Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Morning. And as we come to think about Pentecost this morning, one thing that struck me very much as we were worshipping this morning is the word that I think I want to share with you this morning, I just felt God saying, just emphasize this at the beginning, is to say that it's a, you know, in scripture when it uses the word you. Sometimes we make that very personal, don't we? And say, it's about me, it's about my faith, and it's about my this, that, and the other. And that is correct, and it is right to do that. But the word also is collective. It's a. It's a. It's a community thing. And I just think God said, the stories we had this morning is all about saying, we are the body of Christ. We are the church. We are part of the church that Jesus died for. We are part of the body that the Holy Spirit is animating. And so when I say the word you this morning, I think what God is saying, yes, it's about us as individuals, and we can apply it individually, but it's also about us collectively. And what we pray for is for us.
[00:01:04] Does that make sense? Is that okay? So in that spirit, before we read scripture together, can I invite you, if you're happy, to close your eyes and just. I want to reimagine two things. You might have to open one eye to do this. Actually, having thought this through, the first thing I'd like you to do is just imagine the person sitting nearest you. Now, you may know them. You may have to have a quick squint as to see who they are, and you may not know their name. If you do know their name, just think of that name and just join me with this prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for this person who's near me. I pray you will speak to this person this morning by your spirit. We collectively want to hear your word this morning. And so please, will you apply this word to them so they may feel encouraged, inspired, and blessed this morning. In the name of Jesus, amen. And then just have a little, if you can, as far as you're able, imagine yourself in the week to come, as far as you know, what will you be doing tomorrow? What will you be doing on Tuesday? What are the challenges that are coming your way this week? What are the things you're looking forward to?
[00:02:17] Heavenly Father, I give you. We give you the week ahead, and we ask that something in this message this morning, something imparted by your spirit, will empower us and enable us to live filled with your spirit. This week we ask it in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:02:34] Amen. So it is Pentecost. It's really exciting. Sunday, you may be surprised to hear I'm not going to speak about acts, chapter two. We are going to read from Romans. If you've got a bible with you and you would like to, it's going to come up on the screen. Romans, chapter eight, verses 14 to 17, we will refer to acts, chapter two. So that will get a look in. Don't worry about it. But we are going to look at that and it's going to come up on the screen. It's only a few verses and so I'm going to invite you, if you'd like to, to join with me as we read this together. It's not just me reading it to you. It's us reading it together and then taking it into our souls. So let's read Romans eight together. Those who'd like to. Out loud. For all who are led by the spirit of God are children of God.
[00:03:20] So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God's spirit when he adopted you as his own children.
[00:03:34] Now we call him Abba, Father, for his spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God's children.
[00:03:45] And since we are his children, we are his heirs.
[00:03:50] In fact, together with Christ, we are heirs of God's glory.
[00:03:57] But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering. Amen. So, Pentecost, the day when God sends the promised Holy Spirit to the church to animate it, to bring it into life. It's an exciting day. And if you read acts chapter two, two amazing things happen on that day. First of all, the spirit comes and people start speaking in other languages and it draws people in wonder and they can't understand what's going. So there's a very powerful demonstration of the power of God. But then equally remarkable, Peter, a friend of Jesus who is well known for putting foot in mouth. Does anyone put foot in mouth and say things they shouldn't? Sometimes Peter is your patron saint, isn't he? He always gets it wrong and he stands up and he gives the most amazing testimony. He talks about the power of God. He talks about what it is to follow Jesus. He unpacks the gospel and at the end of it 3000 people repent and turn to Jesus and get baptized. And then the passage goes on to talk about how they live in community together. It's an amazing story.
[00:05:09] It's a spirit led understanding of who we are as church, our status before God and a call to a new way of life. And in his speech, Peter references two particular verses which will come up on the screen in a minute. First of all, in acts 221, he says this, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved, which is from Joel, it's from the Old Testament, exactly the same words. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. If you call on Jesus, this says, you will be saved. You will be free for everything that God has for you. And as Esther spoke on Easter Sunday, when we think about the resurrection of Jesus, that speaks to hope.
[00:05:53] That speaks to hope.
[00:05:55] But also Peter says this in verse 28. A few verses later, he says, he quotes from psalm 16. He says, you have shown me the way of life and you fill me with the joy of your presence.
