Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:05 Okay. Greetings. Hello. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Right. I'm just looking around to remind myself of the faces that I've said hello to and Alaw, who I haven't met yet. How many of you here? Were here on the first week when we launched. Cool. That was fun, wasn't it? It's, it's so lovely being back and just kinda seeing us all and, and yeah, it's lovely. Really, really, really lovely. Right. Um, this morning, the word this morning is around the shepherd heart of Oh, he's good. He's good. It's on the screen already. The shepard heart of God. And it, it was lovely. My new friend just gave me a bit of a confirmation a minute ago. There's something that I wanted to remind you of before we start, and, um, first of all, those of you who heard me preach an exiter last week, although there's a few of you heard, I apologize in advance cuz some of the things that I, I'm speaking about this morning, overlap, overlap as I spoke on this last week in exit are, but
Speaker 1 00:01:21 For you guys in Newton Albert, this is really, really important. Amen. This is, this is vitally important. You guys are gonna be setting the temperature for the guys who are gonna be coming in. Yeah. And the way that we shepherd each other and the way that we allow the, the, the good shepherd to shepherd us the, the way we, uh, you know, we, we submit and we yield to the Holy Spirit guide in here is gonna set the temperature for the people who come in, right? So the, the, this morning's word is really important. So I do want to encourage you, I know some people would say, you know, I'm not, I'm not a shepherd. I'm, my gift in is I'm an apostle or I'm a prophet. That's cool. But I do believe that there's a she at heart that when all of us carry it, the effectiveness week and half of the kingdom will be incredible. I really do believe that. And, um, it was lovely. I was just smalling this over. I was speaking to my friend earlier on then, and I was a reminder, you know, about Isaiah 43, about forgetting, forgetting those things, stings and not to dwell on the past. And I want to acknowledge
Speaker 1 00:02:29 That this morning, some of you may not have had the best experience of shepherds in the past. In fact, looking out now, I know that some of you haven't, and my encouragement just as it was to the people in Exiter last week, is not to let the enemy use that moving forwards. And the part, what I would love this morning is that, that part of what the Holy Spirit would do this morning, not that we ignore what's happened in the past, but that we press onto the future and the new thing that the Lord is doing here, and that any bad shepherd and experiences you've had in the past would not stop you moving forward into the new thing that the Lord is doing here. Great Lord Jesus, wonderful precious Jesus. We acknowledge you. We just take a breath and we acknowledge you as king. And we ask that your spirit would move and would inspire us this morning. Let your word really, really go deep this morning, father, so that we move, we move forward, and we set the temperature here in Newton Abbot for your glory. In Jesus name, our amen. Our amen. Right? Okay.
Speaker 1 00:04:02 To set the sea of the shepherd heart of God. What I would love to do is to put it in a context of scripture. Because right through Genesis, all the way through this thing, God describes himself as a shepherd. Amen.
Speaker 1 00:04:17 And it's, it's in here all the way. So if you are offended by being called a sheep, it's in here <laugh>. It's in here all the way. For those of you who wanna study things a bit further. Uh, and those of you who are making notes, Ezekiel 34 and John 10 would be places that you could follow up this afternoon if you wanted to. Zeal 34 and John 10, could we start in Ezekiel 34? Just to put us into context, God says, I myself will search for my sheep and look after them as a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them. So I will look after my sheep. That's pretty straight. And I think if we go to verse 31, this is pretty straight too <laugh>, especially for us who don't like to be called sheep. As for you, my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, you are men and I am your God. Okay? That's pretty declares the Lord. So that's what we are. Let's, let's move to what Jesus said about himself. And if we move to, to, to John,
Speaker 1 00:05:33 If we move to John, I am the good shepherd. The good shepard lays down his life for his sheep. It's pretty, pretty clear that God himself puts himself in the context of a shepherd. It'll be very hard to argue against that. But it's not only, it's not only God who describes himself as a shepherd. In Psalms, there's a dude called Asaf. Maybe you've read the Psalms and you've seen this guy Asaf, you've seen him mentioned a couple of times. He was kinda like the Ed Sheeran of the time. People would've recognized Asaf and his musical ability. <laugh>. Um, Asaf said this, he was obviously talking about Israel and how, how the Lord had it shepherd it's shepherd of these people. He brought his people out like a flock. He led them like sheep through the wilderness. He guided them safely. So they were unafraid. But the sea ingul their enemies.
