During the service this last Sunday, as we were worshipping God and singing the Brooke Fraser song, “Soon”, Angi Sussex sang a prophetic song she sensed God wanted to use to minister specific encouragement to all of us regarding the eternal weight of glory found in and through Jesus Christ.

Here’s the lyrics from the song, and a rough recording. May it serve and encourage you all!

I’ve placed a treasure in your heart
It’s the knowledge of my glory
Found in Christ.

By my Spirit this treasure won’t depart
As Jesus was lifted up
So you’ll be raised up on high.

So don’t lose heart
Though you see you outer body wasting away
Know that I’m renewing you inside, day by day.
So don’t lose heart
Though the burden of your trials seems to heavy
Compared to my glory, they are light and momentary

For I’ve placed a treasure in your heart
So don’t look to the things that you see
Your home, you job, your car, clothes or money
But look to the things that are unseen
For your joy is found in my glory
That will remain for eternity.
So don’t lose heart
I’ve placed my treasure in your heart.

 
Prophetic Song on the Eternal Weight of the Glory of Jesus Christ by Grace Church

Tomorrow (4th May 2012) is the next instalment of our monthly “First Friday Fast” at Grace Church. (Time for those “May the 4th be with you” Stars Wars gags!)

It’s one day a month we encourage all the people of Grace Church to set aside, to devote time to fasting and praying for our church and the advance of the gospel in our community and city.

Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath, and at the start of a new month we want to dedicate time to praying again for God’s grace to be lavished upon His church.  We want everything we are and do as a church to be saturated and soaked in prayer.

As we prepare our hearts for tomorrow, I found this short “Sermon Jam” video which draws on a couple of sermons on prayer preached my a favourite preacher of mine, Matt Chandler.  It’s powerful and stirring.  May it stir your heart as you join us in praying for our church.

Here’s some points to guide our prayer tomorrow:

GENERAL POINTS:

• Let’s pray and praise God for allowing us access to Himself through Jesus, and for loving to hear and answer our prayers.

• Pray that the Holy Spirit would move powerfully among us as a church; that God would increase our thirst for him, and deepen a burning desire to see him act, and manifest himself and his power — that people would be healed, that spiritual gifts would be used to build up the church, that the Spirit would soften and pierce hard hearts by the power and truth of the gospel, and that God would use us in mighty ways to shine the bring light of the gospel into the darkness of the world around us.

• Pray that our passion for Jesus would be freshly awakened, and our desire to proclaim the gospel to our community and city would grow, be Spirit-empowered and effective.

• Pray that God would give us a God-sized vision of what he is doing in his world, and that he would give us an increase of faith to play our small part in His unstoppable gospel mission.

SPECIFIC POINTS:

• Pray that we (as individuals) would have boldness and courage to invite our friends, family, neighbours, and co-workers to the “Jesus for Skeptics” Guest Sunday on May 20th.

• Pray that our friends, family, neighbours, and co-workers would respond positively to our invitation and come to church that morning.

• Pray for Brian Whittaker as he prepares and preaches the message that morning, that it would be full of gosple clarity and power, and that our friends, family, neighbours and co-workers would respond in faith to the gospel, and be saved.

• Pray that our church would grow in number as many from our community and city come to a saving faith in Jesus Christ.

Last Sunday we continued our preaching series from the book of Daniel with a sermon entitled, “The Ram, The Goat, The Horn & The Divine Shepherd“.

You can listen to or download the audio from here, or via our iTunes podcast feed.

Here’s the quote from the sermon, which is taking from Iain Duguid’s excellent commentary on Daniel.

Iain Duguid:
“Daniel 8 affirms God’s victory in the face of darkness.  If God’s purposes were not thwarted by [Antiochus Epiphanies and] that period of rebellion and defilement, then they will certainly never be thwarted by our personal experiences of unfaithfulness of persecution. Yet from our standpoint in redemptive history, we can see the same lessons demonstrated on an even larger scale.  We can look beyond the darkness and restoration of the days of Antiochus to an even greater act of rebellion and defilement — the climactic act of rebellion and defilement that, in God’s grace, itself became the source of our hope.  The defilement that Daniel foresaw in the time of Antiochus was certainly horrific, with the temple being desecrated and truth cast to the ground, but there was worse yet to come.  Even though Antiochus desecrated the temple, at least at that time no one laid hands on God himself.  But nearly 2,000 years later, in the person of Jesus Christ, the dwelling place of God was once again desecrated because of man’s sin and rebellion, and Satan’s enmity.  God’s own people rejected the Messiah that he had sent.  Instead, the leaders of God’s own chosen people actually allied themselves with the forces of evil against the prince of the Lord’s army and handed him over to death, crying out, ‘Crucify him!’  What worse abomination or act of betrayal could there ever be than crucifying God? Yet even such abominable rebellion and enmity could not thwart God’s purposes.  At the cross Satan did his worst to Jesus, and as a result simply brought about precisely what God had planned from the beginning.  The cross is the place where God gave his final answer to our rebellion and transgression, as well as Satan’s enmity.  At the cross, Jesus took upon himself the full weight of all of our transgression and rebellion, dealing once for all with our sin.  His devastation there brought God’s wrath against our sin to a final end.  There at the cross he broken the sting of death, which is the power of sin, and so guaranteed the ultimate happy ending to our story.  Just as Christ was raised from the dead in glory, so also all those who are in him will one day rise in glory, on the day when God’s timetable is complete.  The cross, is therefore the guarantee that God’s plan will always prevail in the face of our weakness, rebellion, and sin, and in spite of the fierce enmity of Satan and all his hosts.  Because of the victory won on the cross, the gates of hell can never prevail against God and Christ’s flock.  To be sure, evil remains, awful and powerful in this world.  Our path to heaven often takes us through the valley of deep darkness.  Yet in the midst of that sobering reflection, we must never lose sight of the glories of heaven and the fact that God is the one directing events.  He will eventually draw our time on this earthly stage to a close and usher in God’s victory.  We don’t know when that end will be, but we can still live in its radiant light and long for the coming dawn.”