[00:06:09] And that is as much a part of what we think about on Pentecost as the hope. And this speaks to glory.
[00:06:16] And so when he talks about it, there's two aspects to it. He says in that verse, that you have shown me the way of life and you have filled me with the presence, the joy of your presence. Glory is about enjoying the presence of God, and it's about a way of life.
[00:06:32] And that's what I want to unpack this morning together. I want us to look at those two themes on this Pentecost Sunday, hope and glory. And it's not last night at the proms, so we're not going to sing land of hope and glory. Sorry, Lawson, sorry about that. But we're going to think about how does the spirit, how does the spirit affirm in us, lead us in that way of hope and glory, this Pentecost? Are we up for that this morning? Fantastic. So let's have a look at hope. First of all, Peter says, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. So looking going back to our verses in Romans, Romans, verse 14 says this, for all who are led by the spirit of God are the children of God. Verse 13 says, if though the spirit you put to death through the spirit you put to death the deeds of your sinful nature, you will live. So Peter and Romans Paul in Romans are saying the same thing. There's an equation there, isn't there? They're saying, if you do this, this will happen. If you call on the name of the Lord, you will live. If you put to death your sinful nature, you will this. If you are led by the spirit, you are children of God. And that's the equation that we're looking at. So first of all, the spirit leads us. We have hope because the spirit leads us. Question, are we being led by the spirit? And remember, I'm talking about us individually and us collectively. Being led by the spirit means, first of all, coming to a place of surrender.
[00:07:59] It means coming to God and saying, I cannot do life on my own. I cannot make myself suitable to be in your presence. The only way I can do it is to surrender and to be and to put my trust in Jesus that's being led by the spirit. And many of us here this morning will have got to that point at some point in our lives and we'll have a story about how we got to that for some, you may be on that journey. And if you're sitting here this morning and you're thinking, I'm not sure if I believe in God, I don't know whether God's real. I don't know who this Jesus person is. What's all this talk about a holy spirit then? You are so welcome here this morning because the spirit is leading you and prompting you and giving you questions to ask. If you're here this morning thinking, I am so rubbish, my life is such a mess. God could not possibly love me in the way that I am. And the way I think you are being led by the spirit because he's putting that thought in your head to say, there's a better way, there's a better life. So the being led by the spirit means coming to a place of surrender, but it also means coming to a place of transformation. It means on a day by day basis saying, what do you want me to do today?
[00:09:12] What decisions do you want me to make? How do you want me to think? How do you want me to live? How do you want me to relate to people? How do you want me to do my job? How do you want me to be a parent, how do you want me to be a neighbour? And so on. So it's a place of surrender, but it's a place of transformation. We call on the name of the Lord and we put to death our old nature. That's what being led by the spirit. Neither are things we can do by ourselves are they can't do it by ourselves. It's the spirit of God who leads us. And I have to say this because I feel it's important. It's one of the things I keep coming back to, I guess, in my own life and experience. If you're not led by the spirit of God, you will be led by another spirit, there is no doubt at all that we follow somebody. I said this on Palm Sunday. We follow Jesus or we follow another philosophy or another thinking or another way. You can't be neutral. You have to be following one or the other. So I guess the first question this morning on Pentecost Sunday is, are we being led by the Holy Spirit? So we have hope because the spirit leads us. We have hope because the spirit transforms us. So if we look at verse 15, the first part of 15, it says, you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Now, Paul uses this equation in other places. In one corinthians two, for example, verse twelve, he says, we don't have a spirit of the world. We have a spirit of God.
[00:10:36] Two Timothy one seven says, we don't have a spirit of fear and timidity, but a spirit of power, love and self discipline. So again, you've got this idea. There's two spirits there. There's the spirit of the world that tries to conform you to one way of thinking. And there's the spirit of God which tries to conform you to another way of thinking. And by allowing the Holy Spirit into our lives, by surrendering ourselves to him, we are able to be transformed. Philippians 212 says, this, work out your salvation for God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. I love that verse. God will give us the desire to please him. Psalm 37 four. Sometimes I think misunderstood says, delight yourselves in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. So you could read that. And it says, delight yourself in the Lord, and I will get the flat screen tv that I really, really want?
