The Bethel - Old Trafford Christadelphian Church

Mike explored the links between forgiveness and forgiving and the contrast of the unpayable debt depicted in the parable of the unmerciful servant, compared to the 'pocket change' debt that the other servant had to him. We make the mistake of challenging people and often looking down at them at the same time. These should not be linked in the same way that Jesus was able to challenge people without looking down on them.

Before everything else in the list, Love is Patient! We can all admit that we struggle a lot with patience. When we have less than enough time and expectations that are higher than we can cope with, patience is stretched and often we don't have enough. The literal translation of the word Patience in 1 Corinthians 13 is 'takes a long time to boil'. LOve takes a long time to boil! Patience is borne of the process by which, as Christ grows larger, ourselves diminish and in the words of Philippians 1:6, 'God who started this great work in you will carry on to completion until the day Christ returns.'

Jesus proclaimed that there was no man greater than John the baptist. Then John says, referring to Jesus that 'there is one who comes who's sandals I am not worthy to untie'. John was a great man but Jesus was greater. MAurice guides us as we explore how great Jesus was and how we can use him as a measuring stick to inform how we live, now that Christ's greatness has destroyed the power of sin and death.

It is a human trait to judge people and attribute some kind of value to them before we really know them. We also often find that the people we don't give time to and judge most harshly are those on the fringes, the difficult ones, the outcasts. Jesus approach was different. He viewed everyone through the lens of evryone being made in the image of God. When we copy his example, we start to value the most vulnerable who are prepared to stick their necks on the line for redemption

David discusses the event that is commonly known as ‘Communion’ - the service we meet for every Sunday that involves sharing bread and wine amongst Jesus’ followers. Where did it come from, and how did we come to the ceremony we now know? How did it go from being the remembrance of a nations escape from slavery to being a celebration of mankind’s salvation from sin and death?

Phil explored the necessary attributes required to 'finish the race', reminding us that Jesus has already won it and our completion of it is enough to make us winners too. Our encouragement is to seek the Kingdom first, knowing that our reward is a relationship with God and Jesus.

In our quest for righteousness, we can sometimes follow the footsteps of the Pharisees and Saducees. These groups were so bent on their extreme version of matching up to God's law that their experience of forgiveness was very shallow. It took a woman 'steeped in sin' to demonstrate to them that they may have missed something. David brings out the lessons for us from that encounter.

Belonging to a family is not always straightforward. There are many ways it can come about, birth, adoption, chosing to join a group... Mark reminded us that belonging to Jesus is more important than belonging to church and gave us encouragement and guidance for how to help increase acceptance and belonging.

In a world where patience is a virtue being rapidly lost, David explores our agenda and timing and compates it to the timing of God. God is patient and waiting for us, can we be patient and wait for the Lord?

It is all too easy at times to beat ourselves up and languish in our sinful state. On the flip side, we can also sometimes find it easy to be so caught up in the joy of forgiveness that we forget the seriousness of our sin. Darren encourages us to walk this balance carefully and gives us a way to navigate the through remorse, repentance and forgiveness and truly embrace grace.