hallelujah let it rise above the up in the heaven sound let Praises Echo From The Towers of Cathedral to the faithful gather under ground of all the songs from the tone of creation someone to all the bells thousand n Rings up and this it’s all got Children singing Glory Glory hallelu All Children singing Glory Glory hallelu Hallelujah hallelu and know the powers of Darkness tremble at what they just [Music] heard cuz all the powers of dark can’t drown out a single word yes all the powers of Darkness tremble at what they just heard cuz all their powers of Darkness can drown out single it’s allong should been singing Glory Glory Hallelujah every people every every standing the of Glory Glory hallelu hu every C every tongue every KNE everybody our Messiah GL Glory hallelu [Music] worshiping sing Hallelujah glor Glory GL hallel Hallelujah All Children singing Glory Glory Hallelujah he uh good morning everybody good morning uh welcome to church this morning it’s lovely to have you here my name is uh Keith one of the pastors here at slow backst Church uh why don’t we just take a moment to say good morning to somebody why don’t you stand up uh say good morning if someone s behind you to to a new face an older face say good morning to somebody good morning great so it’s really nice to be here this morning good to worship God together I’m going to uh start with just a few words from Psalm 100 Psalm 100 says shout for Joy to the Lords all the Earth Worship the Lord with gladness come before him with joy ful songs know that the Lord is God it is he who made us and we are his we are his people the Sheep of his pasture enter his gates with Thanksgiving and his courts with praise give thanks to him and praise His name for the Lord is good and his love endures forever his faithfulness continues through all generations shall we uh shall we pray just to begin our time together and I’m going to close my my eyes I’m going to say dear God thank you for this opportunity to worship you together this morning we thank you that we can come here in the name of Jesus your son our Lord and savior we thank you that thanks to Jesus’s death in our place that our sins can be forgiven and we thank you Lord Jesus that you have risen from the dead that you are alive and you encourage us this morning to meet with God and to worship him together so may your spirit fill us and fill this place may we worship you may our Focus be on you this morning to let you be greater and greater in our lives so come Lord Jesus meet us we pray amen so encourage you to stand if you are able to do so and we’re going to sing a couple of songs together as part of our opening song worship so let’s stand if you’re able to do so and let’s worship god with our [Music] voices we are here together to lift our hearts as one we’re in a father presence his spirit is with us we are here together to lift our hearts as one we’re in our father’s presence his spirit is with us here is good to lift the name of the Lord our God is right to give him thanks and Grace for his heart is overflowing with love for us and his Mercy we can never [Music] contain each and every morning will tell of his great love of his faithful mercies and all that he has done for who can match his kindness and who can count his words oh let our praise continue to theing it is good to lift the name of the Lord Our God it is right to give him thanks and praise for his heart is overflowing with love for us and his Mercy we can never contain it is good to lift the name of the Lord our God is right to give him thanks and praise for his heart is overflowing with love for us and his Mercy we can never contain Glory H wisdom power and strength to our Savior Jesus wory of the praise glory honor lift power and Str to our Savior Jesus worthy of it is good to lift the of the Lord Our God it is right to give him thanks and praise for his heart is overflowing with love for us and his Mercy we can never contain it is good to the name of the Lord our God is right to give him thanks and praise for his heart is overflowing with love for us and his Mercy with con it is right to give it thanks and praise it is right to give thanks and praise ways we do that is uh by giving God back some of the resources he’s given us during the week so we at this point we take up our offering so those who uh handbag handr The Collection bags going to come and service in that way if you give in other ways feel free to let the offering bag pass if you’re visiting us you can feel to free to let it pass to but it’s recognition that God gives us and so we give back to support the work of his church here in slau and in The Wider world so as we continue to worship god with our songs we shall uh take up our [Music] offering BL and honor glory and power the anent [Music] of from every nation all of creation before the Ancient of Days Every tongue in Heaven and Earth shall deare Your Glory every KN shall power your in Word you be exalted oh God and your kingom shall not away anent blessing and honor glory and power to the ancient of from every nation all of creation B for the ancient of every Tong in Heaven and Earth shall declare your glory every KN shall bow at your throne in worship you will be exalted oh God and your kingdom shall not pass away for ancient of [Music] your kingdom shall rain over all the Earth sing the ancient of for shall compare to your m word sing to the Ancient of Days your kingom shall R over all the Earth sing to the ancient of for shall compare to your m sing to the Ancients of things every time in Heaven and Earth shall declare your glory every knee shall bow your throne in worship you will be exalted oh God and your kingdom shall not pass away anes oh Ancient of Days oh ancient of yes Lord we uh thank you and praise you that you are the alpha and