HTB Live Stream | 11.30am Sunday 12 September

[Music] [Applause] [Music] hello and welcome to htb church it's national video games day today but we are so pleased that you've put down the playstation and you've joined us for church my name is jess my name is ryan we're so glad to be with you this morning and if you're joining us for the first time we'd love to get to know you would love to make a little community in the chat we've got one of our friends james ray you'll see his name in the chat he's got a little blue spanner next to his name and he'd love to welcome you in the chat so go on drop us a hay a high fire emoji well what would be your go-to emoji like a little vibe nice i'd do a piece um and as always if you would like to access this live stream in bsl british sign language then the wonderful claire will be interpreting for us today and so you can head to www dot never do the w's normally but there we go http.org livestream and you can access the link there you know every sunday at hcb church is an exciting sunday but i think today is particularly exciting we've got a lot to look forward to we'll be hearing from des johnson this morning he's um dez is director of alpha scotland come on he's been on staff at hp since 2017 and we can verify he's the new president of the boys brigade uk amazing i did brownies and girl guides how did you get badges and my mom had to sew them on it was great fun um enough about brownies and guides and boys for great boys brigades um if you are new to church we would love to get you connected in or if you just chanced upon the live stream then the qr code that is appeared on the screen now you can scan that and that will just take you to a form you can fill out your information and you can join a team you can join a connect group you can get plugged in it's just a great way of getting connected and as always if you would like prayer for anything we have a team ready and waiting who would love to pray with you and you can find out more at hgb.org forward slash livestream prayer nice always um if you didn't join us for our pre-service chats then you might not know that it's a very exciting week for us here at htb because alpha is kicking off in person um on the 22nd of september but we will talk a bit more about that later right now we're going to pray as we head into time of worship father thank you that you are with each one of us as we join in today and we ask that you would speak to each and every one of us you'd pour out your love afresh fill us with your spirit in jesus name we pray [Music] we amen you jesus [Music] [Applause] we praise you jesus [Music] he's coming on the clouds kings and kingdoms will bow down [Music] and every chain will break his broken hearts declare his [Music] [Applause] [Music] he's [Music] our god is [Music] [Music] forehead [Music] thank you jesus thank you [Music] make way jesus the kingdom [Music] the god who comes who can stop the lord [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Applause] who can stop the lord who can stop the lord almighty [Applause] [Applause] [Music] our is [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] hallelujah [Music] [Music] [Applause] this is what freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise you this is what living looks like this is what freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise [Music] [Applause] [Music] a weapon that conquers all anxiety let it rise [Music] and we claim your victory [Music] let it rise [Applause] [Music] is [Music] let it rise [Music] is [Music] [Music] this is looks like and this is what freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise you and this is what living looks like this is why freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise you and this is what freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise you this is what living looks like this is what freedom feels like this is what heaven sounds like we praise you we praise [Music] is [Music] cry god we praise you you're so worthy jesus we praise you [Music] we praise you jesus [Music] bless the lord on my soul bless the lord on my soul [Music] gonna sing this out in faith let's join with the psalmist and say bless the lord o my soul bless the lord on my soul for you are worth you are worthy jesus and bless the lord on my soul bless the lord on my soul and forget not all he's done he who heals your diseases and forgives your sins bless the lord [Music] you're worthy jesus [Music] so worthy jesus there's no one like you [Music] the storm surrounding me let it break at your name and still call the sea to still the raging meat is still [Music] oh jesus jesus you make the darkness tremble jesus jesus your silence fear jesus jesus you make the darkness tremble jesus jesus [Music] once again [Music] jesus you make the darkness tremble jesus jesus your silent fear oh jesus jesus you made the darkness tremble jesus jesus sing his name oh jesus jesus [Music] you make the darkness tremble jesus jesus your silent spirit oh jesus jesus you make the darkness jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] your name is [Music] jesus you make the darkness triple jesus jesus [Music] jesus you make [Music] [Music] in the name of jesus there's freedom in the name of jesus every chain will break the salvation in the mighty name of jesus and jesus your name is a lie that the shadows can't deny your name [Music] [Music] your name cannot [Music] your name cannot be overcome [Music] foreign [Music] oh jesus jesus you made the darkness jesus [Music] jesus you make the darkness jesus oh jesus jesus you made the darkness tremble jesus jesus your silence fear oh jesus you made the darkness tremble jesus jesus [Music] jesus we thank you that you make the darkness tremble that we can bring all our fears to you