Loving God, Loving Yourself, Loving Others | Rob Pitts | Sunday 10th September

Pre-Service [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] good morning everyone welcome to church it is great to see you understand we're going to start by praising God he is the reason we are here [Music] our God is good [Music] Song: Praise God (Doxology) he is always good [Music] come on [Music] [Music] for the last ones [Music] magnify foreign [Music] he's always [Music] [Music] on and call me Holy Ghost [Music] s [Music] [Applause] [Music] daddy rains it rains around foreign [Music] we have a ghost [Music] praise God [Music] is good this is why we [Music] thank you come on Church come on Church [Applause] praise God from whom all blessings flow who's blessed this morning the fact you have air in your lungs means you're blessed the fact that we've had a week where the kids went back to school and the sun came out you are blessed maybe that's just me that was happy about that but we are blessed due to the goodness of God thank you God for your goodness I'm going to let you take your seats for a moment but we definitely haven't finished praising our God but I just wanted to let you know about a few things before we start and the Welcome (Rhi Davies) first thing is to start with an apology because we've got internet issues it's a first world problem but if you're watching this on catch up thank you for joining us we're sorry we haven't been able to live stream this morning but we're working on a solution also to let you know that unfortunately that also impacts the live feed that normally goes down to Suite one at the bottom of the corridor which if you take your small person between the age of one and three you may not be able to see the service but I'm sure you will be able to hear it through the walls so we're sorry about that and we are working on a solution but it's happened this morning and it's one of those things but we're still blessed right still blessed so if it is your first time to Breathe new life church this morning I'd like to welcome you it's fantastic to see you this morning we've got a wonderful New People's team who wear orange lanyards so if it is your first time and you've sort of snuck in and you haven't connected with anyone look for someone with an orange lanyard they have access to free cake they have access to good biscuits tea and coffee and it's in the new people area at the end of the service we would love to chat with you get to know you introduce you to different people in the church that you can connect with and engage with because we love you and we want you to feel at home so please make yourselves known to to the orangey lanyard team also if you have a small person under the age well between zero and one we've got a fantastic baby room over there where you can see and hear what's going on if they're between one and three we've got the suite at the end of the corridor which has simply got a bit more space and a few more toys out and also to let you know our fantastic kids team I've got kids church and they've split into two different age groups which is wonderful we got key stage one and key stage two groups and they will be going out during one of the songs so if you've registered keep an eye on the screen behind me and it'll let you know when kids church is going to start but I would just like to say a massive thank you to the kids team because they are facilitating two groups and that's not easy it requires commitment from the team it requires effort it requires two lots of planning but they are so wonderful and they've put the time and the effort in and I know that that bears fruit because that's God's heart so he's ready to praise God let's stand to our feet now I'm not sure what your week's been like I know the kids have gone back to school I know teachers have had to therefore go back to school anyone working in education sort of starts back now and sometimes it can feel a bit like oh I've got to go back oh it's not easy but actually do you know what it's a new start and God's mercies are new every morning his faithfulness is new every day so no matter what your week has been like no matter what even your yesterday is like today is a new day of neem full of new mercies of new goodness of new faithfulness so you may not feel like you've got much to praise God for today but make a choice because you've got a new thing to praise him for today because today is new so I'm going to hand over to the band and we're going to spend some time worshiping a god of new beginnings Song: Lion and the Lamb [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] is coming on [Music] Every Chain will break [Music] slave [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] back if this language feels strange the lion is our Victorious God and the lamb is our sacrificial God who went first yourself own sacrifice and bought a path for us to Eternity our Gods can be both at the same time problem with sin the promise was brought about by the Lamb of God who takes away everyone's sin whether you've done it yet or not [Music] Ary of the Lion of Judah and that is why we can praise because we are on the other side of a great promise that has been fulfilled do you know the lion and the lamb this morning do you know him as the lamb and you're lying this morning there is nothing that can stand in your way not because of who you are because of who the god the lion is but who can stop him what can stop him the biggest mountain that might feel like it's in your way cannot stop our guards who can stop our gods who can stop the Lord Almighty among Jesus [Music] who can stop the Lord Almighty who can stop the Lord oh sing it out [Music] our God is true [Music] every neighbor God here [Music] [Applause] [Music] Song: Holy Forever 's a generation relax ing to sing a song of Ages [Music] sing the song your name is the highest your name the greatest your name stands above the Moon [Music] stands above the Moon and the angels all creation [Music] [Music] if you bear his name sing a song forever to the lamp [Music] forever [Music] is [Music] [Music] now [Music] you can always be [Music] better [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music] just cry holy [Music] all creation Cries Holy you are lifted High holy holy forever your people see [Music] me [Applause] [Music] Jesus your name is the greatest [Music] [Music] is the greatest [Music] stands [Music] all creations [Music] me holy to the king to the king of peace [Music] you will always be holy holy holy forever [Music] always always [Music] what a God [Music] what a gods what hope we can have when that is our gods [Music] what faith we can have when that is our God what dares stand in the way of our gods [Music] what a gods What a Mighty God what a God that we get to pray to we don't have to go through rituals we don't have to go through other people we can come boldly into the presence of our God knowing that he is ready and receptive to what you have to say he know already knows it foreign [Music] he wants to see hearts that lean to him and go I see a mountain I see a situation but I have a God and you are enough [Music] and if you have that faith today then right now it's your privilege to pray we're going to continue pointing towards our God but we get to pray get to make a song a prayer prayer of the church I love coming together because sometimes you need me and a lot of the times I need you and right now we get to pray together with the melody I got a picture and I was listening to this song this morning of hands joint and arms around each other now I'm not asking you to do that because you might not know the person next to you but that's the picture I got the attitude that I ask and encourage you to come into this song with but as I speak the name of Jesus over you you speak it over me knowing that every need in this house is covered and every heart is drawn towards their guards and is coming closer and closer in Jesus name so if you're comfortable if you know the person if you know what's going on then make it known to them that you know if not speak these words over the people that surround you knowing that they speak it over you Jesus [Music] Song: In Jesus Name (God of Possible) I speak the name of Jesus of you and your heard in your sorrow I speak the name cause it's all that I can do desperation I'll seek heaven pray this for you I pray for your healing the circumstances will change pray that the fear inside will flee Jesus name I prayed at a breakthrough will happen today [Music] I speak the name of all authorities [Music] clearing blessings every promise [Music] in Jesus name [Music] and today he calls over your life Jesus [Music] in the mighty name of Jesus [Music] while you're healing circumstances will change [Music] welcome back [Music] in Jesus name in Jesus name every knee shall bow every tongue confess the name of Jesus foreign I just want to take a moment because I really believe in what we've sung there's power because there's power in prayer so what I'd like to do is I'd like to pray these lyrics not the whole song I'm going to pray them over you and at the end we're gonna sing amen because together we're joining in unity when we say Amen together we're standing shoulder to shoulder because none of us have got it all together none of us have got it all sorted just because all of us stand on the stage doesn't mean we've got it sorted so amen means so it is also be it it declares my belief and faithfulness it declares my belief in a faithful God it declares that I'm going to lay aside everything else and believe that what God does is good I may not understand it I may not get the full picture but by faith I believe in the name in Jesus name I pray for our healing that circumstances will change I pray that the fear inside will flee in Jesus [Music] name [Music] I pray that breakthrough would happen today I pray Miracles over our lives in Jesus name I pray for Revival for restoration of faith I pray [Music] that the Dead will come alive in Jesus name in Jesus name [Music] good [Music] morning [Music] foreign [Music] by faith we pray these prayers Lord do you know what needs to happen in each individual you know what needs to happen in my life you know no what needs to happen in church you know what needs to happen in Nations and Lord we surrender to your sovereignty Jesus we declare amen amen and amen and all God's people said amen if you'd like to take your seats God is so good it is so good I could stand up here all day and declare that really could he is so good in the highs and in the lows don't think it's only on the mountaintops and if you're just mediocre if it's just straight he's good in that as well so we're going to continue our praise Offering and worship and we're going to receive an offering this morning and the host team we're gonna we're gonna show a video while a host team receive an offering and I'd just like to say a thank you for your generosity because without generous people that are invested in God's house we can't really do a huge amount we can do some things God's not limited but when people invest and partner and walk together there's so much strength in that and one of the things we're able to do is put on Alpha and Alpha is a phenomenal tool which encourages people which builds people up which points them towards Jesus and helps people on their Journey you may have been a Christian for many years and if you haven't done Alpha it may just open your eyes to something a little bit