St Matts Weekly Message

The last of our Summer series — Enoch was a man who walked with God for a really really long time. Jeff takes us through the brief mentions of Enoch in the scriptures and shows us how we can learn the kind of discipleship which is "a long obedience in the same direction."

This week we were joined by Becky Murray. Becky is the founder and CEO of One By One, a charity aiming to end the exploitation of the vulnerable across the world. As well as sharing about the story, mission and work of One by One, Becky also shared a message from the book of Exodus with the title 'I AM'. Becky encourages us to think about where God could send us to build his kingdom - whether on a mission trip to another country or volunteering at the Soup Run next week. All we need to do is respond just like Isaiah did: "Here I am, send me."

Back to School Sunday! It’s a time of year when lots of people are getting ready for new things or getting back into old things. Mike continues our Summer Heroes series taking us through three episodes in the life of Joshua in the Old Testament and what they might teach us as we head into this next term, like Joshua, knowing God has big plans, living faithfully in the waiting rather than getting stuck, and keeping up our hunger for God.

Phil shared from the story of Daniel in the Bible. Daniel (of lions den fame!) was an amazing man of faith in the Old Testament who chose to live faithfully to God in a very hostile environment of exile. He was also gifted in interpreting dreams and had insight from God into the unseen spiritual world around us. We need to recognise evil in the world around us and these things can seem a little weird and even frightening. However we rest in the fact that God has won the victory in Jesus, and are called to continue to live faithfully like Daniel — keeping on doing good, focussing on Godly things and holding on to the truths of the Word of God which the Bible calls the Sword of the Spirit.

This week we were blessed to hear Adrian share with us on 3 of his heroes from the book of Daniel: Shadrach Meshach and Abednego. These three men are praised for their unwavering faith in God, even when faced with the threat of a fiery furnace. Adrian challenges us if we would remain as strong in a similar situation. At the end of the message, we look a Peter and his denial of Jesus three times out of fear for his own life. Despite his denial, Peter was restored by Jesus and went on to preach the gospel, write two books of the New Testament, and inspire millions. Adrian encourages us that even if we have faltered in their faith - unlike Shadrach, Meshach & Abednego, we can be restored and make a significant impact- just like Peter.

This week Teressa kicked off our new message series: 'Summer Heros.' In this new series, we will be looking at our speaker's favourite figures from the Old Testament and what learning we can take from their stories to help us in our own walk with Jesus. Teressa kicks us off this week in a somewhat unlikely place - the story of Abraham, Sarai and Hagar...

We had an issue in recording this week so we are missing the first few moments of the message. This is the entirety of the reading Teressa is speaking from when the podcast begins:

Genesis 15:18 to 16:6

So the Lord made a covenant with Abram that day and said, “I have given this land to your descendants, all the way from the border of Egypt to the great Euphrates River… 1 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had no children. So Sarai took her servant, an Egyptian woman named Hagar,  and gave her to Abram so she could bear his children. "The Lord has kept me from having children," Sarai said to Abram. "Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.” And Abram agreed.  So Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. (This happened ten years after Abram had settled in the land of Canaan.)  So Abram slept with Hagar, and she became pregnant. When Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress Sarai with contempt.  Then Sarai said to Abram, “This is all your fault! Now this servant of mine is pregnant, and she despises me, though I myself gave her privilege of sleeping with you. The LORD will make you pay for doing this to me! Abram replied, “Since she is your servant, you may deal with her as you see fit.” So Sarai treated her harshly and Hagar ran away. 

Apologies for the delay in uploading Sunday's message- the whole team have been away at Creation Fest!

In this, the final instalment in our Upside Down series through the book of Acts, Mike looks at our whole life mission as Christians. The passage for this weeks message is Acts 20:17-38.

In our penultimate message in our Upside Down series, Graham Smith takes us through the story of Paul and Silas in Prison in Acts 16:13-34. He draws on his experience as a missionary in China for 7 years to help shed some life on the experience of persecution millions have faced over the centuries up until the present day - including Paul and Silas in our passage. 

Graham finishes by asking us the following questions:

Join us next week as our Curate Mike takes us through our final instalment in our Upside Down series 🙌

As the early church grew it also faced lots of difficulties. This week Sally, one of our Church Wardens, takes us through the story of Peter’s miraculous escape in Acts 12. It’s a story that starts with the church in crisis - James has been put to death, Peter has been put in prison and the church is being persecuted. In the face of all this the church pray - both earnestly and honestly, and Peter joins in with Gods amazing rescue plan. Many Christians around the world face persecution for their faith - we get to join in praying earnestly and honestly for christians around the world, as well as asking God to help us to find freedom from the things which hold us back in our own lives.

As humans, we all have underlying prejudices. The thing about prejudice is that it's not easy to spot it ourselves- sometimes we need some help. That's exactly what we see the Holy Spirit doing in today's passage as the boundaries of the early church continue to be pushed outward. Join Mike as we find out about an unexpected character seeking God, about a follower of Jesus making space to listen to and be challenged by God, and about the widening circle of the Kingdom of God where everyone is welcome but everyone is also transformed.