Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: I believe the Lord has got one of those words on my heart this morning for us as a church for the season we're in.
And I believe it's going to bless and encourage and stir us on in our journey for this year. So Isaiah, I'm just going to read and then we'll carry on. So Isaiah 43, and starting from verse 16, this is what the Lord says. He who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters, who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and the reinforcements together, and they lay there never to rise again. How many of us know that the word of God is talking about the enemy there?
The enemy, okay, and from obviously referring back to the Exodus, extinguished, snuffed out like a wick.
Forget the former things. Do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing now. It springs up. Do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. The wild animals honor me, the jackals and the owls, the. Because I provide water in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland to give drink to my people, my chosen.
The people I formed for myself, that they may proclaim my praise.
What a terrific passage of scripture for us this morning.
Forget the former things. See him. I'm doing a new thing. It springs up. I am making a way in the wilderness, streams in the wasteland, to give drink to my people, my chosen. I'll refer back to that a little bit later.
I love Bovi, Tracy, where we live.
Absolutely love. We came from Manchester, the north, so when we moved to a village, we were so blessed. In fact, every single time we walk through Bovi park, anybody know what I'm talking about? Bovie park, the national park. Right. Phil and I look at each other and go, we're so blessed. We're incredibly blessed to live here. We can go from our house and walk out when we're in this lovely national park. And we love it. All right? But there is a particular path that I love to walk on. All right? And we're going to have a picture coming up.
Thanks, Shaz, for getting these for me. All right, next one.
There is a path that I love to tread on, and it is called, literally, rocky path. All right? And there's the sign to prove what I'm going on about. And there's my dog. Sorry. Doing a wee. If you can just see in the picture.
Sorry, sorry. Okay, next one. Right, so the rocky path. So this is the rocky path. And you go up kind of these steps, and they're quite steep steps. And then go round this huge rock and then keep going. I think we've got another one. There you go. And then we get to loads of rocks. That kind of stuff.
Is the next one a video? Don't play the video. Can you play the one after that?
All right. And just keep that on there. All right. So there's this rocky path.
In fact, go back to the sign that says rocky. We'll have to do that a little bit. Sorry, I didn't put them in order.
But what I love about this path. All right, this rocky path, it's not the easiest.
It's not easy. All right. In fact, it involves some climbing.
It involves some careful walking, because at times my walking boots get a bit wobbly as I tread over the rocks. Does anybody know? Everybody experience that? Yeah, the wobble. All right. I have to actually go at a slower pace. I can't go in a fast pace. I have to go in a slower pace as I navigate the rocky path. But the reason why I choose the rocky path instead of the smooth path is because there is a beauty at the end of the rocky path.
There is a beauty at the end of the rocky path. And it's not long before I get to the end of the rocky path that I come across some water.
This beautiful place and this beautiful, peaceful atmosphere as I see a stream of water.
In other words, what I was saying is the hard and rocky path was worth it to see the beauty at the end. All right. Do you want to just show that video, James? Let's see a video of it.
This is at the end of that rocky path.
Anybody feel refreshed just watching it?
See the alternative path? Do you want to just put that smooth path on for me, James? The other one. It's like the straight one. The other one.
Keep going. I think it's the last one. Is it the straight path? That's the one. Okay. In contrast, the straight path, it's smooth, it's long.
It just keeps going. It keeps. It's easy.
I can see what's ahead clearly.
The landscape doesn't really change.
Now, I'm not saying the smooth path is wrong.
I'm not saying that I don't like the smooth path, but the smooth path at times is a good place to be.
It's good to take a breather. It's good to not work so hard.
It's good to kind of just say, hey, I'm trouble free.
This is easy. I'm walking down this smooth space. And there are times in our life when we need those smooth paths.
But the only thing with the smooth path, and you know where I'm going with this, we don't often grow on the smooth path.
We go, but we don't often grow, we don't often mature, we don't often feel the stretch of life, but we need the smooth path because we know life can hit us really hard.