different to seeing Jesus in a new way to seeing how he can be a part of your everyday life so we're going to watch this short video and thank you host team Alpha Testimony Video sisters God's daughter was getting baptized and they were talking about an alpha course and I was like oh this is cool like this was like the first time me going back to a church intentionally after the pandemic so I I really liked the vibe and they were talking about Alpha and my sister looked at each other were like yeah we're gonna go to Alpha like we gotta get ourselves involved and see what God's got to do with us it completely went against all my expectations of what like church looked like and it was just this fun welcoming and a comfortable environment to be in at Alpha we were having these discussions about like who is Jesus was the Holy Spirit um being able to read the Bible and I met like one of my closest friends to this day I kind of fought like being religious was just like for older people that wasn't really what young people do like it's not just for older people it's for everybody like Jesus wants to get to know everyone it doesn't matter how old you are or what what books of Life you've come from and like trusting that there is a plan and there's a God that loves me and that there's a God that cares for me and like no matter what life can throw at me I will still have god with me and that is something I've taken away from alpha like while you're still getting closer to God and you're still on this journey because the journey doesn't have to be a journey that you do by yourself you can do as a community of people there is a need and there's a longing that people want and need and Jesus could definitely do something in their lives but I think it offers like a perfect way to bridge that Gap and I do think a lot of people in colleges and stuff like if they heard about this and if they experienced like Jesus that it would transform their lives thank you so if you'd like more information go to Announcements the connect point if you'd like to sign up you can go to the connect point and it'll be wonderful to see you it starts in October and it's going to be a great course it starts the first Sunday in October so please sign up other things to let you know that we've got going on about I can't believe I'm talking about October already just feels like we've just finished the summer but we have got prayer and fasting coming up which is on the 16th to the 25th of October more information is available on our website but I would encourage you if you haven't signed up for our e-news to sign up because each day during prayer and fasting this time we're going to be sending out written devotions to help and encourage you during that week they're all going to be based on a scripture and it's just something to go do you know what keep going because let's face it prayer and fasting isn't always easy it's not always easy to keep your attitude in check to not get angry if you're doing food or to not feel I really want to watch that TV program because it's just started the new series actually it's okay it's okay to have all those feelings but we want to encourage you in your prayer and fasting so please sign up for those divations and the other thing to let you know about is because it's now September loads of things start kicking back we've got our first reload on Tuesday for kids families parents Tuesday running 3 30 till 5 30. but we've also got youth starting back as well and we're starting back big we're not going small scale in fact we've already had our first event we had it on Wednesday but this Friday we've got awaken which is fantastic if you're new to youth it's running 7 till 8 30 for those in secondary school and it would be great to see you there it's an evening of fun craziness trying the latest challenges Etc but today we've also got parent Youth and donuts Donut's been the most important thing now if you haven't signed up for this don't panic we went big on the donuts okay if you don't go big on Donuts you might as well go home but we would like you to come and join us in the cafe afterwards at 1pm if you have a son or daughter of secondary school age just come and meet the team find out what's going on at youth this year ahead and we'd love to share that with you and the other thing to let you know about youth because I've got the microphone so I thought I'd take I was allowed I was given permission to take advantage but we're going next Saturday rescheduled we're doing Snowden now we're doing Snowden with a wheelchair with 11 young people and a lot of motivation and jelly babies so please pray for us please if you see young people around encourage them because it's a big thing lots of them have never done it before lots of the team have never even no we do have experience going don't panic but it's going to be a great day we would love the weather I'm gonna be really picky I'd love it to be dry but slightly overcast but a good view from the top okay God says be specific in your prayers not sure he meant that but that's what I'd like because I recently climbed a mountain and it was just a whiteout at the top and I took a picture and I thought could have been anywhere could have been absolutely anywhere but please encourage the young people they have nearly raised a thousand pounds and our Target as a team and as young people was 500 so we've nearly smashed double that okay so please encourage them it's absolutely fantastic their willingness to do it astounds me because we're leaving at six okay so that's how much they're committed to this anyway enough about that I'm gonna hand over to Rob who's going to bring a message this morning and I just want to say Rob is a great encourager and he also cares and he cares