[00:11:31] Delight yourself in the Lord and you will get x, Y and Z? I don't think it means that. What if it doesn't mean that? What if it means, delight yourself in the Lord and he will plant in your heart the things he wants you to desire. The things he wants you to want. He has planted in the people here a desire for the people of Newton Abbot to know the name of Jesus. That's a desire from God, because we delight in who he is. So it transforms us. It transforms the way we think. The spirit transforms the way I think. At least I can only speak for myself.
[00:12:01] You don't have to put your hands up. You could nod or smile gently just to help me know that I'm not alone on this. Have you ever had that sort of situation where you think to yourself, I know, I'm going to give half an hour to reading the Bible and I'm going to do it.
[00:12:18] And then you think, do you know what? There's a drawer upstairs that I haven't. I've been meaning to tidy up for the last five years. And it's just calling to me, I think I really need to go and tidy up that drawer. And you leave the Bible reading and you go off and you tidy the drawer. There's a few smiles or maybe fasting. You think, I know I'm going to fast. I'm going to dedicate myself to the Lord with a fast, and I'm going to miss lunch.
[00:12:43] But maybe I'll do it tomorrow, or maybe I'll just have a raisin before I start.
[00:12:52] Or maybe I'll have that raisin encased in some oats and call it a flapjack. Or maybe I'll go to Deo Gloria first and then I'll start my, does that happen to you?
[00:13:04] And the moment we start thinking to ourselves, I'll let the spirit transform me. That other spirit, that other word will come along to us and say, don't do that. Do this instead. So it's a constant challenge to us in our current state to allow the spirit to transform us. We might want it, we might say that we want it, but we need to allow the Holy Spirit to transform us. We need to make decisions, and we need to do things that allow the Holy Spirit to change us.
[00:13:33] So the spirit leads us, the spirit transforms us, and then we have hope, because the spirit affirms our identity. And this is a really key part of Romans chapter eight. Instead, you've received God's spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him Abba, Father. Now his spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God's children.
[00:13:56] Now, I'm just going to take a little drink here because this gets complicated.
[00:14:02] Are you ready, Gordon?
[00:14:05] Okay. Right.
[00:14:07] This is quite high tech. So when the Romans heard the word adoption adopted into his family, that had a very specific meaning and understanding. And I think it's important for us to try and grapple with that for a few moments this morning. So hold on to your seats. Here we go.
[00:14:22] In the roman system, the father of a family, and excuse the patriarchal language, but that's how it was in the day, so excuse me for using that language. The patriarchal system was that the father in the family had complete control, power and authority over the family household. So if you've got that, you've got a father and you've got a son, and the son was under complete authority of the father in that household. There was no coming of age. They didn't get to 18 and be independent like we are. They just had that control over the son all the way through life.
[00:14:55] If a situation arose where the son needed to be adopted, maybe he's being requested from another family or something was going on that needed an adoption to take take place. The father would symbolically sell his son. He'd weigh out some money and he would symbolically sell his son.
[00:15:15] But then he would buy him back again. So he'd move out of the house, as it were, and then move back into the house. And then he'd do it again. He'd symbolically sell the son and then move him back into the house again a second time. And then on the third time, he would not buy the son back again. And so the son moves from within the family household to outside of the family household. And it was at that point, legally, that the son was no longer under the authority of the father.
[00:15:44] At that point, the new adopted family can come along and say, I'd like to adopt this son.
[00:15:53] I'd like to bring them into my family, into my household. But before they could do that, they would have to go to a magistrate. Bing.
[00:16:03] High tech, isn't it?
[00:16:05] And the new father would have to make a legal case to the magistrate to say, I want to adopt this child into my family. And the magistrate would have a look at that and say, yes, that's okay, you can do that. And so the magistrate would agree. The son would move into the household. And from that moment, first of all, that child would be under the new authority. The authority of the old house has gone, and the authority of the new house is now absolute.
[00:16:31] Magistrate disappears and the whole of the son's former life also disappears. It's erased. It is not considered relevant anymore. The only thing that is relevant is the new identity of the son in the new household. The new name, the new power, the new authority. So when Paul says, you've been adopted as God's family, as God's children, that's what they'd be thinking of. They'll be thinking, we've moved. We've moved from one authority to another authority for us. Or in Paul's language, we can look at it slightly differently. We can look at it as the two households of slave to and adopted child before we meet Jesus, before we put our trust in Jesus and hand ourselves over to his mercy and grace. We are slaves. We are slaves to ourselves. We are slaves to control. We are slaves to fear. We are slaves to worry. We are slaves to anxiety. We are slaves to all sorts of things. We are slaves to that thought that I can do life on my own. I am okay.