today and know that you have destroyed the paths of darkness you've set us free you've brought about your kingdom in all our hearts and we're so grateful to you thank you lord our men are men would you all like to take a seat as we continue to pray for our world we want to pray for um the us 20 years on since 9 11. lord we pray for that country we pray for everyone who lost loved ones as they remember again this year we pray for your comfort for your strengths your hope in their lives we pray for wisdom for people in government dealing with terrorism and the threats we want to go on praying for afghanistan and the people who are left behind still desperate to escape in that war-torn country we ask for peace and hope in that country and we thank you for all of the refugees who have arrived here in the uk and for the opportunity to offer hospitality love and hope to these people who have arrived here for healing for love and pray lord that you'd help us to be your hands and feet in this time with them in jesus name amen amen welcome again to everybody here at and http to all of you joining us right now on live stream we're thrilled to have you with us and love to invite you to come and join us we have 11 services now on six sites and the church is filling up isn't it exciting the church is filling up again [Applause] freedom is coming and jesus is alive and there's nowhere like being in in his presence worshiping together it's been wonderful worshiping online as we have been doing for many months joining uh a live stream and so on while we're on holiday but there is nothing like being in the room and i'd love to encourage you when you if you're able to at all to come and join one of our services we have such fun together and it's great to be able to connect great to be able to have coffee together after the service and chat to one another so uh right now we come to our time of giving you know the vision of here is that everyone should be praying everyone's serving everyone giving and the details will come up on the screen and we're so grateful to all of you here at brompton road at all the different sites and all of you who've been giving online you know you're making a real difference two weeks ago we gave the entire offering to world visions work in afghanistan they have over 300 staff there and thanks to your generosity we raised over 9 000 pounds for world vision [Music] and last week we have now there are 14 600 refugees coming to this country many of them are quarantining and then moving into hotels all over the country and 900 of them are in our area which is a huge privilege and we are working with churches in this area but also right across the country to make sure every one of them is cared for welcomed given hospitality as they arrive in this country as many of you know my father came here as a refugee and i have an absolute passion that we should i'm so thankful to this country for the way that he was welcomed i would not be alive if he had not been welcomed into this country so we want to give an amazing welcome to all of these uh refugees and thanks to your generosity we are to those in this area we have one uh that we are looking after particularly a group of it will be but we don't exactly would be somewhere between four and 500 already 200 have arrived we were there yesterday with them and we were there last week and it's it's it's amazing to see what the churches are doing across this country to welcome and it is um you are privileged to be uh involved with with that group in the um providing them in an undisclosed location for for many different reasons we need to be very confidential about where they are to protect them but they are um thanks to your generosity they're receiving clothes uh good new or good as new and we are going to be giving them all everything that they need um and amazing people here who are helping them get to a doctor or a dentist people here who have come and helped translate and that's the needs so we're not we're not asking people to give clothes that's all in hand uh we have also businesses a christian businessman uh who owns uh who is at least runs a whole chain of well-known department stores have given vouchers and it's just amazing to see people's generosity and kindness and thanks to your generosity this is what you did last week you here and those of you online for those refugees those 500 refugees you gave nearly 30 000 pounds isn't that amazing and it is wonderful to see the joy and the the the just the the uh the blessing that you're bringing to those to those people and that's what we do giving is a way that we can bless people and we don't just you're giving ghosts of course to world vision to afghan refugees but also all the other things that you're doing as a church love your neighbor we have over the last since the pandemic we have fed together with churches across the country 14 million meals have gone out thanks to your generosity looking after the homeless helping people get debt advice that's what you give to that's what you're giving to today all the needs of the church uh that are coming up so thank you for what you do uh those of you give by standing order particularly thank you the average standing order here is uh around 200 pounds a month and that's what enables us to do all the things like the services like alpha that is coming up on the 22nd of september the new alpha courses start here and we have not had alpha live and in person since march 2020 but on the 22nd of september we will be meeting here in person and live so if you've never done alpha before please if you're watching online right now and you'd like to come and join us you can come and join us at seven o'clock for food uh for the live seven at the live alpha course here at hdb if you'd prefer to do it online uh that