about people and it's such a lovely combination and heart to have and he is such a blessing to this house and him and Becky being on core team and overseeing small groups they are so encouraging and and Care genuinely care about people and how they're doing which is wonderful so I know what he's going to bring this morning is going to benefit not you just you as an individual but us as a whole and as a house as we journey through this next season so I'm going to hand over to Rob [Applause] thank you Ray I've just been informed my bottle is leaking I haven't got any on me so that's good so it's great to see you this morning great to see so many of you in church looking good as always looking good Message (Rob Pitts) well I'm going to continue this morning with our theme that we've got for this month of Back to Basics and I'm really going to build on what Tim last week as he introduced the topic of loving God and this week I'm going to expand on that and continue on that thought of loving God but also loving people as well and looking at not only loving ourselves but loving other people as well and Tim rather read a passage from Deuteronomy chapter six and in there it talks about loving God with all of our hearts our soul our mind and our strength as well and I want to continue with that thought so I thought it would be good for us to to pray to begin with this morning and and yeah let's just do that now so Heavenly Father we we thank you for this opportunity that we have to to gather together as your body to gather together as your people and we just asked that as we open up your word this morning would you speak to us Holy Spirit we ask would you come and reveal things to our hearts Holy Spirit we give you permission this morning to do an incredible miraculous work in our lives and we've already declared that you are The Miracle Worker and we declare that this morning in Jesus name amen amen have we got any people in this morning who are All or Nothing people let me explain what I mean by that I'm a bit of an All or Nothing person so if I'm on a bit of a health kick I'll go out running regularly you'll see I'll get out there a couple of times a week and if I'm not in a bit of a health kick I won't go out at all it's it's all or it's nothing on that theme of being healthy eating healthy food so either I'm eating carrot to my lunch every day and I'm eating fruit and I'm being good and I'm limiting the number of desserts I have a week or I'm not at all anyone else out there a bit of an All or Nothing person some some of you might be able to relate to that this morning well I want to read a scripture to us this morning that is an all-in scripture that Jesus asks us to be all in on this subject I'm going to read it out to you and it'll be up on the screen as well and it's from Mark chapter 11. verses 28 to 34 and it's either New Living Translation I'm going to read this and it says this one of the teachers of religious law was standing there listening to the debate he realized that Jesus had answered well so we asked of all of The Commandments which is the most important Jesus replied the most important commandment is this listen o Israel the Lord our God is the one and only Lord and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart all your soul all your mind and all your strength the second is equally important love your neighbor as yourself no other commandment is greater than these the teacher of religious law replied well said teacher you have spoken the truth by saying that there is only one God and no other and I know it is important to love him with all my heart and all my understanding and all my strength and to love my neighbor as myself this is more important than to offer all of the burnt offerings and sacrifices required in the law realizing how much the man understood Jesus said to him you are not far from the kingdom of God and after that no one dared asking any more questions don't you love those people who ask questions Jesus starts off by answering this question by saying this is the most important commandment and he prefaces it with saying you you must I don't know about you but are you you used to being given commands I must admit it's not something that's in my everyday but Jesus says that you must love the Lord your God with all your heart your soul your mind and your strength this is not optional for us this morning church it's a commandment from Jesus himself and this is an all-in requirement in verse 29 Jesus Jesus says that God is the one and only Lord and what he's saying there is God needs to be number one in our lives that he is the only Lord that we have no other gods that we have no other Idols he needs to be the priority in our lives and Jesus goes on to say that the second commandment is equally as important love your neighbor as yourself what's Jesus saying there simply saying treat those around us those people around us with the love and the respect that we would like to be treated with and what's interesting is the teacher of religious law he points out something interesting he says there is more to this or there is more than to offer all the burn offerings and sacrifices required in the law and he highlights something really important you see in the Old Testament it was about sacrifice it was about offerings it was about making yourself right with God but what we see here highlighted by Jesus is that actually in the New Testament God cares more about us pursuing him and how we treat other people there's a shift that takes place and my first point for us this morning is this loving God and I've put in there in Brackets Jesus centered and this is taken from our vision where as a church we commit to be in Jesus centered that we're learning to live a jesus-centered