And throughout the Bible, whenever God gave promises, whenever Jesus said, come, follow me, whenever people responded and got serious about following Christ and said yes to the Christian life, often before the promise landed, before the nice smooth path lay before you, before a miracle ever came, the journey seemed to take a turn down a rocky path. Have you ever heard new Christians, new believers say, I became a Christian, and it was as if all hell broke loose.
And before the promises come, it's as if we're taken down this rocky path in life. Now, if you find yourself on a rocky path, maybe some of you here on a rocky path, and you know, all of us will at some point be on a rocky path.
We're to expect them in life. Especially if you are a Christian, we're not saying that you're necessarily on the wrong path.
Just because there are some rocky paths that you are walking through today and walking on it does not mean to say that you're necessarily on the wrong path.
Rocky seasons are a part of life. And if you are a devoted follower of Jesus, let me tell you, not only have you got to navigate life in all its difficulties, but we have an enemy who's working against us, not for us, but thank God today we have a God who is greater in us than he that is in the world.
But we do have an enemy.
And as we navigate life's challenges, we have to realize that the enemy is out to get his people and he's out to get the church.
You know, all across the global world at the moment, the Charismatic church is under fire.
There is a mob culture in the church today, a mob culture that wants to get stones and throw at people.
And I don't want to go too much into it. You'll know what I mean. If you are in the news of charisma and follow what's happening across the world in the church.
But often, let me tell you about the rocky path.
Often. Setbacks in life, they build our character. Can anyone testify to that?
Setbacks in life build our faith. And this is why we need to be encouraged on the rocky path. Setbacks in life enable us to trust God, to lean into him more, to build endurance.
So that we finish the line well, Anybody want to finish the race? Well, but it's not going to be easy getting there. You do know that as the enemy, particularly in these last days, is ramping up his pressure on the church. And he is.
There is a pressure that's ramping up.
But God often uses these rocky places in our lives to build us. If we will allow him to do that in our lives.
The prize is worth it.
Jesus is worth it. You know, I think of Joseph and his setbacks.
You know, Joseph was sold into slavery. I don't need to go all the way down through the story, but he was sold into slavery. He was accused of doing something that he didn't do with Potiphar's wife. He was thrown into prison. These are pretty big rocks, right, that Joseph was thrown with. Pretty big rocks. He was on a rocky path, but he allowed God in that place of hardship to form him, to change him, to grow his character, so that eventually it would lead him to a place of influence in society.
I think of David, the character of David and Saul, chasing him down.
Saul was jealous of David, and so Saul was trying to catch and kill David. And David had to hide. This is the future king of Israel, and he has to hide in a cave to flee for his life. And at the right moment, as David trusted God at the right time, God provided an opportunity for David.
I think of Queen Esther, huge rock.
Her people were about to be annihilated, taken out, and she had to break all protocol and come before the king.
She risked her life and the stories go on and on and on.
But you know, just as rocky paths can produce good character in us, as we allow God to work in us during those moments, it can also produce the worst in us.
When I hear scripture, it says, blessed is the one who remains steadfast under trial.
Anybody feel steadfast under trials?
But you're blessed if you do.
And then I hear, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that our suffering produces endurance and endurance, character and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame because God, God's love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit that he has given us. Count it, joy, brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds. For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. Let steadfastness have its full effect so that you may be perfect, complete, lacking nothing.
That is the stretch, right? In life, anybody feeling stretched right now, things are rocky.
You feel on uneven ground.
That is the stretch. And our rocky Path can either make us and draw us to Christ, or it can do the opposite.
You know, sometimes I think with the church, we don't like working out our salvation.
I think we like our nice cozy worship times and we like our good works.
We like feeding the poor, which is a good thing to do. We like helping those in need.
But actually we're not very good. I think at times of persevering, getting some spiritual backbone, recognizing that there's something else in play against the church, against believers. We have to work out our salvation, we have to grow up. And the rocky road will either produce something beautiful in us at the end of our trial or it will ruin us.
And I have seen so many Christians taken out of the race because they have not persevered in, in the trials.
And the trials are hard.
The trials are hard. Don't look at us and just think we're perfect. And we do not experience trials. We experience trials.