is equally good 7 30 online there will be new online groups starting on the 22nd of september morning and evening and we'd love you to join us then and um right now we are going to have a look at a little uh glimpse of what alpha involves [Music] so i heard about alpha through my work they told me that there was this horse type of thing that was really relaxed i thought alco was gonna be a bit more preachy and not quite kind of as open and honest as it was you could literally ask whatever you want and not made to feel silly yourself you're put into your little groups you have dinner together at first which is really nice and then you watch a video about a specific topic and then you go into your small groups to answer some questions and talk about it each week they you know we have a time which everyone would join in on a zoom call and so it was a bit more relaxed i think i definitely had a preconceived notion of churchgoers i felt that they're probably older and a lot more conservative at one point we were just strangers in a room because so many of them have become like my best friends we see each other weekly and i never thought that would happen based on the first first encounter it's not a big commitment at all it's if anything i look forward to it by the end of it it was like i don't want this to end like i really don't want this to end because it's so nice like just having these conversations with people it was almost like a form of therapy every single week i feel like wow i kind of like had a therapy session here it was so nice i did feel like there was some kind of like a deeper thing missing from my life a lot of questions about my worth my purpose like where it came from and i just think i there was something that i lacked i definitely felt for a long time that there was some kind of like longing in my heart for me the way i knew it was real was the the other saturday because that's when i felt the holy spirit for the first time and it was such an intense and emotional but yet peaceful experience it couldn't it couldn't be anything other than true no matter who you are whatever you know no matter what walk of life you you live you all have massive questions and i feel like alpha's a place to start [Music] well let's hear from one or two people who've done alpha here first of all let's go to amy amy you actually did alpha uh four years ago i think it was here so but just say did you have any kind of christian background no no so didn't wasn't a church-goer my parents i think would probably have said that they were agnostic so no not a question okay so how did you come on alpha um so i was not in a very good way i was really struggling with quite severe ocd and anorexia and one of my friends who i'd met at university three years previously messaged me out of the blue invited me for pizza and invited me to alpha at the end of our meal and um yeah so i came along i just thought and what happened to you so i turned up at alpha expecting maybe five people around some orange squash and turned up in this church and there were just hundreds of people queueing for church i'd never seen anything like it and i was driving quite far each time because i was living in surrey at the time and it just very quickly became a priority to me to keep coming back and by about week three i suddenly realized that i felt like i was coming home every time i came here um and yeah the course was just was just incredible um met some of my closest friends of my entire life during that course and just felt really compelled to come back and what difference has jesus made for you i can't i can't begin to explain in in words properly but i was my life there was just a complete absence of peace in my life um with the kind of the mental health stuff that was going on and i really feel a piece that i never thought was possible um my relationships are better um i feel well and um it's just knowing that you're you're never on your own once you've met jesus and i think then you went on to help on a course and then to lead courses and i think one of the people who was in your groups here today yep absolutely yeah so um i was so passionate about it that i was then a helper and a group and then hosted a number of courses and a couple of years ago just before the pandemic i hosted a group and sam sam sam come and tell us you're so you were in amy's group yes what about you tell us what had you had you been a church girl for the last few years no yeah so i um i sort of grew up in a christian home but stopped sort of going as soon as i really had a choice so when i was about 16 um about yeah 10 years ago stopped going to church played football instead and all that sort of stuff um and basically that whole time i kind of tried to do life on my own um and on the surface level it all seemed to be great on paper but like underneath i wasn't really that happy and then it all kind of came tumbling down at one point um i came out of a 10-year relationship i moved into a job that i didn't like anywhere as much i moved to london which london's great but i didn't have my support network around and yeah came to church one one morning this 11 30 about two years ago pretty much the other day um and just started worshiping tears down my face massive spiritual moment um prodigal son moment where i just felt the holy spirit just giving me a big hug um and then you were talking about come to alpha i was like okay i'll give it a go um and then amy was my leader um and yeah basically i had all this sort of spiritual knowledge but i had a lot of big head questions that were getting in the way and really alpha enabled me to like go through those one by one get the resources um that i needed to answer the questions was encouraged to read the bible started to try and live my life the way that jesus