the Oma the one who always is who was and shall be and we worship you this morning the god of all creation the god of every nation The God Who is in charge of everything that happens and so we worship you and praise you for your power your might and your majesty We Worship You Lord God Amen do take a seat and uh I know for many people this is the highlight of church we’ve got the notices yeah uh so um if you are a church member you should be aware that we have our church members meeting on Wednesday uh we start at 7:00 with prayer and uh 7:45 for uh some praise and worship and then different items you should have read the agenda uh you’ll see that there’s stuff about Visions stuff about the building so if you can be here in person please join us uh for our church members meeting if you are a church member on Wednesday quite a few important things to be praying about beforehand as well so do make sure you got that agenda and have taken some time to pray through that we also have our church lunch today yeah if you’re forgotten uh there is some well actually Following last week’s talk maybe you should just come and join us anyway there will be plenty of food I was going to say go and buy something but remember what Matt was talking about last week so maybe we should uh just come and enjoy the feast that will be there uh through the back hole come and enjoy it have some fellowship and chat and food together uh now some other stuff uh John where are you going to come and let us know about a prayer opportunity coming up good morning team um I don’t uh know what your prayer life might look like at the moment but it might look a tiny bit like mine which is uh on a good day it’s praying about sort of daily things I’m often finding that something comes up and I’m like I should pray about this today and then the next day I should pray about that thing for the next day um and when it comes to some of the bigger stuff the the important some really really important large stuff that sort of longer term uh I often sort of just don’t make time for it and want to rectify that quite thoroughly um and so uh I want to invite everyone uh to a big prayer event uh and it’s going to start uh July the 20th it’s a Saturday and we’re going to start at 10:30 in the morning and the hope and I’m going to need everyone to commit Way Beyond they’d expect uh is that we’ll run it until Sunday morning at 10:30 which will end uh in our church service um so the desire is for the church to be open for 24 hours for prayer and we want to be praying about two things really uh I hope anyway uh number one is the church Vision we’ve spoken a lot about church vision and I know that I have not prayed about that a huge amount and if you’re in that boat you should join me for a Prayer day on the 20th of July um I also uh feel really really like massively about individual Vision the the biggest thing we can work out is what God wants us to do with our lives and to do that I think we can do two things at once uh number one is pray for the church and the vision that we’re looking at at the moment and number two your individual vision for you know what has God got for you let’s answer that question let’s spend a load of time doing it um so a reminder key times uh 20th of July it’s two weeks obviously I’ve planned this really well and we got loads of time to prep uh and then it’s finishing the day after so if you’re up for like a 3:00 a.m. prayer session uh now’s your opportunity it’s come anyway thanks okay can sign up in the the Foy for it’s take an hour or a few hours so H do speak to John afterwards or one of Us’s leaders as well but the sign up sheet is in the Foy uh Paddy do you want to come up as well H can you give a a welcome back to pad he’s been away for a little bit it’s uh it’s good to have you back Patty and you were going to uh just share with us for a couple of minutes some of the the things you’ve been up to you’ve been in Uganda yes and do you want to take the take the space there and just uh tell us a little bit about what you’ve been been doing all right okay good morning yeah I bring greetings from Uganda thank you ever so much for your prayers for those who have been praying for me um we I had a really wonderful time there so I’m going to share with you uh just to briefly what uh um I did while I was there um I got to some slides if you could yeah oh um I’ve never used this you do it for me yeah okay oh yeah so so that’s the map of Uganda and uh the one on the left is the map of Africa where Uganda is and C is the capital city casess in the west there is the district where I have been and is 450 miles away from CA and so yep next yeah okay so um the I told you about this church which started six months ago uh I will say now 7 months including the month that I have spent spent there um the um we we most of the um o of the people in the congregation and are new Believers and the gentleman who uh invited me to go and help them um lives 200 miles away from it so he goes there occasionally so what we did uh during my time there was to teach these people about the best uh Christian principls um knowing uh the what the church is what Christ did for us CU many of them um it was most of what I told them was new so we we got we had to uh feed these people um we met every we met for 5 days every day from 9:00 to to 4:00 um we we had different sessions during that time uh of Prayer of discussion the the one you see here was time of discussion we did it like like we do uh what do we call it in the evening here discover like we do discover um uh and so yeah it was it was very very uh very um very very good next one so those so those those are the people the the number that they have the ones that we we had on a daily basis were uh between 30 and 35 so um so in six months to