But the worst can come out in us. And it's a test between are we going to walk in faith or fear?
Come on, church. The church has got to stop declaring fear and walking in fear.
We've got to start walking in love and faith with our eyes fixed firmly on the perfecter of our faith, Jesus Christ.
And we will either in our trials become more like Christ and sometimes with tears running down our eyes on a Sunday in worship, because we know we're not in a great place in the sense it's rocky, but we know our spirit. Man is good and it's alive because of him.
You can live like that, don't you think? Our brothers and sisters in Iran right now, what they are going through, yet there is reports of people finding Jesus. There's reports of miracles upon miracles happening because they are keeping their eyes in the rocky times on Christ.
See, the process will stretch us.
The rocky path will stretch us.
And it's in those moments we either allow the enemy to rob us by responding with fear, with doubt, or we allow God to grow us, to form us, to change us.
That in the dark nights of the soul, we say, lord, I respond with faith.
I respond with faith in your word. You know, I think of the Israelites, how wrong they got it.
If you're on Boz on a Bible on Zoom on a Thursday night, we've been going through some of this. But the Israelites, when they came out of Egypt, they went straight into the wilderness and they had some huge rocks in their life to overcome. Huge rocks. In fact, they didn't overcome them. A journey that should have taken them about 11 days. Took them 40 years. Because they could not grow up in their salvation.
They wanted the smooth path. We'll come out and we'll follow you, Moses. As long as the way is smooth, don't give us any rocks, don't give us any hurdles. We want it smooth.
But you see, the rocks came in the form of their enemies, in the form of, well, where's our food coming from, Moses? Where's the water going to come from?
They were panicking.
They were walking by fear. They were walking by sight, not faith.
And so instead of trusting God and allowing that rocky path and that rocky season to form them and change them and grow them and lead them to endure in God instead, they complained, they quarreled, they moaned, and in fact, they wanted to get the rocks. You can read it for yourself. And where did they want to throw them?
In Moses direction.
They wanted to kill Moses.
Out of the first generation that came out of slavery and out of Egypt, only Joshua and Caleb made it through. In their generation.
The Bible says about Joshua and Caleb, and we looked at this at a leaders, a key team Knight is because they simply. And I say simply because it's not that simple, is it?
Ironically, they simply took God at his word and trusted that if God said, the promised land is ours, we're going for it. I don't care what's in the way. I don't care how many giants are in the land.
If God says it's ours, it is ours.
And I want us as a church. I'm going to explain something in a minute, in a season. I think we're in right. We've got to say. Say We've got to almost grow some spiritual muscle and say, lord, this town needs you on our watch. There are too many people going to hell.
This is a year of salvation, Lord, and we're here to see lives come to know you.
Then we've got to walk by faith. We've got to trust in the Lord. You know, there are people here who have walked rocky paths.
Some of you right now are walking rocky paths. I've got permission to name some names this morning, but I'm not going to actually. But I have got permission to tell some stories.
There is a woman. It's Mother's Day. Let me tell you some inspirational stories about women.
There are. There's a woman in this room today, in this church some years ago, abused by her husband.
Such severe trauma and abuse in a Christian marriage to the point that she was so abused that she had to flee her country, bring her children back to the UK and build a new life for herself. But let me tell you, today, she is thriving in the house of God. She is serving in the house of God. She is raising her children in the house of God. That is somebody. Yeah, you can give a clap. That is somebody that has not allowed the rocky path in life to destroy her.
Eyes on the prize. There's another young woman in this church so abused at the hand of a loved one as a young, young girl.
So abused. But today she is now a leader planted in the house of God.
She's not allowed the rocks to take her out. She's allowed God through the rocky times to form her, to train her character.
And then there's another lady.
As she was young, just about to go to university, she got the sudden news that her mother had passed away.
Her beautiful mother. I can't imagine what that's like. I love my mum. Got an amazing relationship with my mum. But to lose your mum in the prime of life when you're starting out your journey. And today she is leading our Alpha ministry.
God's got great plans for this woman.