life so what does it look like for us to love the Lord Our God with all our heart soul mind and strength and I want to answer that question with another question if a complete stranger was to observe your life how would they know or how would they see that you have a relationship with Jesus would it be obvious that you were passionate about him what would they see would they just see that a couple of times a month you came to an old Cinema building on new leak Road or would they see more than that how do we ensure that we keep God the only Lord in our lives well it's really simple I don't do complicated we'll do simple this morning you see we keep him Lord by keeping him number one we make God a priority in our lives and we Center our entire lives around him and I want to talk some more this morning how we can do that and throughout mine and my wife's my Becky my wife's relationship we've tried to ensure that God has always been at the the center of our marriage and he's been the priority and when we first started dating and I told her that I loved her for the first time we we had a conversation about how Jesus is always going to be the first love in our lives and when I proposed and we got engaged the ring that I gave Becky on the inside has engraved Ecclesiastes 4 12 which says a triple braided chord is not easily broken you see from day one in our relationship we've ensured that it's God that is in the center and we're on the outside and we've not always got that balance right but we've done our best to keep God the priority and we all have different things that fill our lives and many of those things are good things we have family we are friends we come to church we have different passions and hobbies we go to work but what is it that our life centers around you see if it's not God there's an issue and I was in the privileged position recently to get a classic car and it's a car that needs a bit of work doing to it does anyone know the type of car that um and when I got that car I no problem learning all about this new car I was online watching videos I went and bought myself a service manual and I was staying up late ordering parts and I was happy to do it because it's a desire that I have it's something that I'm passionate about are you passionate about placing God at the center of your life you want to go out of your way to ensure that he is a priority like my car I'm passionate about learning more about him and the question even for myself is do I desire to spend time with him do I desire to be in his presence and the challenge for me is it's little things like am I prepared to go to bed that bit earlier so that I can get up early the next day start my day right pursue him and spend time in his presence and that's the challenge for me or would I rather just sit on the sofa watching YouTube that's the challenge where is he in my list of priorities and have we can can I can't even say the word if we made that decision to make God that priority and that passion you see when we choose to pursue something it becomes a passion it's a bit of a chicken and egg situation and there's nothing wrong with having passions other than God if anything I believe God wants us to have passions but the question is this morning is where do they line up in the list priorities and if I was to ask you some more questions of well how do you spend your time the chances are it's going to be reflective of your priorities and you know do you give your time to God in warm form or another way of purana is how do you spend your money oh we can't talk about money in jail so everyone's screaming how do you spend your money is it reflective of your priorities are you generous with what God has given you no matter how big or small it's not about the size it's reflective of our hearts and these different things they can be indicators of how we prioritize God in our lives they're not the only way they're not the one way but they are an indicator and this morning I want to challenge us to pursue God to open his word to read what it says to pursue him through prayer it's great that we've got prayer and fasting coming up in a few weeks time where you can put that time aside to focus on him and how is it we can put God number one in our lives through our time our finances and what we see is Jesus prioritized his time and he specifically prioritized his time with his Heavenly Father praying to him we read in Luke 5 16 got it up here on the screen it says but Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed Jesus was intentional with the way that he lived his life he recognized that spending time listening and talking to his Heavenly Father it needed to be a priority so much though that he withdrew he withdrew from the busyness there was demands on his life but he recognized if he didn't separate himself if he didn't go and withdraw and spend that time with God he wouldn't be effective and we too need to prioritize spending time with God above all else and Jesus knew that his life was going to be cut short and as a result of that it kept him laser focused and I had a revelation of my own more mortality recently myself and Beck had the the opportunity to to go to Dublin and while we were there kids free I'll point out we went to the Museum of Ireland oh yeah it's like what do you want to do when you've not got kids let's go around a museum yeah and we were around the Museum of Ireland and specifically in the archeology section and I must admit I really loved it I really enjoyed it and we learned all about when the Vikings invaded and there were there was armor and there was swords and there was even a whole section on when Christianity came to Ireland and I loved it I thought it was really interesting but when we're walking