[00:17:33] But God wants to adopt us into his family.
[00:17:36] But you might be thinking, well, Graham, you know what? I wouldn't adopt me if I was in that situation. Why would God want to adopt me? I'm so messy, it's messed up. Why would he want to do that? And if you follow the logic of the adoption process, he probably wouldn't.
[00:17:52] But instead of the magistrate, where you make the legal case, we have the cross.
[00:18:00] And God says, it doesn't matter what you've done, it doesn't matter how you feel about yourself, it doesn't matter what you're a slave to. Jesus has made the legal case. He's done absolutely everything necessary. And therefore, having had the cross, having left your life of slavery, you now live as an adopted child. And that is our identity. And that's what the Holy Spirit does to us this morning for us. He says, you are an adopted child of God. And it is so hopeful to know that if there's anyone here this morning who doesn't see themselves as a beloved, beautiful, special, valued child of God, please ask someone to pray with you this morning, because it is so important. It's so important and it is so exciting to be part of God's family.
[00:18:53] Ephesians five eight says, for once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord, so live as people of light.
[00:19:02] We are under a new authority. We were in a new household a few years ago, or a number of years ago now. Liz and I spent a few years as foster carers and we had a little girl staying with us. She came to us, she was five years old.
[00:19:21] She was a beautiful, beautiful little girl. And she lived with us for about a year. And she was rescued, she was saved. She was taken out of a situation in which she was not safe and in which she was not going to flourish.
[00:19:35] Her family actually loved her, but they could not keep her safe.
[00:19:39] They could not give her what she needed to thrive. And so the system was that she came out of that situation and she came and lived with us for a little while, for a year. And after a year, they found a family for her, what they would call the forever family.
[00:19:54] And she moved into this forever family. And we were blessed and we were honoured when we were invited to the adoption ceremony at Exeter Crown Court. So you can see some of the things here. Crown court judge, magistrate and so on. And so we went, and it was a beautiful ceremony. And there are two things that struck me. The first thing that struck me, I don't know if you know this about adoption, you may do, is that when you're adopted, you get a completely new birth certificate. It looks exactly like your old certificate. There's no difference to it at all, except it's got a new name.
[00:20:27] God wants to give us that new name, his family name.
[00:20:32] But the second thing that happened was, as we were standing there and they'd done all the formal stuff, the judge said to this family, to the parents, what names have you given this child?
[00:20:44] Sorry.
[00:20:47] And the first thing was, the first name stayed the same. That would get confusing, wouldn't you? You change the child's first name. The second thing that happened, as I've just indicated, is the surname changed. So the moment the judge signed the papers, the name changed to the new family name. It's what God does for us. The moment we say yes to Jesus, our family name changes. We have a new father.
[00:21:10] And then the third name, they said, we've given them a new middle name. This little girl who's been taken out of a place where she was never going to thrive and then moved to a place where today she is still thriving.
[00:21:27] She said, we're giving her a new middle name.
[00:21:30] And the new middle name was Hope.
[00:21:33] That little girl carries that name from that moment to this day. Her middle name is Hope. Can I encourage you this morning, if you haven't already done so, put your trust. Let the Lord, let the spirit lead you, transform you and affirm in you you are his adopted child.
[00:21:53] Right?
[00:21:54] Is that okay?
[00:21:56] It's all right. I'm okay.
[00:21:58] Let's carry on. Let's carry on. So that's hope.
[00:22:01] Let's have a little think about glory. Let's have a little think about glory then.
[00:22:09] Because being adopted, verse 17. Since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together we are heirs of God's glory. Because being adopted was not just about an inheritance, a new identity. Sorry, it was about an inheritance. It was about a new inheritance. The father would bequeath his estate to his sons. And if you were an adopted son, you had as much right to that estate as anybody else.
[00:22:37] The son would be expected to carry on the family name, which they'd just been given, and the family business. So whatever the family did, the son would be expected to carry on with that business.
[00:22:49] Did you know, I didn't know this. Did you know the first five roman emperors were all adopted.