There are others. There's another lady in our church. Four weeks ago, diagnosed with cancer.
She is the first person that wraps up on a Sunday to start preparing this room for everybody. And she hasn't had a Sunday off since being diagnosed with her cancer.
That is somebody who says, I'm not going to allow the rocks in my life. This rocky path.
My eyes are on God.
There's another lady in here who's part of our church.
Parents live the other side of the world and she's got small children. And last year she had to suddenly go because she got the dreaded phone call.
And I remember she had to go, leave her children, her family, and she didn't know what she would find. The other side. And I remember ringing her. I can't remember if I rang her or text her. She was at the airport on her journey. And these are the words she said to me, God has got this, Esther.
I love hearing believers in Christ turn around and go, God's got this.
He's got me.
She came back and her father was fine, but she came back.
Do you know what she did? She carried on serving in our Discoveryland kids.
Just kind of carries on serving because she loves the house and she loves the Lord and the list goes on. There's another lady who had such traumatic experiences with her own family for decades and decades and decades.
Was rejection felt? Yes.
Was so much hurt and pain felt. Yes, but that lady, when we started planting this church, she said, for two years, I'm going to serve you on a key ministry. I want to serve people tea and coffee every single Sunday. And that is what she did. She took those rocks, that rocky path, and she said, I am not going to allow that path to destroy me.
And the list goes on and on. Unexpected health challenges, loneliness, brokenness, the loss of a loved one. This is uneven ground.
But, you know, in those rocky times, we have to keep moving forward. We have to just keep going, persevering, loving, knowing that with God, no rocky path can ever separate us from his love.
Can I repeat that again? No rocky path would ever separate us from his love. No rocky path can ever stop God from fulfilling his plans for your life. If you are in a struggling relationship right now, whatever you are going through, let me tell you, no rocky path. And I need an amen for some of you. Going through stuff can stop God from fulfilling his plans over your life. No rocky path can stop our peace.
No rocky path can stop his presence.
No rocky path can stop his guidance and protection over our lives. No rocky path can stop God's mercy and his grace.
No rocky path can stop God's promises over your life.
It may be a jolly tough path.
It may be, but Joshua 1:3, God says this. He says, I'm going to give you every place where you set your foot.
I'm going to give you every place where you step your foot. In other words, God is saying to us, I am going to give you.
Wherever you go, it's yours.
Newton Abbott is ours for the taking.
[00:25:08] Speaker B: Come on.
[00:25:10] Speaker A: This region is going to see the glory of God.
This region is going to be transformed. There are going to be whole families,
[00:25:18] Speaker B: mothers, fathers, children, grandmothers, grandfathers, aunties, uncles,
[00:25:24] Speaker A: running to the house of God. I believe it. In our time, success, not failure. His watchful eye over us.
Incredible.
Somebody quoted this. I don't know who it's from, but it said, when you finally get through. Because we know rocky paths don't last forever.
When you finally get through, Amen. You won't arrive exhausted or empty.
You will arrive.
Proven.
And isn't that the journey of life? When we see him face to face, how are we going to arrive?
Proven, proven, proven.
Streams in the wasteland. Anybody want some streams?
Any of us here want our lives to speak of God's faithfulness to the next generation?
When my children look at me and we're going through hardships, I want my children to look at me. And I want my Life to point to him as they look at us. I want my life to speak of God's faithfulness. I remember my dad. Six months ago, he passed away and it was horrendous. He went through motor neuron disease. And this incredible Bible teacher leader for over 50 years in the church, six foot one, had to be hoisted up in the living room in like a baby's hoist to pick him up from a bed to a wheelchair. And right before he lost his voice, about a week or so before he passed away, he said, esther. He looked at me, he said, esther, there is every temptation to give up.
And giving up is the easy path. He said, do not give up.
Keep running your race for Jesus Christ in the workplace, in the school, in that business you run, in your ministries that God has got for you and you are leading and serving in. Do not give up.
You might be here this morning. You said, esther, there doesn't seem any hope. My life seems so broken. How can it come back?
How can it come back?