build um to build up a fellowship to that number within 6 months they’ve done very very well uh it’s not very easy to evangelize and get that that kind of number within such a short period so there is great potential for these people to grow uh the challenge is the person leading them is is is also a new believer as as as it were so we we need we need people there who have grown who are mature in Christ who know the word of God to teach them um to uh so we need prayers in in that area uh we the money that the church provides for me while I’m there for my use I used to buy food for them so I had to use my own resources for whatever else I need I I needed to do and uh fuel now the vehicle you see in the in the background the Lord blessed us with that vehicle we bought it from here and took it to Uganda and it is very very good for the terrain over there it’s a double cabin Ford Ranger it’s uh it was very helpful during during that time so you see the seats um sorry I’m going to finish in just a few seconds um the seats on which they are sitting the benches they have to hire and the tent or not the tent the toolin which which is is erected up there is is also hired so um we we will need support to to buy them seats um uh to buy them chairs uh suitable chairs uh other than those benches which are hired and each one costs five5 the plastic plastic ones more comfortable um so each each chair would be5 so uh we need prayers for that and we need support for that as well to to support them and to get them Bibles and if you have clothes which you haven’t been wearing for probably the last year it means you don’t need them so the these people uh need need need help in that way so if you could get us as many clothes as as you can for both men and women and children um that that would be very helpful also so so so yeah that’s it we we uh we had a great time and I pray and we ask that you pray for us to go and continue that work because there is great potential to grow that work uh both spiritually and numerically as as as it were it’s in a very very remote area at the food seals of renzor mountain and these people are hungry for the word because you could see uh the desire uh of them how they came they came every day even when it rained you you you found them there on time as as as it were we got eight eight who accepted Christ on that uh during that during that period eight of them who accepted Christ as their lord and savior and yeah we need to do to do more then after that I went to campla um there’s a church where I usually go uh and so I spent the rest of the month teaching in that church uh we are this this is the same church which you’ve been saying I don’t have the pictures for the other one um yeah so these these are the people that I was with and uh they have so many children as as well because because in Africa we we do we we do have some women who work came with six seven children and we had to feed them all so thank you so much for your support thank you for your for your prayers in a nutshell that’s what it is um and uh PR praise God for that thank you thank you uh Paddy I’m sure we could ask you a lot more questions but should we just take a moment just to to pray for you and for that ongoing work uh maybe one or two people in the church would like to to pray if you do please play nice so we can add Ament and I I’ll close off in just a moment let’s let’s pray together for for pad and for that work of Jesus that’s going on there in Uganda so if one or two could pray out nice and loud we can join with you prot e God we thank you for your church in Uganda we thank you for those pastors and places that Patty has been able to visit in recent weeks we thank you for Patty’s safe return for safe travel for safe health and uh we pray for him and Juliet too as they uh as they lean into to you as they seek your guidance about their future service in Uganda may you provide for their needs and may you bless them and thank you for the blessings that’s been to us to to share in that work and to pray for them at this key time so continue to speak to Paddy and bless him we pray Lord amen thank you for sharing thank you great shall we uh continue to to worship God we’re going to stand together if you’re able and sing uh one more song as we uh sing this song Those are going out to our our younger groups to crash and to our Sunday club and to these groups along with the leaders and help as they will leave during the singing of this song go to their bit of church so let’s stand together if you’re able as we continue to worship God strength We rise as we wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord Str Rises we wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord Our God you re forever Our Hope a strong deliver you are the Everlasting God the Everlasting God you do not thank to one Roy you’re the death of the you come for those in me you lift us up on wings like he [Music] go strength fores we wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord strength for uses we wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord we will wait upon the Lord Our God you re forever I hope I strong you are the Everlasting God the everting god you do not think to want we you’re the defender of the you comfort those in me you lift us up all PR like we [Music] go good morning church my name is oad um before I go into prayers this morning I just want to quick covered the topic of Faith which is a key to answered prayers so I remember a song from my childhood which was written by Frank Hernandez it’s called The Music Machine um I don’t have a great voice I just kind of harm a few lines of it which is relevant to what I want to talk about today um so without faith it’s impossible it’s impossible to please God he who comes to God must believe that