did and obviously we can't exactly live up to that because he's jesus um but so i started to follow in some of his example um and life just started to get better um what difference has jesus made for you yeah so some of the things like um i'm way more able to trust in god i was really quite an anxious person before um always tried to do everything in my own power um and um yeah and basically now like just way more was trust so i had a big interview the other day um and where i'd normally be like paralyzed with fear about the interview i just completely trusted god obviously i've done my prep and everything but i completely trusted god um i even had like a 20-minute nap like just before the interview was completely relaxed um and just went and yeah the interview went really well um and then in other things like relationships um i i've never had sort of a bad relationship with any of my family been like i've been quite lucky really um but i remember sort of dad and i would sometimes argue about things and one particular argument got quite uh fierce and we were just sort of having a bit of a shouting match um and he won't thank me for saying that but um and um i just sort of stormed off um and uh really just uh well i flicked to the bible and my bible's got sort of at the back uh sort of go to forgiveness go to here um so i went to one verse i can't remember the actual verse you'll remember but it says um how many times should i forgive and it's like not seven but seven seven times i was like okay god fine um went back out after a bit and just went and found my dad gave him a massive hug and he's a christian as well so i think he's probably thinking along the same lines um and yeah like so we just started a holiday together and i was genuinely before i looked at my bible thinking i've got to get a plane out of here like this is going to be an awful week but it was actually just like such a blessed week and it was so great and um yeah like relationships of just not just with dad but with everybody just been way better um yeah just trying to follow uh jesus like uh example has just made such difference and i think you two become friends in a different kind of way yeah so the last [Applause] yes probably about six weeks ago um we got together we've obviously known each other not guaranteed on alpha but it does happen thank you guys very much josefina [Applause] we've seen you on the video so so you didn't come from a christian background no so i'm originally from finland i'm grew up in a home where my dad had some kind of um church hurt in his childhood so i grew up in a home where christianity was talked about in a bit of a negative way yeah and just say what happened to you so i started working a christian charity so the salvation army salvation army yeah um hope my boss is not watching this because of what i'm about to say um so obviously i was around christians a lot and i was really curious about it i found it a bit strange quite a bit funny um and i'm not gonna lie sometimes i did just waste time asking them questions about the bible and we also had a prayer meeting and i did just go to it because they paid me to sit there for an hour but something did happen because um or just a lady got tired of my questions because she told me about alpha and i thought you know what let me just give it a go and what happened to you well i didn't start dating anyone so we'll talk about that later nikki i thought that was guaranteed [Music] um on the weekend away um i was certainly quite i was getting to a point where i felt comfortable um and i thought christinacy was nice i thought it was nice for you guys didn't really see it happening for me and there's a moment on the weekend away where people can pray for you and my alpha host came up to me and asked me if his friend can pray for me and i was like all right here we go then this lady comes up to me and i'm like okay i guess i'm like meant so i close my eyes or something and she starts praying and i literally had to like open my eyes and just look at her in shock because i was like either this lady some crazy stalker who has been like following me for years or this is from god because she was saying exact things that i had written in my journal exact wordings really private deep personal things and that was just a moment that i gave my life to jesus [Music] and what difference has jesus made um jesus has changed everything um i'm quite naturally anxious person i'm really easily swayed by things i'm quite um emotionally a bit dramatic i would say maybe um and jesus has just given me peace and purpose and also i'm not from the uk so sometimes i felt quite lonely and through church i've just found family i'm part of a connect group i'm studying to host alpha i'm i serve on seoul square and also i'm getting baptized next week so oh wonderful thank you so much [Applause] well if you think you might like to come and join us we would absolutely love that 22nd of september it's not far away now just 10 days away if you're watching online um 22nd of september you can do alpha online or you can come and join us right here at holy trinity uh seven o'clock in the evening we would love to see you love to meet you and uh be wonderful to have you here so our speaker today is dez johnson dez is the uh national director of alpha in scotland he i'll again i'm not going to tell you too much about him because i want him to tell you his story uh but uh this is dez who's a very good friend of uh ours and a wonderful guy but i'll let him tell you his story over to you dez god bless thank you sir it's two kinds [Music] [Applause] thank you having too many things now good morning everyone how are we good morning everyone at home nice to see you it's a point where you say hello sorry i realize i'm scottish i will go slowly for you