Speaker 0 00:06:30 Amen.
Speaker 1 00:06:31 Now, as well as Asaf in the Psalms we have Psalm 23, a Psalm of David, which is one of the most beautiful things written in the Bible. And even before we read it together, I wonder if this has ever kind of touched you or the Lord's spoken to you through this. Give me a little wave. Awesome. That's most of you, me too. Could we read this together? Church, the Lord is my shead. I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul. He guides me in the parts of righteousness for his namesake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. One of the most beautiful poetic things I believe that's ever been written on this planet, but also one of the most misunderstood, uh, my role, my, my role in Exeter that I, I love to do my, my official title is I'm the Pastoral Coordinator. Ooh, no pressure there. <laugh>. Alright. Um, and over the years and recently too, one of the things that people do come to me and, and some of the chats that I've had,
Speaker 1 00:08:15 People have said to me, Des, you know, the scripture, I don't feel like that. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. I don't feel like that. I don't feel like I'm in a green pasture. I don't, I don't feel like that. And as we study this morning, and as we learn more about the role of the Shep ad, I do want to encourage you that if you are feeling like that and you don't feel like you're in green pastures at the minute, part of the reason for that is he didn't promise us that we'd always be in green pasture. He didn't, he's not a liar. He's true to his word as we'll, discover this morning. But if you're not there right now,
Speaker 1 00:09:17 He never promised us that we always would be. As we look more about the role of the Shema, we, we learn that there's no one we can trust more to guide us there. And he does promise that he will guide us there and that these pastures exist. Yeah. But he didn't promise us we'd live there. So if some of you feel disheartened that the Good Shepherd doesn't have you in these passages at the moment, I pray that you would find peace this morning in that, as you follow 'em, maybe to guide you to where they are. Yeah. Okay. So last week, well I did, I did part of this. I had this Shep's crook. It was probably the most underwhelming shepherd's crook.
Speaker 0 00:10:03 It was,
Speaker 1 00:10:04 Right. But you haven't seen this morning shepherd's crook, right. <laugh>, are you, are you ready for this? Oh, yes. Round of applause. I love it. Okay. <laugh>. Rachel helped me to make this. Well, Rachel helped me. Rachel made this this morning. This is my, this is my wife Rachel
Speaker 0 00:10:31 <laugh>.
Speaker 1 00:10:33 And what are the things that I've found most helpful as I've prepared for the last few weeks, is that in order to understand what the Bible says about the good Shepherd, we have to understand what a shepherd does. We do. We've gotta understand what a shepherd does because now we can look and there's, there's all of these lush green fields. But a shepherd had a lot of rules. And one of the rules is that a shepherd would be nomadic and a shepherd would move his flock around. They wouldn't be staying in the same place often. And the people who were the, the people at the time would recognize the shepherd as such as nomadic. In fact, Moses, those, those of us who've, who've kind of studied Moses, would know that just before the Vernon bush, Moses had just led his sheep as a shepherd through the wilderness. They hadn't just been in the green pastures. He'd been leading them through the wilderness. Now,
Speaker 0 00:11:33 <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:11:34 The shep at heart of God, this crook symbolizes a few things and has a few rules. So as the shepard leads his flock, here are a few rules of the shepard that I'd love to share with you this morning. Newton Abbott. The first one is protecting and preserving the unity of the sheep, the unity of the flock. There we go. Protect and preserve unity. As I'm looking out at you guys, you are the foundational group that is, that is part of this church,
Speaker 0 00:12:16 Cannot
Speaker 1 00:12:17 I encourage you, protect in Jesus' name, protect and preserve the unity of yourselves. Protect it and preserve the unity Shepherds. It's sometimes been suggested that shep hads are the cuddly ones who computer agrees.
Speaker 0 00:12:40 <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:12:42 Shepherds are the cuddly ones. And there is a time to be cuddly. Absolutely. I like a good hug, right grip. Please feel free to come and gimme a hug at the end. I'm a hugger.