he and he rewards those who seek him all things are possible all things are possible just believe that God will do everything that he says he will do and he Rewards those who seek him so what is Faith the D dictionary meaning of faith means complete trust and confidence in someone and that means complete trust and confidence in God faith is the Assurance of things hoped for and evidence of things we cannot see um I will quickly take you to Genesis 1:1 in the beginning the Earth was in chaos confusion it was without form and void and in darkness and the Holy Spirit brooded over the waters over the face of the Earth and God said let there be light and there was light and God created the heavens and the Earth the Stars the you know animals vegetation and lastly he created man and he gave man dominion over everything he has created and what I want to draw from this is that God spoke that word that word was spoken and everything was created so um when God created man he rested and he said man should be fruitful and multiply fill the Earth and govern it and in John 1:1 this confirms the same word that in the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the Word was God so the Bible that we read is the Living Word of God um so we know and understand that the world was framed by the word of God so things that we see were not framed by visible things and we understand from Hebrews 4:12 that God’s word is alive and Powerful sharper than any two SW it penetrates into our soul Spirit joints and Marrow and God knows our real thoughts and what we want so I have a few examples here of um our fathers in the Bible who have walked on faith the first is um Abraham um by faith Abraham when he was called to go to a place he would later receive his inheritance he obeyed and went even though he did not know where he was going um the same thing with Ruth Ruth decided you know she was going to go with her mother-in-law and she will serve um the god that she serves so um I have I think three examples here that I just want to quickly dwell on so we know the story of the woman with the issue of blood um for 12 years she spent all the money she had on Physicians and nobody could heal her neither could she be healed of any other method in desperation she turned to Jesus in faith and touched the Hem of Jesus’s garment and was healed and then Jesus prayed for her and she became whole um in John 4: 46-54 Jesus healed an official Son by speaking the word of healing Jesus said go thy way thy son liveth and the official believed and went on his way and the son was healed at the same time and in the same hour then another example is in Matthew 85-10 the Centurion asked Jesus in capam to heal a servant who was sick of the paly and grievously tormented and Jesus said I will come to your house and heal him and the Centurion said no that um he’s a man under Authority and he’s not worthy to have Jesus under his roof and that Jesus should speak the word and his servants will be healed and Jesus marveled and said verily he has not found so great a Faith No not in Israel as Christians we live in Victory the victory that Jesus bought for us on the cross of Calvary and we know that um Jesus sacri through Jesus sacrifice on the calvary we obtain salvation by believing in in his sacrificial offering for us um and he conquered all works of Satan shame ill health poverty Affliction of all kinds and he also gave us the opportunity to have a direct relationship with him so Jesus is saying to us today come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest I leave you with this message God is Not Human that he should Li die neither is he a human being that he should change his mind has he ever spoken and failed to act he has ever pro has he ever promised and not carried it through okay shall we pray father Lord your word says ask and it shall be given we ask that the Holy Spirit bro over our church the for Winds of our church and the nations of the world to bring about order and peace in nations of the world world as well where there is conflict strengthen and protect the weak and weary and families in war Thor zones we are created in the image of God and we are wonderfully and perfectly made your word reminds us that by your stripes we were healed so just as God raised Jesus from the dead he will give life to our mortal bodies by The Same Spirit that is living with you therefore we speak to anything in our bodies that does not glorify God um cancer is caused from his roots every elet of infirmity we speak healing for everyone looking for healing and wholeness in every area of Life father we also pray for restoration of families and homes we pray that you heal relationships and help us to make you the center of our homes so we can learn more about your love for us and forgiveness we also raise our leaders before your throne of grace oh Lord we ask that the spirit of wisdom rest upon them so that they can govern the nation and church according to your will and purpose in the name of Jesus Amen thank you for listening so uh John is going to come and speak to us in just a moment but uh our reading that John’s going to uh unpack for us comes from Mark chapter 10 and uh hopefully we’ll have the the word on the screen as well but if you got access to them you can look them up Mark chapter 10 and we’re going to read from verse 35 and John’s continuing our series of what is church then James and John the sons of zebede came to him teacher they said we want you to do for us whatever we ask what do you want me to do for you he asked they replied let one of us sit at your right and the other at the left in your glory you don’t know what you’re asking Jesus said can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with we can they answered Jesus said to them you will drink the cup