around we we saw these different objects and some of them were literally thousands and thousands of years old and we were looking in this cabinet and there were all these different parts and cups and various different objects that at some time someone would have used that to collect water someone would use that to potentially cook in and as I was walking around I just had this just realization that for these people that they literally struggled and had to fight for their survival that they literally had Invaders come in from other lands attacking them and from a a living point of view you know living living primitively and you know the the chances of getting on wealth and various different things I just had this this realization and you know here I am on my holidays scrolling on my phone and it just popped for me just into perspective my life and I was like you know what if someone from all you know thousands of years ago if they were to look at my life what would they think here I am and it just made me realize how short my life is in the grand scheme of all of time and it just made me realize that actually I want my life to count for something I want to Steward my time and live in a way that is honoring to God and Ecclesiastes 3 11 it it says something really interesting it says he has planted eternity in the human heart you see you might not realize this but we've been built for eternity that this time on Earth is just a sliver of all of existence that we are going to live God I believe is intentionally planted that in our hearts and one day we have the opportunity to spend all eternity with him and choosing to spend our time with God is one of the ways that we can love him with all our heart soul mind and strength and it means so much to him then in our lives in the busyness we choose to spend our time with him and I have a son Eli who's two years old and as a baby Eli was completely dependent on his mum and dad for feeding him for clothing him for bathing him and washing him but you realize now getting to the stage where he's more independent and his parents like yes but he can do a number of things on his own now that he doesn't need my help for certain things and as he gets older the Dynamics of our relationship will change he's not going to need me to tie his shoelaces he'll be able to do it on his own and what I love as a father as he's getting older is when he just wants to spend time with me when he takes me about the hand and just wants me to come and play with his trains and one of the things that he does at the moment is when we're eating whether we're having breakfast we're having dinner he just wants to sit on either mine or Becky's lap and it's not so that we can help him eat he's he can do that on his own but what he wants is to just be close in those moments and for me when I thought and reflected on this I thought that's just just the picture that we have of our heavenly father that he desires for us to live our own lives but in that in the busyness and the fullness of that to be close to him see our heavenly father he loves us he wants the best for us in our lives and one of the ways that we can love him back is by making him the center of our lives so that's my first point for us this morning that we can love God and be Jesus centered the second point for us this morning is this loving yourself and I don't know how you feel about loving yourself this might come more easily to some of you than others but we have a Heavenly Father and we have a savior who loves us who was prepared to die for us and has the highest value on our lives and you may look at your own life and you may see those imperfections you might see those areas where you get it wrong and you fall short and we sin but when our heavenly father looks at us he looks at us differently you see he looks at us through the filter of what Jesus has done on the cross you see the heaven our heavenly father looks at us and has the same level of love for us as he does for his own son and he looks beyond all of our shortcomings and he sees what Jesus has done in and through us and that is good news and when we come to Christ we become a new creation and 2 Corinthians 5 17 it says this and I've got it up here for you therefore if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation old things have passed away behold all things have become new you see when you choose to put your faith and your belief in Jesus a spiritual transformation takes place that we are transformed into something new and this is a gift that is freely given to us and it was paid by Jesus on the cross and Jesus saw such value in US and loves us so much that he was prepared to do that he was prepared to die for our sin and our wrongdoing and if Jesus died for us don't you think that we too should love ourselves and we're called to live a new life as as a new creation and for us this year as a church we our theme and our Focus theme has been renewable and for many of you'll know Paul and Sarah are way on sabbatical at the moment are part of that but renewal is available to all of us and I've got a definition here of what renewal is just to remind you and it says renewal is to make new again to restore to freshness Perfection or vigor to give New Life to to rejuvenate to re-establish to recreate to re-build and I wanted to ask yourself or ask yourself the question this morning of what would it look like for me to be renewed how would you act if you had some more Vigor in your life that's a word we don't use very much but it's it's a great word but what would it look like to be made new again in your life what would it look like to be restored to freshness given New Life rejuvenated or rebuild and I've got a picture up here on the screen of a an old