Village Church Annandale (Sydney) sermons

In this first talk of a series of four on 'Holy Sexuality' Dominic Steele takes us to the Bible and explores big issues confronting each of us as we live in 21st century inner city Sydney.

We look at the way God made things in the very beginning and then explore what went wrong.

Dominic Steele gives us eight principles for pastoral care.
1. I want to share the word of God and pray

1. One to one meetings are super effective for pastoring people.

2. Recognise that you personally will have a spiritual battle.

3. The message is constant: Jesus is saviour and Lord with application of faith and repentance.

4. Make sure you pray

5. Sometimes you will need to state a position, rather than have the opportunity to open a passage

6. Listen first

7. People don't want to know how much you know, until they know how much you care.

Who is responsible for our own care and growth in holiness?

Dominic Steele says the scriptures teach us that:

1. We each have an individual responsibility for ourselves.

2. We as brothers and sisters are responsible for the other members of the community

3. The elders are responsible

It's not our flock. It's God's flock. The Lord Jesus has done the heavy lifting. We are but under-shepherds.

1 Peter 5:1 I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory about to be revealed: 2 Shepherd God’s flock among you, not overseeing out of compulsion but willingly, as God would have you; not out of greed for money but eagerly; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. 4 And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.

Having talked yesterday about the goal of pastoral care. Today we introduce the primary pastoral carer, the shephard.

1 Peter 5:1-2 I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory about to be revealed: 2 Shepherd God’s flock among you, 

We are so thankful to God for you! Many times today I have stopped in conversations to praise God for the miraculous generosity of Village members yesterday towards our Intergenerational Gift.

We have a current pledge total of $304,965 against a target of $375,000. 

Stop and rejoice with us about the generosity of our membership.

$99,015 has been pledged towards our tax deductible ‘Wipe the Debt’ plan to pay off the church building.  We have oversubscribed our target of $80,000 and can’t take any more. 

$205,950 in pledges have been received towards our housing deposit target. 

The average pledged gift from an employee is $4,932. The average gift from a student/retiree/pensioner is a whopping $2,428. 

Our current deficit on our overall target is $70,034 

To make our target we need 20 more forms with an average gift of $2,592.  It would be especially helpful if they came in before Wednesday’s parish council meeting. 

We are praying this will get us close to our target of $375,000. 

If you haven’t put in a form it would be wonderful if you could join us in helping close this $70,034 gap.  Any amount would be greatly appreciated.  Please fill in this form (https://bit.ly/iggift2021) and email to [email protected] 

We’d appreciate getting the form by Wednesday morning to assist in preparing the recommendation for Parish Council on Wednesday night. 

Warmly,

Dominic Steele

On behalf of the Parish Council and staff team at Village

We start an examination today of how to care pastorally for people. And first off what are we looking for? What's the outcome in a best case scenario?

We get clues from the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 4:11-12 and Ephesians 5:22

Ephesians 4:11 And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ, 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God’s Son, a growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ’s fullness.

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. 27 He did this to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless.

The last paragraph of Galatians sees Paul writing in his own hand, emphasising the point that Christians should boast only in the cross of Jesus Christ.