hello i'll talk like nikki we're going to talk about the power i'm only joking boss it is so good to be here with you this morning um as nikki said my name is dez and i am i just want to share a little bit of my story with you and i just want us to be thinking this morning especially about invitation would that be okay good oh you've got it right this time audience participation is required awesome so yeah my my name is dez as i said and i grew up in the northeast of scotland if you've ever had a space side malt whiskey i created that my family created that we we are where it's all from it's actually where em sandy miller who was the previous reverend boss bishop overlord of htb was and um sandy and i are from the same place i realize if you've ever met sandy that you will be surprised by that and then it's also where nikki and peppa had their honeymoon which is a claim to fame that i'm also taking and in fact it's where my tattooist is and it's the same one that nikki uses um so that's good we've both got alpha luke see living the dream come on nikki's is a fullback do you want to show everyone no okay um so anyway i am i grew up up there and i wanted to become a superstar dj because let's be honest pressing play and dancing about seems like a really good way of making money and i just thought i would be amazing at that you know i'm handsome i can do this you know i was like what more do you need in life and i i became quite famous in the elgin area there was about eight maybe nine people who knew who i was two of them were sheep but you know that's a different matter but i am a part of that whole scene as i'm sure many of you are aware is there's a whole drink and drugs culture that surrounds it and unfortunately i got myself kind of tied up in that mainly because i i wanted to be the person that partied the hardest i wanted to be the person that was at every party that was in the middle of everything that was the chaos in the room and that just meant that i i just got more and more embroiled in this in this downward spiral of of drink and drugs and party lifestyle so much so to the point where i actually had to stop djing because nobody wanted to pay for the dj to turn up and be more out of control than the guest it's kind of like a frowned upon thing do you know when you can't speak and you're slaughtering your words setting up it's a bad sign and then i think what any sensible person with a drug problem should do and that's moved to glasgow and then when i got to glasgow um i i wasn't able to dj anymore but i was able to work on the doors as a bouncer and surprisingly i've got a face for it apparently and i'm really good at getting punched which also helps but um while i was while i was there i was getting more and more involved in in violent acts and i was getting more and more carried away and and just these these things that weren't me and i got into this vicious downward spiral where i would act more and more out of control and then i would take more and more drugs to hide from the person that i was becoming like if any of you guys ever felt like that maybe not with drugs but you know that you're in that spiral and you just can't feel like you can get out of it like there seems to be no way up you're just in this this chaos and then for me that resulted in me taking an overdose one night not not because i was trying to end anything just because i'm quite greedy and then i uh i could see my heart jumping out my chest and and i'm not a cardio thoracic surgeon but that seems like quite a bad thing when you can actually see your heart doing this so i i just cried out i cried out to god or whoever was out there that i wanted to live and then i woke up the next day and i never touched cocaine again isn't that amazing [Applause] now the story would be really good if i then went i realized it was jesus and my life went like this but i didn't i put it down to the fact that i am the greatest human that has ever lived on this earth i was indestructible i beat drugs overnight hear me roar it's kind of what i thought do you know and i was just i was i couldn't understand why everyone else couldn't do the same thing but then this weird thing happened over the next three years i kept meeting christians and in my line of work that was quite a strange experience you know these visions and beige coming towards you do you know like there was a lot of czech shirts and chinos no offense sir um but they were everywhere you know and they've got the smile you know the smile and and it got to the point that other people were seeing them and saying oh there's there's a christian to come and talk to you and i was like i don't know what i'm supposed to do do you know when they say they say weird things like are you bathed in the blood like no i don't know am i anyway i kept meeting these christians and i worked in a shop during the day as well and we were employing a new member of staff and she said she couldn't work sundays and i was like oh i take it you're a christian she was like i am we gave her the job anyway and um but but what i found really strange about this girl was that she was normal like she liked the same music i liked she she wore the same kind of clothes i liked she was into the same stuff i like for all intents and purposes she was normal apart from this christian thing that i just couldn't get my head around but then i had a pet christian that i could ask all my questions to and i was this is amazing so i bombard her with questions and i kept asking stuff and she bought me a bible which i ignored and then um i asked her a really important question would you go out with me yeah and she said no um and sir i feel that we have an affinity i'm sure you can understand i was as surprised as that by everyone else in the room do you know there was just