Well, it can come back.
It's already come back. Because of the cross.
The work has been done. The promises are yours in Christ Jesus.
February 18th. What time are we on? Got a couple of minutes. February 18th, I had a vision.
I don't know if any of you have had a vision before.
I've never had a vision.
I've had dreams, but I've never had a vision.
This vision was at about 4am one morning, and it was on the 18th of February. And this vision was so clear that I was rubbing my eyes going, what on earth am I seeing? And I've never had a vision. So visions happen when you're awake, right? Dreams when you're asleep. And it's 4am and I'm looking into the night and the lights coming through the window. And right before me were some gates about that big, about a foot long. Gates right in front of my eyes. And behind the gates were flames, okay? Flames were coming out of the gates. These were iron gates. And these iron gates were rattling. And I mean, rattling, rattling.
I've only shared this probably with about six, seven people.
Some of the team up in Exeter, they were rattling away.
I didn't really think anything of it other than it was very clear they were enemy gates.
It was very clear. These were the gates of hell that were rattling, that were coming to intimidate, that were coming to cause some fear, okay?
So that's all I thought. And what we need to do when we have dreams or we have visions or we have a word of Prophecy. We need to go away for a while and test that. Right. We need to maybe ask some people in our world, what do you think that means?
So anyway, waited for a while.
On February 23, we had a key teams meeting at our house. Beautiful bunch of people, about 20 of us. God is just growing a lovely team of people, you know, those who are leading some ministries in this. In this church. And we had a time of worship, and Phil and I, before that really sensed the Lord say, we need to go into 40 days of consecration as, as a team.
And the 40 days of consecration was that we would basically fast and pray when we could and just pray over the church, pray over you guys, pray over one another, pray for our ministry, pray over our region. All right? We didn't realize that from that date that day 40 would land us on Resurrection Sunday.
Okay. We didn't know. We're not that clever in our planning.
We just go with what the Lord says and then realize there's some significance in it later.
All right? And so we did that.
So we started to pray and fast.
Let me tell you, everything started going wrong.
I mean, really wrong.
People would text me and go, this has happened in my personal life.
Like, this has happened. This sick. I've had this sick thing happen. And it's really bizarre.
So as we're praying, as we're fasting, things started getting really seriously wrong. It started feeling a bit rocky 10 days ago.
And I mean really rocky. I'm kind of smirking a bit now, but it was. It's been rocky 10 days ago.
Matt rang and he said he was at Deo Gloria and he rang and he said, esther, someone's left a scarf. And I'm like, well, put it in lost property.
And Matt says, I didn't quite say that, but I'm thinking it. I'm going, matt, just what are you ringing me about a scarf for in the middle of the day? And he goes, esther, I think you need to see this.
And someone had left a scarf in Deo Gloria neatly folded. Am I right? Was it kind of neatly folded? Ish.
Okay. You were meant to pick it up.
Yeah. We're blown away really, aren't we? Right, this is the scarf.
You're going to see a blown up image on the screen. Can we have that blown up image?
This is a lion completely subduing the serpent.
Completely. Taken that week in Boz. We were looking at Genesis 3. Bible on Zoom. We were looking at Genesis 3.
Keep that picture up for a while. Yeah, Genesis 3 and Genesis 3.
We were talking about the redemption plan of God where the enemy would strike the heel, but God would strike the head.
The head would go.
And God reminded Me in Revelation 5, it represents Jesus as a lion.
Jesus is represented as a lion and a lamb. But in this case, I was taken to Revelation 5. I think it is where Jesus. It says about Jesus that he is the lion of the tribe of Judah.
In other words, God was speaking to us as a team.
We had the vision of the gates of hell coming. And I believe. And we don't have to be scared, but I believe the enemy hates the church right now. Not just in Newton Abbott, but there is attack across the church, across the globe. There is a huge attack.
We have to perceive in our spirit what God is doing. We have to.
Otherwise we will not get through.
We cannot think. The church cannot afford to think carnally and in the flesh.
We've got to think in the spirit. The Holy Spirit is talking. He's saying things, he's doing things.