Speaker 0 00:12:52 But
Speaker 1 00:12:52 Shep Shein is not just about giving a hug and saying there, there it's not. If you need some convincing of this, could we go into Samuel and you read what Samuel says. So what David says in the book of Samuel, when, when David is putting his argument together before Goliath about whether he is ready or not, he says this, your servant was tending his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came out and took a lamb from the flock, I went out after him and attacked him and rescued it from his mouth. And when he rose up against me, I seized him by his beard and struck him and killed him. Your servant is killed. Both a lion and the bear. Hang on a minute. Shep are meant to be cuddly all the time on I seized him by his beard and struck and killed him. Well, just like in Exeter last week, my encouragement to you in Newton Abt, there might not be physical lions or bears, but an example would be gossip. In our church, as we as shepherds are following the leading of the good shepherd, how are we protecting and, and restoring the unity of your group? Let's look at gossip.
Speaker 1 00:14:40 What would this church be like moving forward if we replaced
Speaker 0 00:14:46 <laugh>,
Speaker 1 00:14:47 The Bear and the Lion with gossip? Check this out. I went after gossip and attacked it. I seized gossip by its beard and I struck it and I killed it. Come on. Someone starts talking about, about my brother. Someone starts talking about the wonderful ruts over there. What we gonna do? Do we go along with it or do we see not in this church, we don't gossip about each other. We care for each other. We protect unity. Because where this unity God commands a blessing and we love each other. And then that what means is the people, the next people who come in can see we love each other and we don't gossip a boat each other that. And they feel welcome too. So good. Cause they feel they can trust us. Wows us. Right? Okay. I'm not used to holding a mic, by the way. I've normally got this thing that wraps on my head. It feels a bit like an ice creamer. Right? Moving on. Moving on. I have a question for you. How she bull Are you? And this next bit might sting a bit. It might sting a bit. I'm mourn you now. Could you play the video please? Oie sheep gets stuck
Speaker 1 00:16:15 Here. We have a sheep. I'm guessing this young guy isn't really that, that's not his shepherd, but he's trying to get the sheep out. Anyway, <unk> Bible says like sheep, we've all gone a stray. We all get stuck sometimes. Hey, I didn't call it that. That was the name of the video. I didn't call it that <laugh>. So under the next heading, correcting and guiding to correct and guide, how shepherd are we? How shepherd are we? You know, directly from the Good Shepherd through his word and through the Holy Spirit, but also through each other. Also through each other. Em, there is a scripture as, as I look back at the start of the sermon and the encouragement I gave you about forgetting the past and moving on to the new, there's a scripture in Proverbs, Proverbs 27. And in the context of shepherding, this is probably one of the most dangerously used, uh, scriptures in the Bible. But when used in the right context could be one of the most powerful and helpful and shepherding scriptures, faithful are the wounds of a friend faithful. The wounds of a shepherd. Sometimes the shepherd has to, we need a little tap. Sometimes
Speaker 1 00:18:35 We do.
Speaker 0 00:18:36 Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:18:37 And faithful are the wounds of a friend. I I No, look now, but some of you find this difficult because some hideous things have been said over the years to people and some hugely damaging things backed up by the scripture from many other agendas than the good of the person who would be receiving it. And Lord, we're sorry when that's, that's happen. And forgive us, Lord, if we've ever delivered that unwisely. Let me give you a couple of examples of when this scripture is alive in my life. My wife Rachel, the lovely Rachel, you were supposed to clap then. <laugh>. Hey, there we go. Rachel, Rachel is, is my faithful friend. 22 years.
Speaker 0 00:19:39 23.
Speaker 1 00:19:40 Is she? 23 years. 23 wonderful years. And in my life when I've, I need a bit of a nudge from the shepard, maybe when my time allocation is not healthy. She says things to me like, what a God. Do you serve Des
Speaker 0 00:20:01 <laugh>?
Speaker 1 00:20:02 She does. She said this numerous times, says, do you serve Jesus or do you serve New Castle United
Speaker 0 00:20:08 <laugh>?
Speaker 1 00:20:10 That stings a bit, doesn't it? <laugh> it sting. I'll tell you what, you don't wanna follow new neither. Don't put your life in that hands. Listen, I I can testify to that. It re that stings me. It stings me. Oh, Rachel, come on. But I need it sometimes if I'm not going to a prayer meeting or I'm not joining in with something that God would have me do because I'm inside watching the match and I can't miss the match. <laugh>, I need the nudge of the shepherd to nudge me in. Come
Speaker 0 00:20:45 On.