I drink and be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with but a sit at my right or left is not for me to Grant these places belong to those for whom they have been prepared when the 10 heard about this they became indignant with James and John Jesus called them together and said you know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles Lord are over them and their High officials exercise authority over them not so with you instead he wants to become great among you must be your servants and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all for even the son of man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many good morning Namaste Alum wherever you from you’re welcome here this morning and it’s good to see you so my question this morning is who is the goat now some people might be saying that it was Jude Bellingham after last week’s overhead kick superb um got England through and or even B Saka last night who saved us who is the goat we know of course that the proper Sunday school answer is Jesus someone say Moses there no it’s Jesus um but I realized when I was writing this that it might not actually translate all that well clicker will probably be useful um yeah it might might translate all that well because the word goat obviously is going to translate a little bit odd there isn’t it um so for those who aren’t sure goat means greatest of all time greatest of all time Jesus is of course the greatest of all time we’re not saying an actual person is a goat um but today’s passage Jesus tells us what it takes to be the greatest because he said whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant and whoever wants to be first must be the slave of all now that’s really not going to be the most popular message in our current Society because it’s the opposite of what the media tells us it says you should be standing up for your rights you’re important you deserve better but the Christian message what Jesus brings is you must be the slave of all so before we go any further I want to make sure one thing is really clear here the Bible in no way at all condones slavery there’s nothing in the Bible that gives anyone the right to enslave others ever slavery is a terrible evil which has done and continues to do harm to many people but to the extent that this passage talks to people in any sort of authority it’s saying that their responsibility is not to enslave but rather to serve those who work for them so whether when it talks about being a slave it’s saying that we should have the attitude of being a good servant not that we can treat anybody else ever as a slave so our former Queen Elizabeth II you may remember because it came out around the time of her death a lot on her 21st birthday she made a promise to the nation which was that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service she understood this idea that the Bible was saying ahead of this nation in that speech saying that to be effectively a good Monarch required an attitude of service a few uh years ago our family watched a comedy starring the Ukrainian President Vladimir zilinski which was called sluga which means servant of of the people in which he was trying to be an honest politician um an honest president serving the people in the face of politicians who just seem to be completely and utterly corrupt and their only role was to benefit themselves and that is really what we want from our leaders what we want from our politicians as well and I was reminded of this as I listened to Kia st’s election victory speech um what we really want from rmps is for them to be putting the efforts into serving their constituency to doing what is best for this country those who seem to be least popular are those who appear to be looking to benefit themselves and serving themselves rather than serving the people but we do find this kind of bit contradiction going on that people um want to be great and powerful without serving but at the same time they want their leaders to be their servants it’s a little bit of a contradiction going on so to today’s passage James and John honestly they were a little bit outrageous in their behavior weren’t they we want to be sitting at your right and your left we want to be the greatest Jesus had hundreds of followers and yet these two thought they were something special Jesus had 12 special disciples and yet these two thought that they were the greatest they were asking for special treatment for Jesus in his kingdom now I that their behavior was totally inexcusable but we need to give them a fair hearing and to do that we need to look a little bit broader the context what was going on around you see shortly before this we can read in Matthew 19:28 that Jesus said when the son of man sits on his glorious Throne you who have followed me will also sit on the 12 Thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel so James and John were pretty sure that they would have a High position in Jesus’s Kingdom let’s face it actually they were two of the three who were closest to Jesus when Jesus was transfigured up the mountain just a uh one chapter before today’s reading there was only Peter James and John that went with him they were the ones to see this special thing and to be honest well when he got up there Peter kind of made a bit of a fool of himself so that that left James and John they were the two special ones so in their eyes it was a perfectly reasonable request they were the favorites they hadn’t messed up surely Jesus would give this honor to them but the disciples should have known better because we also can just look back later in that chapter to see that all the disciples together had been arguing again about who was the greatest this was coming towards the end of Jesus’s Ministry so they’d had three