It was great to be together this passed Sunday and join our voices in praise of our great God. Jadie Stiven led us in singing praises to God, and rejoicing in the future joy of heaven that is ours through the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We sang the following songs together:

• Generous King (Sovereign Grace Music, “The Gathering” album)
• Beautiful Saviour (Stuart Townend, “The Best of Stuart Townend Live” album)
• Revelation Song (written by Jenny Riddle, “Kari Jobi” album)
• Soon (written Brooke Fraser, from Hillsong United)

This week we continued our preaching series from the book of Daniel.  You can listen to or download the seventh sermon of the series, preached by Nathan Smith from Daniel 8:1-27, entitled “The Ram, The Goat, The Horn & The Divine Shepherd” from here, or via our iTunes podcast feed.

The quote from the sermon will follow in a separate post.

We want to be a church who loves to read, and so to help us toward that end we have our GRACE CHURCH “Book of the Month” Recommendation idea.

Each month we highlight one book that we feel compliments and re-inforces the truths taught on Sunday mornings, and will benefit our souls and families to go deeper in believing, living out and representing God and his gospel to the world.  The books will be available to purchase on Sunday mornings – at a cracking price!

This month, we have decided to highlight a book to compliment Peter’s sermon on being “Alive in Christ” (preached on Sunday 15th April 2012, available here).  The book is:

The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness by Tim Keller

This is a 48-page gem that gives the reader a handle on how to pursue true Christian joy!

Timothy Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, New York City, which he started in 1989 with his wife, Kathy, and three young sons. He is the author of several books.

Here’s the publisher blurb on the book:

‘What are the marks of a supernaturally changed heart?’

This is one of the questions the Apostle Paul addresses as he writes to the church in Corinth. He’s not after some superficial outward tinkering, but instead a deep–rooted, life–altering change that takes place on the inside. In an age where pleasing people, puffing up your ego and building your résumé are seen as the methods to ‘make it’, the Apostle Paul calls us to find true rest in blessed self–forgetfulness.

In this short and punchy book, best–selling author Timothy Keller, shows that gospel–humility means we can stop connecting every experience, every conversation with ourselves and can thus be free from self–condemnation. A truly gospel–humble person is not a self–hating person or a self–loving person, but a self–forgetful person.

This freedom can be yours…

The book is available all this month for a staggeringly fantastic £2.50!

A couple of weeks ago, Peter preached a sermon looking at the great and glorious truth of Christians being “Alive in Christ”.  You can listen to it here.  He also used a number of quotes, and they are now available here:

John Calvin:
“The Holy Spirit is the bond by Christ effectually unites us to himself.”

John Piper:
“We will never experience the fullness of the greatness of God’s love for us if we don’t see his love in relation to our former deadness, because Ephesians 2 verse 4 says that the greatness of his love is shown precisely in this: that it makes us alive when we were dead. ‘But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.’ Because of his great love for us, he made us alive. If we don’t know that we were dead, we will not know the fullness of the love of God.”

Martin Luther:
“It is not imitation that makes sons, it is sonship that makes imitators.”

ESV Study Bible:
“Paul knows that the triune God initiated and accomplished cosmic reconciliation and redemption to the praise of his glory.”

John Piper:
“This amazing love of God that gave us life when we were dead, and caused us to be born again, and brought us into the family of God, secures our final perfection in God forever.”

Poem:
“In the Beloved” accepted am I,
Risen, ascended, and seated on high.
Saved from all sin through His infinite grace,
With the redeemed ones accorded a place.

“In the Beloved” – How safe my retreat!
“In the Beloved” – Accounted complete!
Who can condemn me? In Him I am free!
Savior and Keeper forever is He!

“In the Beloved” – God’s marvelous grace
Calls me to dwell in this wonderful place!
God sees my Savior, and then He sees me,
“In the Beloved” accepted and free!