classic car and as I said I like my cars and when I prayed about this and the picture that I feel like holy spirit gave me for for Renewal this year was of a classic car that's been restored and I've spent many a Saturday morning watching a good classic car restoration program where they've got this old car that's been sat in a barn for like the last 40 years and the paint's peeling off it it's not been moved it's not been driven and they take that car and they strip it down and they rebuild it and they make it new so much so that it was better than the day when it rolled off the production line and you see when we come to Christ we become a new creation and God does a restoration work in our life and that is available to each and every single one of us that we spiritually get transformed in a moment but then we spend the rest of our lives Allowing God to work on us and he can iron out some of those imperfections and we become more christ-like and I want to give opportunity today for people to be renewed for different areas in our lives and the prayer team are going to be available after this morning where you can come and receive prayer but you can say Lord in this area of my life I need God to do a work I need him to come and renew me I need him to come and to restore me and this picture was taken from a Bible reading plan called restored so if you want to go and read that then feel free but we need to love ourselves and we need to recognize the value that God puts Upon Our Lives that he died for us and my third and final point for us this morning is this loving people and we've read the the first and most important commandment was to love the Lord Our God with all our heart soul mind and strength but then Jesus said the second commandment is equally important to love our neighbor as ourselves and just as we've talked about of recognizing who we now are in God recognizing the value that he places Upon Our Lives we too need to place the same value in other people as well and I want to continue reading from 2 Corinthians 5 18 and verse 17 is what we read where it says that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new creation has come a new person the old life is gone a new life has begun but Verse 18 it doesn't stop there it goes on to say this and that we should have it up on the on the screen it says and all of this all of it is a gift from God who brought us back to himself through Christ and God has given us the task of reconciling people to him we've been given that task of reconciling people back to God now God does that as well but we get to play a part in that we're actually asked and given that task and one of the greatest way that we can love people is by connecting them to Jesus it's one of the most loving things that we can do it's through sharing the love that we have received and sharing it with those around us and we all show and receive love differently we're all unique we all love in different ways and there's a great book on the subject Called Love Languages and it's by a an author called Dr Gary Chapman and the book was specifically written for for really for couples who are in romantic relationships but within that it gives some tools and it gives us a structure that I think can be used in all of the relationships in our lives not just those that are romantic and I wanted to use this as a structure this morning because for some of us we might just love naturally but for some of us it might not come so naturally so I want to give you some tools and some ways that you can practically show the love of Jesus to the people in and around your life so there's five different languages the first one is words of affirmation and this is for people who value having verbal acknowledgments of affection so this could be giving someone a compliment it could be words of appreciation could be saying you know you did a great job with that today you know I really appreciate you doing that I saw what you did there that verbal encouragement it could be through communication you know it could be sending someone a message thinking of you today you know have a great week thought of this scripture thought of you could be connecting with someone on social media that's words of affirmation a second way is quality time and this is where for some people to feel loved to feel appreciated they actually need people to spend time with them nothing wrong with it it's just we all like to receive and give love in different ways and it could be going out for someone with a coffee it could be saying to a work colleague hey you know we don't always get a chance to talk let's go out and grab some food it'd be great to have a catch up going for a walk and it's it's really comes down about having or being present actively listening to that person giving them your eye contact in a digital world it's so so very important third love language is acts of service and this is where people appreciate when someone goes out of the way to help them so it could be things like just it could be a simple thing like making some old cup of tea or a cup of coffee it doesn't have to be massive but then it could be things like helping someone move house which is a bit more massive and I appreciate all the people who've helped me move this year but it can do just generally helping someone going out of your way the fourth way is through gifts and for some people it's the appreciation that they have when someone gives them a gift and it's not necessarily about a monetary value it's not about being you know spending really expensive things but it's more symbolic it's more that that person knows that you've thought about them you've gone out and you've thought about getting that gift and you've reflected on giving them that gift and