years with Jesus they thought in this time they might have developed a slightly better attitude but you know what I find the disciples to be such an encouraging example because Jesus never gave up on them no no matter how bad their attitude was no matter how cluess and self-absorbed they were maybe there’s some hope for me there but in this passage once again Jesus or that previous one Jesus rather than getting angry he gently told them in Mark 9:35 whoever wants to be first must be the last and the servant of all just twice in two chapters Jesus talks about the importance of serving one another of being the servant and now in this passage Jesus was heading up to Jerusalem with his disciples he’ forewarned them that when he got up there he was going to be killed but they didn’t really seem to accept that they were expecting the inauguration of Jesus’s Great and Powerful Kingdom they thought he was going to come in might and overthrow the Romans they were right in that Jesus’s kingdom was there going to be manifested in a special way but they didn’t seem to expect that it would come through his death and his resurrection and his Ascension to Heaven that was something that even though Jesus had told them about it they didn’t get the hang of Jesus’s kingdom does not come through violence through lording it over others Jesus’s come Kingdom came about through submission even as Jesus said in verse 45 even the son of man did did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many so if Jesus came to serve how much more so should we his followers serve whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all maybe the best example of a servant that I could find in the Old Testament was Joseph one of the uh 12 sons of Jacob he was sold into slavery by his brothers he didn’t deserve that in fact he was the favored son he was the one who was going to be the greatest but he was sold to be a slave out of the jealousy of his brothers as a slave he could have become resentful of what had happened to him since he deserved to be free but in spite of those unreasonable circumstances of slavery he took the attitude of serving his new master Piper and the reason and the result rather was that because he was in uh because he acted as a servant and was trustworthy the his master poser entrusted him with everything in his household serving Faithfully led to a much better and higher position for him one of the comparisons the Bible uses for a church is that we are like a family now when I was single I could do what I want when I wanted however no problems at all there’s some limitations you know had to go to work had to eat and sleep but generally it was all my choice but then I got married and apparently things needed to change don’t know why my wife’s laughing instead of suring myself I needed to serve Jennifer as well and the decision was no longer what suits me best but what is best for us and then we had children they needed to be served 24/7 and so what was best for us expanded to become what is best for our family and if we take this analogy back to the church we’re making decisions we should no longer be asking what is best for me but what is best for Jesus what is best for Jesus his family what is best for the church this doesn’t mean you have to just do everything that a church leader tells you if Kei says do this do that do do the other I don’t think he’s a dictat like that most of the time um because that sort of thing can lead to abuse but rather you should be thinking about what is the best that you can do for the whole of the church family there was obviously needs to be a balance between what is best what’s best for your um biological family and what’s best for your church family but you know if you’re doing so much in church you don’t have time for your own family then clearly you got things wrong down one end of the scale but if you’re not doing anything to bless your church family then maybe you’re also doing something wrong there it’s a difficult balance point to get and I’m sure that I don’t get it right allot of the time so I was thinking about another biblical example of of of the church and the church is described a lot as a body now I realize that my lungs have done a pretty good job at serving me all of my life they breathe like in and out about once every four seconds or so and I’m kind of grateful that they keep that up day after day without too much complaining each and every part of our bodies serves the body as a whole I’m still not quite sure what the appendix does but part from that it serves us but what does happen if a side part of our body decided to go on strike and not serve the body anymore because it didn’t think it was getting like the recognition it deserved so just just say that one of my legs decided that it would just stop working out and leave me having to finish the sermon balancing on one leg or then my arms decided to not serve me anymore as they just wanted to look after themselves and I ended up like this having to preach and then the problem is that I got my sermon notes here and I’m getting to the bottom of the page and I don’t know what I’m meant to be talking about next have you ever scrolling with your nose it doesn’t work very effectively does it but that’s what it’s like when people are part of the church and are not serving one another it’s really important that we each come with this attitude of serving one another not just on a Sunday morning but the whole time because I’m not just talking about everyone joining rotors and stuff you know it’d be great if we have more people in the music group Tech Team the children’s work welcome those people serving C tea and coffee and I could happily send out some pieces of paper people to sign up if you want but it’s more than that it’s this whole