Speaker 1 00:20:46 I, uh, Ali lead Pastor Mark, uh, I love him and I trust him. I do, I really trust him. And one of, I let him down a little while ago. And the reason I let him down is because my temper at the time was not as good as it is now. And I'm not perfect now. I'm, I'm far from perfect now. But the Holy Spirit, he's, he's been working on my temper. I was quick to speak, I was quick to anger and I really let him down. And, and he, ah, really stung,
Speaker 0 00:21:25 Really,
Speaker 1 00:21:26 Really stung.
Speaker 0 00:21:28 He,
Speaker 1 00:21:31 He's des I, I'm not sure the, the way you react to things really honor as God fully. I'm not sure your reactions are fully honor on God. Des what would it be like? What would it be like if you reacted more gently and, and you were slow at to speaking and slow to anger? What could God do in your life in and through
Speaker 0 00:21:53 You? Oh, it was horrible.
Speaker 1 00:22:00 He's my friend. He's my pastor. But I really trusted him. I trusted if you have someone in your life that you trust and that your know is full of the Lord, it can be a beautiful thing in terms of shepherd in you. It really can. If you don't have those people in your life, it'll be a super encouragement to try and get them. Please do. And as this church grows, just the faithfulness you can show to each other that other people can see, can be inspiring. Really inspiring. Do you believe that God is kind? Can I put this down now? Okay. The kindness of a good shepherd and how he leads us. If you truly believe in your heart that God is kind, the instances in the Bible from cover to cover will come alive with the heart of God, the shep and heart of God. Here's two examples. In the, in the 10 Commandments. In the 10 Commandments, there's two ways you can look at this. And often we hear the booming voice of God, don't we? The correcting, booming voice of God that looks us directly in the eyes and says,
Speaker 0 00:23:37 Do not. Do
Speaker 1 00:23:40 Not. There's anger there. If he's and he's our, she is he saying, do not commit adultery. What does a shepard heart of God say? Des, I love you. Don't commit adultery. Don't do it. Des, I've given you such a beautiful wife. Treasure your wife. Show your children my ways and and the way that people will see me through your life will be amazing. Don't commit it. Don't read. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:24:14 Come on.
Speaker 1 00:24:15 Do you see the difference? It's amazing. Don't cover other people's things. Don't not cover other people's. Don't cover other people's things. This be satisfied in me. Be satisfied with what I've given you. Be a shining example to others of the satisfaction and the hope people are can find in me. His kindness is all the way through this. I promise you faithfully read it through the eyes of the good shepherd and things will come alive to you. They really, really will. Okay, what's next? The voice as well as using the crook. Something else, another way that the good shepherd leads is through his voice. In John John 10. The gatekeeper opens the gate firm and the sheep listen for his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. He knows you by name. He does. It's true. Could you play the video
Speaker 0 00:25:36 <laugh>?
Speaker 1 00:25:38 The, is it called the voice? There we go. Check this out. This is brilliant. A few people tried to get the attention of the sheep. Someone else comes, tries to get the attention of the sheep. Here comes the she. Watch this. It's amazing, isn't it? I know. I know. My sheep and my sheep know me. They know the voice of the she heads. Thanks. Sorry. Thank you. That's amazing, isn't it? It really is amazing. Do you know the voice of the good shepherd? Do you recognize him when he calls you? Oh, you're listening because one of the challenges today is that I truly believe that when we hear and obey, when we hear, we trust and obey the good shepherd. That's when the green pastures
Speaker 0 00:27:29 Come.
Speaker 1 00:27:32 Not all the time
Speaker 0 00:27:33 <laugh>,
Speaker 1 00:27:34 But the Bible does promise us that he's gonna lead us through them and he's gonna give us what we need. He provides trust and obey. When you hear his voice, be obedient to it. Okay, we're coming into land. We're coming into land. Could you please put on the slide which says Work in progress. Um, I should have changed this from Mark and Nita. Phil and Esther should have gone up there as well. Just as I'm gonna explain these quickly. I hope you never feel that when we land from that we are the finished article coming to show you how to do things. Cause that's so far from where where it is. We are all work in progress. All of us are, and I've just listed a few things here that, that we do through an Exeter. Not you are not clones of Exeter, you are not Exeter storm troopers. You're not clones. But just, just so that you've got a bit of an insight into what we do in terms of our pastoral work. We've got Mark and Nita, you guys have, have Phil and Esther and the team Don and Ruben
Speaker 0 00:28:47 Who,
Speaker 1 00:28:48 Who shed us and feed us each week with the word. Right? That's one of the ways we do it. We do have a pastoral team, but one of the things I did in Exito last week that got a big groan from some areas and silence from other areas and hers from some areas is I said this, we've got a pastoral team and you're all in it.