[00:22:55] None of them was a natural son. So every single roman emperor. First five roman emperors inherited a name and an empire and were expected to carry on the empire.
[00:23:08] Acts 228. I read earlier from Peter says, you have shown me the way of life, and you fill me with the joy of your presence.
[00:23:17] Two things about the glory is this. It's about enjoying the presence of God, his identity and so on, our identity in him. And it's about a way of life.
[00:23:27] It's about carrying on the father's work. That's what glory is about. So only two points, not three points. So you can see we're getting towards the end. We experience glory because the spirit gives us God's presence.
[00:23:43] We experience glory because the spirit gives us God's presence. And one of the things I really love, I've said this before, about the Bible, is the whole of the Bible tells the same story. It doesn't matter where you go in the Bible, you will find aspects or parts of the same story. So if you go into the Old Testament, if you read Habakkuk, chapter two, verse 14, it says this, for as the waters fill the sea, the earth will be filled with an awareness of the glory of the Lord.
[00:24:08] Psalm 70, 219.
[00:24:11] Praise his glorious name forever. Let the whole earth be filled with his glory.
[00:24:16] Psalm eight. O Lord, our God, your majestic name fills the earth. Your glory is higher than the heavens.
[00:24:24] Glory is about experiencing the presence of God. Revelation 21 three. Look, God's home is now among his people. God himself will be with them. God wants to be with us. From Adam and Eve walking in the garden to revelation. He wants to be with you and me. He wants to be with his people. So part one of the inheritance is to enjoy the presence of God. And we can do that through the kind of worship that we had this morning. As we have so many gifted people leading us in worship and leading us in our thinking and our praying and so on, we can experience the present God through a really deep friendship. We can experience the presence of God through music, through art, through dance, through laughter.
[00:25:06] They're intangible things, I guess, but we can experience the presence of God. We can say, I know God was present here because.
[00:25:14] But is that all?
[00:25:16] Sometimes, I guess the more cynical part of me thinks, when you talk about the presence of God, you kind of think about this kind of nebulous cloud wafting around.
[00:25:24] It's the presence of God. Or you can put your finger up, oh, it's the presence of God. Did anyone see the Aurora borealis? Did anyone see that I know some people tried and had a bit of a tough journey up on Dartmoor because it was, like, rampacked with people and you couldn't see anything.
[00:25:41] But it was quite amazing, wasn't it? It was quite an amazing sight. But judging by all the photos, we didn't go up there.
[00:25:47] Did you see the TikTok one? This one? There was the TikTok couple who were coming back from a party and they saw the Aurora borealis. So there was this purple haze in the sky. So they took this photo, this TikTok video, and they were really excited. And then they walked around the corner and it was a premier inn, wasn't the aurora borealis at all.
[00:26:10] So is it a good feeling? Is the presence of God just a good feeling? Well, yes, presence of God makes you feel great. It makes you feel wonderful. But I think he's more than that, because part two in Romans is about carrying on the work of the Father. It's about carrying on the family business. It's about being empowered by the Holy Spirit to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Each one of us individually and us collectively, share the glory of God when we do that. I'll say that again. Each one of us individually and each one of us collectively shares in the glory of God when we step into our inheritance of glory, when we carry on the work of the Father, when we carry on the work of Jesus.
[00:26:56] Psalm eight five.
[00:26:59] Sorry if I have the next slide as well. Gordon. Thank you.
[00:27:03] Psalm eight five. You crowned them with glory and honor. You gave them charge over everything you made, putting all things under their authority. That is us people. Psalm two seven. The Lord said to me, you are my son today I have become your father. Only ask and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, the whole earth as your possession. Sometimes we can have a bit of a narrow view as to what God is giving us, aren't we? God's giving us the earth as your possession. Two Corinthians 318. So all of us who have had the veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. We can reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord, who is the spirit, makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image. So you've got both things there. You've got the identity, you've got the transformation, and you've got reflecting God back into the world. The inheritance is this mandate and authority to carry out God's work on earth, now on earth as it is in heaven. And if you think again about the story of the Bible, you get the same little pattern. Adam and Eve, they're created, they're named by God, and then once they've got their identity, they go out and they rule the earth. They go and do what God has asked them to do.