attitude of like in every conversation in every interaction with anyone that we have that we need to have this attitude of service as we walk through the door of the church rather than it being what can I get from the service today is who can I bless who can I serve how can I help how can I be a servant in Philippians chapter 2 it says everyone should look out not only for his own interests but for the interests of others make your attitude like that of Christ Jesus who existing in the form of God did not consider equality with God as something to be used for his own Advantage instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a slave serving is not just an optional extra for the Keen Christians or for those wanting um to be in leadership serving is something that each and every one of us is called to do as it says in 1 Peter 4: 10 and 11 each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms the reason that God has given you gifts is so that you can use them to serve others whether they be talents or physical gifts that you can touch things that you have each thing you have is there for the benefit of the body of the church and my experience has been that as I have served others The more I’ve done it the more joy that I have experienced took me a while to realize this because you know I grew up as a typical fa selfish teenager but as a student I remember one time I was asked to be a waiter as a volunteer in an Evangelistic event where we were hosting a meal for at 200 people that’s dreading it I didn’t know much about waiting it doesn’t seem like a fun job to me I wanted to sit down and enjoy the food and the entertainment and whatever else is going on instead I was having to be busy bringing around food to tables but I decided Well let’s go and do it and I found that the more effort I put in to serving people to serving people well and to helping them enjoy the event actually the more that I enjoyed it I probably more enjoyed it more than I would have done if I’d been a guest even though I started with the bad bad attitude once I switched to focus to meeting other people’s needs and blessing them i’ really enjoyed it so much more serving is enjoyable don’t know if any of you have grown up with this but I remember as a child being taught many times that the letters of the word Joy stand for Jesus others yourself putting Jesus first then others and then yourself last of all then that is the way to a life of joy in this passage Jesus is setting is saying that putting others before yourself is also a root to Greatness so I was thinking about practical applications of this what what it’s like and I was cycling to work on Thursday sort of mulling it over in my mind and uh you know you kind of get a bit distracted then by things like cars on the road um and I got little bit annoyed because one driver honked at me because they were trying to pull out of a side road and they had to stop to let me through because it was my right of way I’m never quite sure why drivers do that I’m sure it’s none of you guys here um but as I thought about it I think God challenged me a little bit what would it look like to approach that same kind of situation with an attitude of service yes it was my right of way but instead of getting annoyed at bad drivers I maybe might use my cycling to help others to bless others to serve them I don’t need to insist on my rights I can maybe help others to get to where they want to be a little bit faster by letting them out rather than just pushing through how would it affect my driving if I did that all the time really actually this attitude of service just goes to all these different areas of Our Lives what would it be like if in the shops I I was actually looking to serve the people around me when I’m in the supermarket or something I could help them and rather than just trying and push in to get in and out the fastest or whatever how would it affect your workplace how would it affect your studies yes when you’re working of course you know you’re working for an employer you are serving them but how can you also serve your colleagues how can you serve your clients better not just for the benefit of the company but to really model Jesus in what you’re doing how are you serving people in all these different situations how am I pleasing God because in 1 Corinthians 10 it says whatever you do do it all for the glory of God serving is not always easy especially when people are ungrateful or they take advantage of us but Jesus gave us the perfect example of someone who continued to serve even in the face of great abuse even as he was on the cross being murdered his thoughts were not on how he could make it best for himself but on serving others served his mother while he was dying he served the criminal who was crucified next to him and ultimately he served those who were killing him and praying forgiveness for them as they were responsible for his death his whole life and death was an act of service so as you leave today L to think about those those verses and who you can be a servant to this week each and every day whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all for even the son of man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many let’s pray Lord Jesus thank you that you did not come to serve but to be served thank you that we can just see that example throughout your whole life and how you’ve taught it throughout scripture example after example and just so many verses telling us we need to serve and it’s so difficult for us to get it into our heads that it’s not all about us but it’s about you it’s about how we can bless other people and I pray that you would fill us with this Joy of service of looking out for the needs of others above the needs of our El that we might bless them and bless