this like i was like what she was like look you're not a christian i'm not interested and i was like you actually believe this stuff like this stuff written in this book you believe it she was like yeah do you and that totally blew my mind because as far as i was concerned what she did was go along to a building on sunday and do karaoke she sung at a wall and there was nothing there to it and i was like i don't understand this so in an effort to prove her wrong i started reading the bible and then i don't know if you've if you've been a new christian no one ever tells you that the bible's actually 66 books so i did what you start of any normal book you do you started page one but there's quite a lot of reading from page one you know there's adam and eve there's this boy who builds a boat and sailed around glasgow for 40 days while it rained um there's there's talking donkeys there's burning bushes moses has got this stick that separates sea and also turns into a snake what do you do with that it's just blew my mind there's all these lists of numbers there's a guy that gets stabbed in the stomach and then his belly eats the sword now i am a rotund gentleman and i have been stabbed that is not what happens i can't get my head around this and i kept reading and there's poetry and there's love and there's passion and she was quite attractive so i carried on reading and then but i came to this part of the book let me just read this for you now it's ecclesiastes 3 a time for everything for everything there is a season a time for every activity under heaven a time to be born in a time to die a time to plant and a time to harvest a time to kill and a time to heal a time to tear down and a time to build up a time to cry a time to laugh a time to grieve and a time to dance a time to scatter stones and a time to gather stones a time to embrace a time to turn away a time to search a time to quit searching a time to keep and a time to throw away a time to tear and a time to mend a time to be quiet and a time to speak a time to love and a time to hate a time for war and a time for peace isn't that just the most powerful thing it just came alive in my head i realized that if this was true there was a space for me and i saw my life before my eyes and i was like there must be more to life than this there has to be more than what i'm doing right now so i phoned up this girl fiona and i said hey i think i might be becoming one of you can we go to church she was like sure so we went to church and then um i got talking to the pastor and he uh he invited me along to this thing called alpha and i was like oh yeah i am not going to one of your brainwashing courses and then he said you got dinner and i said was it tuesday at half seven and uh so i went along and you know what i found on alpha was the most the most surreal thing was that there was a room of people who i had never met who genuinely cared about me they actually listened to my questions regardless of how crazy they were regardless of how difficult i was being they loved me but they loved each other and i couldn't i couldn't get my head around this i was undone and then i went on the holy spirit weekend and i had a powerful physical encounter with jesus and i knew that jesus had came at earth he had died he had rose again and came back for me the rest of you were just a bonus he literally came for me and i was just blown away by this and i was like you know what this is so true my life's gone out the window so i gave up everything i gave up my job i gave up being a bouncer i gave up working in the shop and i started working for the church voluntary i was a youth worker and then uh i got invited to start working for the church paid me working for a church how's it okay and then i get invited to go to bible college i was as shocked and stunned as you people are quite clearly i was like okay then i got invited to be to go through the training to become ordained hashtag revdes right i was like and i keep get i keep sorry i kept getting invited to more and more things i got invited to work for alpha as a youth coordinator and then three years ago i got made the scottish director yeah crazy right but it just keeps getting better because then i got invited to become the europe middle east and north africa youth director in january yeah it's crazy you knew there was another one coming as well and then this weekend i just got announced as a president of the boys brigade yeah it's hilarious right i go i went to boys brigade once and got thrown out but what happened is that i've just had invitation after invitation and god has opened door after door and all i've seen is an invitations happen i've said okay let's see what you're doing and is that not the story of this book as i read through this and every day that i read this sense i hear about invitations to come and be a part of his journey to come and be a part of his story all of us are sitting here today because we've been invited to be here at some point in your life you've either been invited to become a christian you've either been invited to visit htb you've been invited into this building you've been invited into this family we are a story of invitation we are a collected group of invitations and what always strikes me as that we need to be a people of that invitation we need to find the people in our lives and invite them into this journey just like fiona did for me fiona's now my wife hey and we've got three kids and she is the most amazing person ever and do you know the things that really made the difference for that invitation to me was that few and i was real and she prayed for me i didn't know that she prayed for me but she prayed for me every day for a year and a half and actually i can do those things i can be real with the people that i care about