[00:28:25] In the story of the ExoduS, when the people of Israel come out of slavery and they are moving towards the promised land, they have a new identity. God says to them, Israel is my firstborn son. They come out of Israel as a new identity, and then they are given a mandate to live a different life. Not many people like reading Leviticus and Deuteronomy. It's not the most exciting set of books in the Bible because it's full of laws and rules and things like that. But at its heart, what it's saying is, you are a distinctive people. I've saved you, I've rescued you, and you've got to live differently to how the other people live. That's essentially what those books say. So there's an identity, and there's a way of life. Jesus himself, his baptism was God saying, this is my son. This is who I love. And then he goes and does the work of the father, not before, but after. And he goes and he preaches the good news. He offers love and forgiveness and compassion and the church. On this Pentecost, we have our new identity. We have our identity inspired by the Holy Spirit. And we are called to bring God's wide world rule to the world.
[00:29:39] So before I come to my final point, phew. They say, there is a but because you'll have noticed it in verse seven, the last part of 17 b, it says this, if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.
[00:29:57] The problem is that we are still waiting the final rescue. We're still waiting that time when Jesus returns. And we know it's going to happen. We know that one day God's going to make everything right. We know that all things that are wrong are going to be erased, that everything, all the sickness, the death, the pain, the suffering, the injustices, all of those things are going to disappear one day, but not yet.
[00:30:22] And we're still awaiting that. Though, therefore, Satan is still prowling around, I am still tempted.
[00:30:32] My sinful nature still rears its head from time to time and needs work.
[00:30:40] We, I still exploit the earth and don't treat it in the way that I should. Christians still die for their faith. People do not get healed when we pray for them to be healed, although some do. We may be mocked. Jesus himself and his followers had to go through death. Did you know the only time, I think this is right. The only time Jesus prayed, Abba Father, when we said, up there we can call him Abba father was in Gethsemane. So if we are praying, Abba Father, we're joining with Jesus in the prayer of Gethsemane. We're joining in the prayer in a place of suffering and pain, as well as that intimacy and closeness that the word Abba allows us from other contexts. And so a message this morning that would ignore the reality of suffering or pain would be incomplete. And Lawson explained it so well. We have people who have glorious weeks here. We have people who have had rubbish weeks.
[00:31:37] And that's part of the glory as it is at the moment. Suffering is real and is presently a part of glory.
[00:31:45] It may be through the darkest of times we experience the presence of God that much closer. That's part of the glory. It may be that as we seek to bring the kingdom to earth, we experience an increase in suffering or mockery. That would be part of the glory.
[00:32:04] So how do we reflect God's glory? I'm going to freewheel a little bit here for a few minutes, if that's all right.
[00:32:14] And then we'll pray together, and then we'll sing a final song together.
[00:32:19] I think I was really inspired last week when Esther told us the story. John's mentioned it already this morning about the astor story. Did you put your hands up if you heard the Asda story? We won't repeat it this morning. Go back and listen. I know it wasn't recorded last week, was it? But it's a great story. Ask Esther about the Asda story. That was a great story because we had somebody who was being led by the spirit of God, who was allowing their thinking to be transformed to maybe say, I don't really want to speak to somebody, but I know God's going to tell me to speak to somebody, so I'm going to do it.
[00:32:51] Somebody secure in their identity in Christ, going up to somebody at the checkout and saying, I believe that God's going to heal you. That is a glory story, isn't it?
[00:33:02] We could probably be a bit more encouraging than that. Is that a glory story? Yes, it is. John's story this morning about just having this, about being shared. That story is a glory story, isn't it? Lawson's story this morning about not only feeling lifted by coming into God's house, but having members of his family impacted by that as well. That's a glory story, isn't it.
[00:33:30] When we go out for a walk and Liz is. Liz is very good at this. I'm not so good at this. We're walking along, Liz will see a piece of litter and she will pick it up and put it in the bin.
[00:33:40] I reckon it doesn't say this. I'm just extrapolating from the Bible. I think in Genesis chapter one, there was no litter, do you think? And there was no litter. So when Liz picks up a bit of litter and puts it in the bin, she's taking a little bit of God's earth and she's restoring it to how it was in Genesis chapter one, that's a glory story.