We need to be in tune with what the Holy Spirit is saying and thinking.
If you are walking through some rocky paths today, let me tell you, you're not necessarily stuck. You've not been forgotten. God is making a way through.
When we picked up this scarf, it was as if the Lord was saying, you know, God speaks in many different ways.
He was saying, I am making a way through.
I am the lion, I am the king.
I am the one who holds all authority.
Right back at the beginning of time, it was a done deal. God said, I am going to completely destroy the works of the evil one.
Incredible. Thank you.
Incredible scarf. I mean, it could have been a tartan scarf, but it wasn't. It was a lion subduing the serpent.
God is speaking. He is making a way through.
He's making a way through because he's got streams of living water for his church. I believe with all my heart. We are about to enter and this is why it's been so hard.
I believe we're about to enter times of refreshing.
Honestly, I do. I think there's going to be a great watering over this church.
I think things are going to look a bit different on a Sunday.
I think things are going to start looking a bit different in our conversations and sounding a bit different. I think there's times of refreshing coming over his church because he is the living water and he wants to bless and he wants to refresh. Let me land this thing this morning for five minutes.
Maybe your feet are sore from the rocky path.
Anybody got some sore feet?
That's okay.
That's okay to admit that my feet are sore.
I'm feeling a bit burned.
Maybe the journey has been hard for a while.
Can I encourage you in that season to take things a bit slower?
Don't let your mind race.
Don't be kind of saying, oh, you know, trying to summarize why everything's happening and why these rocks are so big in your life.
Can I encourage you just to pause in the presence of God?
Don't rush this season. Sometimes when the rocky path comes, we want to get out of there quick. Do you know what I did yesterday on that rocky path walk?
I took my time.
I took my time as I climbed the rocky path. And I'm so glad I did because my ankle went over at one point. But if I'd have been going any faster, I'd have been totally taken out.
We've got to go slow.
Maybe it's a season for you to sit still and lean into what the Holy Spirit is saying. Maybe you've not had your ears quite as open recently.
Rocky paths can be exhausting and tiring.
You know, I love the prayer of Jehoshaphat when the enemy was advancing towards him. It's one of my favorite prayers in the Bible. He says, lord, we don't know what to do, but our eyes are on you.
That takes some discipline to sit there for a while and say, I don't know what to do.
I don't know what to do, but my eyes are on you.
Maybe it's a time you just come and you say, I need your presence.
Maybe some of us, we're going to go away from here and this week we're going to meditate on the promises of God.
Be careful in the rocky seasons where your heart lands, what your mind is thinking. We have to be careful in those rocky seasons.
We've got to check our hearts, our attitudes, our motives, our behaviors. We've got to be aware that the enemy in those rocky times is prowling.
He's not far away.
When the Christian brother or sister feels a bit down in life, it is a good time to assess your heart, to assess your life. Because the enemy wants to destroy, kill, kill.
He's a liar.
I want to say from this pulpit today, he's a liar.
I want to say to us as a church, the rocky season won't last forever. Whatever you're going through, God is making a way through.
You're going through today. I believe some of you, when you, as you stay faithful, you're going to find yourself Soaring.
Soaring on eagle's wings.
I remember once being in a meeting in our old church and this woman was going through a horrendous season.
And one Sunday morning she puts her arms out like an eagle. There was like about, I don't know, 6, 700 people. So she was pretty brave to do that. And we're in our auditorium. She's got her arms out like this and she runs around the auditorium and she runs around about 3, 4 times with her arms wide.
And she was soaring and she was crying. These tears were rolling down and she was just, I'm soaring, I'm soaring. It was her symbolically saying, lord, I'm going to soar with you through this storm. I'm going to soar. I'm not going to be taken out, but I'm going to soar with you. Because she got the promises of God that says, those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They will rise up on wings like eagles. They will not faint.
They will run in the chaos. Lean into the peace of God. This is what Colossians says, let the peace of God rule your hearts.
Some of us here this morning, we're letting other things rule our hearts and not his peace.