you in doing so Lord remind us of this during this week bring to mind those situations as we’re in them where we can serve people better glorify you Lord amen thank you uh so much John that was really really good about serving one another and then that challenge how does that play out in our our day-to-day lives in a few minutes we’re going to have an opportunity to share together if God has been up to something in your week or you’d like us to pray about something that that that’s happening in your life then please feel free to to share you can come up to the front or we can pass a microphone to you but good to share together as a as a church family that image that that JN was reminding us of the body of Christ before we do so I don’t know about you but quite often after a top we rush into the next thing I think oh that was really good but I forget to to make a note of it and what I thought we could do is just quietly uh In God’s Presence reflect in what John has been said to us and if you came in earlier you might have got a piece of paper or you might have your phone and just to make a note of any verses or words that God has been trying to to get through to you this morning uh John brought us a very clear message didn’t he but sometimes we we miss that opportunity to hear from God because we get so busy rushing on to the next thing so to just to help us just going to to quietly sit where we are and if something comes to mind write it down pop it in your Bible to have a have a chew on later on H and we’ll just play a bit of music in the background and then we’ll have a little opportunity for sharing [Music] from Heaven you came helpless Spain enter our world Your Glory ve not to be served but to serve and give your life that we might live this is our God the servant King he calls us now to follow in to bring our life as a daily offering of worship to the servant [Music] King there in the garden of Tears my heavy Lord he chose to bear his heart with sorrow was tor yet not my will but yours he said This is Our God the servant King he calls us now to follow him to bring our Liv as a daily offering of worship to the servant [Music] King come see his hands and his feet the SCS that speak of [Music] saice hands that flung Stars into space to cruel names surrender This Is Our God the servant King he calls us now to follow him to bring our life as a daily offering of worship you to the servant King so let us learn how to serve and in our Liv and thr him each other’s needs to prefer for for it is Christ we’re sering This Is Our God the servant King he calls us now to fall in to bring our lives as a daily offering of worship to the servant [Music] King the Ser [Music] King great it’s good to um just take some time isn’t it to reflect on what God might be saying to us this morning so uh this is the point we’ll set aside a few minutes if anyone wants to uh share anything or prayer or whatever and then you’re very welcome to to just come up and share it with with our church family with your church family with our church family and uh just to remind you as well we don’t broadcast this over the live stream so uh it’s a nice safe space to share something if you’d like to shall we uh continue to worship God as we uh as we praise him and as we thank you for the ways he’s at work in our lives and as we we also know that his promises he never lets us down on them as well God loves us and he calls us to be Servants of him and Servants of one another so let’s say stand together if you’re were able to do so as we sing some worship to God as part of our time [Music] together I love you Lord oh your mercy never fails me all my days have been held in your hands from the moment that I wake up until I lay my head oh I will sing all the goodness of God and all my life you have been f and all my life you have been so so good with every breath that I am in oh I will sing all the goodness of God I love your voice you have led me through the fire and in darkness you are close like other I’ve known you as a father I’ve known you as a friend and I have in the goodness of the all my life you have been faithful and all my life you have been so so good with every BL that I have made oh I will s of the goodness of God your goodness is running after it’s running after me your goodness is running after it’s running out to me with my life laid down surrendered now I give you everything your goodness is running after it’s running after me your goodness is running after it’s running after me your goodness is running after it’s running after me with my life laid down surrender now I’ll give you everything CU your good is running after it’s running after me and all my life you have been faithful and all my life you have been so so good with every breath that I am a oh I sing all the goodness of God I’m going to sing I’m going to sing oh and all my life you have been faithful all my life you have so so good every breath that I am oh I’m going to sing of the goodness of God oh I’m going to sing of the goodness of God my soul my saor god with how great th how great th my [Music] my to how great the heart how [Music] great when Christ [Music] and take me home for Joy shall feel my heart sh in [Music] Humble and their procla God great the heart my myor how great th how great th my soul my God to how great th how great [Music] shall we pray then Lord Jesus we praise you because you are great and truly worth the best that we can bring help us Lord as we go out into this week ahead to serve one another to serve Jesus to put you first and to honor you with all that we have and in all that you’ve entrusted us with so bless us now too as we go over to lunch and conversation and coffee and just help us to be church family together in Jesus’s name we ask this amen if you have children