[00:34:00] If this morning you're a parent and you are there every day teaching your children or giving your children opportunity to read the Bible, sing the Bible, pray the Bible, learn the Bible, talk to Jesus, pray about things that are going on in their lives or in your life, pray, encouraging them to look for lost things, that's a glory story. If you are in a place of work and you are working diligently and you are working honestly and you are upholding the name of Jesus and the values of Jesus in everything you do and say, that's a glory story.
[00:34:28] If you are a friend and you have been loyal to your friendships and you go to somebody and say, I know you're going through a tough time. I'm not here to judge you. I'm not here to fix you. I'm just here to walk with you and be with you. That's a glory story.
[00:34:41] If you've done something wrong and you go up to somebody say, I'm really sorry that I did that, would you forgive me? That is a glory story. Every time we reflect the presence of God back into the world, that's a glory story.
[00:34:55] Think about your week to come, because I don't think it's a question of saying, Lord, give me a glory story this week. They're already written. They're already there in what you do and what you say and what you think every day. The question is, Lord, give me the eyes to see my role in the glory. Because if you've accepted Jesus, if you've got the Holy Spirit in you this morning, you will have glory stories this week. You may not see them as such. You may say, that's just little old me living out my little old life, but it's not. You're an adopted child of God and you are empowered by the Holy Spirit and you are giving, you are telling a glory story and people will see that and it will make a difference. And it will lead people to Jesus. Which is what Pentecost is all about. It's about leading people to Jesus. Father Lawson? John? Father, let's just pray for a moment.
[00:35:49] I've said lots of words.
[00:35:52] But there is one spirit.
[00:35:54] And I pray now, Lord, very gently. That your Holy Spirit will, as you've been here all the time. But you will now gently apply the words that I've been saying. Into the hearts of every one of us. And it will look different, and it will feel different for everybody. And it's not for me to presume, Lord, what you're going to do or what you're saying at this point.
[00:36:19] There are some questions, I guess, that are in my mind.
[00:36:22] That I can just throw out as part of this prayer. Lord, for me and for us. Are we being led by the spirit this morning? Are we at that point of surrender to you?
[00:36:36] Maybe. Lord, we haven't been baptized yet. And that's just something you're whispering into somebody's heart this morning. Actually, that's the next stage of surrender, is you've given your life to me. Now publicly declare that through baptism. It may be there's an area of our lives, our thinking, our daily lives. That we are struggling because we know God wants to transform it. But it's hard. The Israelites sometimes wanted to go back to Egypt.
[00:37:01] To the slavery they'd known. Because it was more comforting than the walk to freedom.
[00:37:07] Lord, bring people alongside us who can walk with us on that journey. As your spirit works in us.
[00:37:14] There may be somebody this morning who just needs to sit and receive the fact, the truth, that they are an adopted child of God, that you are precious, you are beloved. You have been bought. You have been paid for. You have been moved under from one authority into another authority. And you are loved and you are welcome, and you are valuable.
[00:37:37] And there is no voice, there is no spirit on this earth that can change the fact of that. It might shout loudly, it might try to draw you away from that. But the fact is the spirit will affirm your identity this morning.
[00:37:54] Maybe this morning that you just want to ask God, Lord, let me see your presence more clearly. I want to experience your presence.
[00:38:02] I want to spend some time in worship, listening to music. I want to just be with you.
[00:38:08] Ada was telling us yesterday morning at the men's morning, just turn up to God. Be present without an agenda. Just allow him to love you.
[00:38:18] I can't remember who was a bishop who said, what's it like to contemplate and be in the presence of God. And they said, I look at God, God looks at me, and we're happy.
[00:38:29] Maybe this morning that's just an invitation to us to look at God and let him look at us, and that's it.
[00:38:39] Or maybe we just want to offer him our week once again and say, thank you for the glory stories that you're writing in my life this week.
[00:38:49] It may not sound dramatic, it may not look and the same as other people's stories, but it's my story. And it's your spirit working in me. And whether it's in my family, in my workplace, in my street, in my neighborhood, whether it's people that I'm caring for, those are my glory stories. And you will, Lord Jesus. You will be revealed through it as I reflect you back into the world. So, Lord, inspire us this Pentecost by your holy spirit.
[00:39:22] Fill us with hope in our identity with you and glory as we reflect you back into the world, as we praise you in Jesus name. And all God's people said, amen. Amen.