We've got to let his peace rule our hearts. How do we let his peace rule?
We have to walk in truth.
We have to get hold of God's truth and pursue it.
We have to denounce the lies of the enemy.
We have to choose love over fear.
Let God's peace rule in your hearts.
We will not live in the peace of God. If our attitudes, our motives, our behaviors, our thoughts are wrong, we will not need extra support.
Can I suggest get a friend to walk the journey with you?
I think sometimes, you know, we need to be a bit proactive.
We need to say, will you walk with me for this season? Will you help me? Will you once a week check in with me and pray with me?
Maybe have a time of just praying and fasting together. We need to reach out for some support. I love it. Last Saturday night we needed. Phil and I just needed some encouragement and we rang an amazing couple in the church and we put them on WhatsApp. Do you remember at 9:30 last Saturday night and we just put them on WhatsApp and they just prayed and prophesied and encouraged us and we had a lovely hour of just praising God together. Reach out to people.
Reach out to our pastoral care team. Jill, it's great to see you back from Pakistan.
You have an incredible shepherd's heart.
Reach out to our pastoral care team. If you need that extra support in life, receive some prayer on a Sunday.
Paul and Briony aren't here today, but Paul and Bryony have a real prophetic gift.
They will encourage you. They will build you up.
Don't just leave this place without that support and prayer that you need.
Can I pray over us? I'm going to wrap up, actually. Phil, will you just find. Because I want to read Psalm 121 over us. We stand this morning.
Matt, do you want to just come?
Let's just bow our heads in prayer this morning.
I want to pray. This is what I want to pray over us this morning. Something really specific.
We say, lord, we love your church.
We love your church.
Do you pray over this church? Church?
If you don't, you need to pray over this church. Because God's going to do something really special.
He's got great plans and purposes for his church.
That means you, by the way, not a building.
Lord, I pray that times of refreshing will come.
I pray, Lord, that we will see streams of living water flow across this region in Deo Gloria. We thank you for the streams of living water in Deo Gloria. There's a physical stream that runs under Deo Gloria Bank Street.
We pray for the stream of the living God in the wasteland.
So I'm praying, Lord, that times of refreshing will come upon your church.
I thank you, Lord, that you don't leave us on the rocky path.
You don't leave us in the desert, but you are making a way through because you love us and you have plans that are to prosper us, not to harm us.
Lord, we thank you for your generosity.
You don't want to give us a trickle.
You want to give us streams. You want to give us fountains.
You want to flood our lives.
You want to drench us in your love and in your kindness and your provision.
Lord, I pray for those who are on rocky paths today. It's been a tough season. It's been a long season.
Lord, I pray that at the end of that season we will stand proven.
Thank you, Lord, that you resist the proud.
But, Lord, you lift up those who have had to bow low for a season.
Your promise is that you lift them up.
You lift them up.
I lift up my eyes to the mountains.
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip.
[00:45:33] Speaker B: He who watches over you will not slumber.
[00:45:39] Speaker A: Indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
[00:45:48] Speaker B: The Lord watches over you.
The Lord is your shade at your right hand.
The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all harm.
He will watch over your life.
The Lord will watch over your coming and your going, both now and forevermore.
He promises to keep you from all harm.
He promises to watch over your life.
He promises to watch over your coming and your going, both now, today and forevermore.
Because he's faithful. He's faithful.
He will not let your foot slip.
He's making a way through the wasteland. He's making a way through the desert. It's not your resting place. The desert is not your resting place. His presence is your resting place. The Most High is your resting place.
[00:47:02] Speaker A: Come on. Speak that over you. There's one thing for me to speak it over you, you need to speak
[00:47:07] Speaker B: it over yourself this morning.
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord.
He will not let my foot slip, for he's forming not against me.
He will carry me home.
[00:47:29] Speaker A: I have to keep my eyes on the Lord. I have to keep moving and keeping my eyes on the Lord.
Come on, let's just exercise a bit of faith in this place this morning.
If you need him to heal you today, if you need some strength today, if you need him to pick you up and put you back on the right path today, keep looking.