that can give that person emotional benefits and again it's about thinking outside the box some of you might be thinking I could do this in my marriage you could you know could do this with my family but it's just different ways and then the fourth and oh sorry the fifth and final one is physical touch and we have to be a bit more sensitive with this one but if we use it in the context of relationships and friendships you know it could be things like as formal as a handshake which if you're in the business world but it could be you know a pat on the back it could be a welcoming hug it could be a holy kiss it's biblical we see Jesus washed the disciples feet can you imagine what it must have felt like for the disciples to have Jesus washing your feet a physical physical touch in that way I can't imagine it and these five different Love Languages they're a tool for us to use and as I said we all naturally gravitate to giving and receiving love in a certain way so let's make ourselves available to share the love of Christ we have the opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus we can show love in so many different ways and we also have the opportunity to be the mouthpiece of Jesus as well that we can tell people how much God loves them what he thinks of them and share that good news that we've received ourselves so just as we come to a close and I begin to summarize I'm just going to invite the band to come up and come and get ready and just really to summarize on those three points the first one of loving God about putting God number one in our lives making him the priority Center in our lives around him he's given everything for us and what we can do in return is make him number one loving yourself recognizing God has put such a great value on your life that he was prepared to send his son that he now has adopted you is his son or daughter that he sees us in that way that's the level of love that he has for me and for you and last of all that we can then be active in loving other people that love that we freely received ourselves we can now share that with the world around us and we're going to sing a song in a moment called good grace and I could read the entire song out because there's so much in it that talks of what we've talked about this morning but I just wanted to just highlight one section and I want us to use the remained in time that we have together this morning as a response that we would pour out our love back to God through our praises and through our worship and those tools that I've given you the love languages they can be used for the people in our lives but I think they can be used for God as well in some ways that we can give him our words of affirmation that we can give him our quality time we can serve him we can spend our lives seeking him it's not just limited to people so in good Grace with understanding this in a moment don't let your heart be troubled hold your head high don't fear no evil fix your eyes on this one truth and you ready for the truth you ready God is madly in love with you he is madly in love with you and we can just bask in that fat this morning celebrate that fat this morning and give Jesus the praise that he deserves so let's stand let's get ready and let's praise our God and savior Song: Good Grace [Music] come together [Music] children Every Nation [Music] so don't let your heart be in trouble hold your head up fix your eyes on this one truth God is madly in love with you to take courage hold on be strong remember [Music] oh [Music] my God [Music] Jesus [Music] [Music] please [Music] fix your eyes [Music] wear a hell [Music] are you ready to go all in this is foreign [Music] what's up [Music] foreign [Music] amazing [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] come on relaxing Jesus one more time [Music] Jesus [Music] come on Church Jesus your kingdom come Response Rob thank you for a great message I love those five practical points that I think we should all take this week and which one can we Implement to those around us which one can we take and impact our family or our friends or our work colleagues or all three of those there's no limit and then which one of those five can we act on with Gods absolutely fantastic now Rob mentioned about all in or not and I do feel like we can't talk about praise and being all in without finishing on another song and I really think it's not about ending with praising God it's actually declaring how we are starting and entering our week so we're gonna sing another song that demonstrates that that Praises God that we started with talking about God's blessings flow the goodness of God that's how we're going to go into our week but before we start there's one thing that I've loved watching over the weeks and it's young people being on the stage put up for Caleb [Applause] on this planet I am cool enough to stand next to the three guitarists who I'm standing over here but it's great to see the Next Generation leading us I'm not 20 I'm not gonna lie I'm not 21 again but leading Us in praise and worship so let's encourage the Next Generation as they lead us and this morning let's go out into our week praising God I'm going to hand over to Steph Song: Praise God (Doxology) foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Falcons with me [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] I know [Music] goes [Music] praise God [Music] praise God [Music] we'll see [Music] all creations [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music] praise God have an absolutely fantastic week enjoy the sunshine the Thunder is gonna come at some point but enjoy the sunshine while at last have a great week and we'll see you next week [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music]