Speaker 0 00:29:13 <laugh>, whoa.
Speaker 1 00:29:17 Oh, we're all in it. All of us. We're all in it. The previous model of four people looking after 600 people doesn't work. It's nonsense. It's absolutely bonkers. Means those four people burn out. We pray for them moving to one side and four more people come in. Doesn't, it just doesn't work. It's nuts. But as well as it not working, it deprives all of us of a beautiful thing that we can do in Shepherd and each other. We rely on other people. So even though we do have a pastoral team, we've got myself, uh, Liana, who was singing this morning, and she's the family's pastor. Our approach is a, to save the universe as pastor all team, it's to engage as a church and inspire others that we can do it together. We've got all of these other things and you're probably looking at the bottom at b and b and you won't know these people. But my encouragement after listening to me this morning is it's an encouragement of everybody, b and b or two people in our church. You'll know them Baun and <unk> and Bek and Diana ba or two ladies who are not young in age. We've gotta be careful what I say here, <laugh>, they are the most beautiful, faithful shepherds you'll ever meet. Yes. And often when people come and see us as a pastoral team, one of the common threads is Yeah, that's what Diana said last week to me. Oh yeah. When Anne, when Anne came to see me in hospital, she said that
Speaker 1 00:31:09 They're never, they're never on stage and they're never on church news. But the shepherd and Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
Speaker 0 00:31:18 Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:31:19 I would hugely encourage you to do the same.
Speaker 0 00:31:23 Please
Speaker 1 00:31:23 Do. Cuz he sees everything. Yeah. Yeah. He really does. He sees it a lot. He sees it all. Okay, wonderful. Drew, could you, could you just play for a few minutes and I'd like us to end with a few questions. You don't need to, you don't need to answer verbally, but here are some questions that I would love us to be open to the Holy Spirit and allow, as we process these questions, just allow the Holy Spirit to, to reveal his heart to you. Okay? As we think about how we're living as a shepherd, how she are we, how she are, we have, we stared soft-hearted and open hearted, or over the years maybe has cynicism crept in and were less acceptable than we were. Father, I ask the where heart might have become hard towards you and towards others, that by your spirit, you would soften us. Now that cynicism would be replaced by faithfulness, that hardness of heart, Lord, those of your spirit, the ness, kindness, faithfulness, self-control, that your Holy Spirit would work. Here's another question. Do you need to forgive a previous sheard? I know that might sting a bit. I know that might sting a bit.
Speaker 1 00:34:21 Do you need to forgive a previous shedler? But it wasn't my fault, Des it wasn't my fault.
Speaker 0 00:34:31 What
Speaker 1 00:34:33 I, I know it may not have been your fault, but you still need to forgive them.
Speaker 0 00:34:39 What
Speaker 1 00:34:43 For like, give us the grace to forgive Holy Spirit. Who in your life needs a shepherd? Who in your life needs a shepherd? And just as we end, as we end this morning, I would love us to think of Newton Kn and Bobby Tracy and the surrounding areas where you live. Holy Spirit, would you work so beautifully in us and through us so that we would be able to effectively she a Newton Abbo and Shep, a Bobby Tracy, and all of those other areas that are too, too many in name. Would this church be <laugh> a representation of your shep's heart that people know the safe here. They're not gossiped about. Yeah. Just gonna just pause for a moment. Just ask you please that forgiveness thing you know is important. We spoke earlier about that new thing and, and about laying down the past. We have to forgive.
Speaker 0 00:37:38 We
Speaker 1 00:37:39 Have to forgive Holy Spirit. For some of us, we really need you for that to take place. We need you. Oh man, do you know, I know sometimes we end on a high, ju just keeps playing. There's an image that I'd love to leave you with this morning. And I, I hope that it's an image that will evoke trust within you for your good sheard. Just the, the, the final video there. As you leave here this morning, there is no safer or more trustworthy or faithful hands you could be in than the good shutler. And there is no voice. There is more worth listening to than his. Cool. God bless you all this morning. Thank you for listening. God bless you all.