and i can pray for them and i know that all of you all of we can so i would just really love to i'm going to finish with a prayer in a second but just as we go into alpha season i would just love for you guys to just think about who is it that you can invest in who is it that you could say i want to see them have a house next door to me in heaven who is it that we could take on this journey with us amen now as i've been praying about coming down here because a big deal coming to london i really felt that there's some people who are just at the point of making that decision today that there's some people that just have maybe been around for a little while have heard this message before and actually want to know that jesus is their lord and savior today and if that's you i would i would love to just invite you to take that step i would love to say come and be a part of our family we're dysfunctional and we're all weird but there's a space for you here and if that's you can i just get you to put your hand up today um it's hard to know because there might be people at home as well so i'm just going to pray for us just now and i think nikki and pips are going to come and join us as well but if you if you've made that prayer we'd we'd love to pray for you and i think god might be doing some other things for some other people as well would you like to stand and uh can we say a huge thank you to dez what a wonderful story [Applause] and what i want to do is i want to um invite what we do every every sunday here is to invite the holy spirit to come and we believe that the holy spirit is going to come here brompton road but also if you're watching online the holy spirit knows your address and he wants to come to your home today as well and speak to you and give you the opportunity to respond right now to what the holy spirit has been saying through dares to the stories we've heard through the worship and i want to encourage you that this is a moment where you can respond and if as dez says you you feel that sense that you are being invited by the holy spirit you can respond right now and i'm going to encourage uh dez to pray a prayer which you can pray in your heart and you can pray this at home and it if you're here in the church pray it's silently in your heart if you're praying it at home you can pray it sadly in your heart or you can pray it out loud but i want to encourage you now as we invite the holy spirit to come to believe that jesus said come to me all you who labor and i will give you rest and jesus is inviting you today maybe you're struggling with whatever it is jesus is saying come to me all you who labor and i will give you rest lord we invite your holy spirit to come right now come holy spirit if you want to receive to be filled with the holy spirit just put out your hands you can do that right now here in church or you can do it at home just put out your hands and say come holy spirit and fill me and if you want to respond to what the holy spirit is doing dez is going to pray this prayer right now which you can pray silently in your heart or you can pray it out loud if you're at home and this is a way that you can be sure that from today the 12th of september 2021 that you are in god's family lord jesus i invite you into my life today i say sorry for all the mistakes that i've made and i ask you to fill in those mistakes i ask you to be on this journey where i can be eternally yours forevermore amen amen okay if you prayed that prayer for the first time or in a really significant way either at home or wherever you are watching this on live stream or here in the church i'd encourage you if you're in the church i i didn't see because i was at the side i didn't see who raised the hand if you raised it before or if you prayed this time as dez was praying if you prayed that prayer in a way that was significant for you or encouraged you just to raise a hand and catch my eye or dez's eye or pips his eye and then you'll know that from this moment on you are in god's family you are a child of god you have the holy spirit living within you you have trusted jesus with your life you have eternal life so if that's you just raise your hand wherever you are in the gallery down here and i'll yeah this woman just here in the third row i've seen your your hand um but just put it down when you when you've got your eye or wherever you are just catch my eye or dez or pips yeah there's a hand just there at the back on this side yeah thank you very much indeed i can't see in the gallery but if you um oh i can't see this side yeah just at the back there i'm pointing it down the back yeah okay okay lord thank you for each of these people who've given their lives to you today thank you for each of those watching online right now and i pray that you would fill each of them with your holy spirit to overflowing that they would know that from this moment on they have eternal life that they're loved by you jesus died for them and i pray that you would give them a deep sense of peace the peace of god which passes understanding i also feel that there might be people here who have come to a fork in the road and you've got decisions to make whether to go one way or another and you've sort of come to that fork and you actually don't know which way to go and i think the lord is saying i'm here with you i will lead you i will guide you in that and that to go and to trust that the decision you make will be the decision the lord wants you to make that he's with you in it he won't leave you in it however difficult this moment is that as you wait on him it will become clear we're going to continue to wait on him as we worship and then i'll come and close the formal part of the service with a blessing in a moment you invite me with a melody you survived me with the song of deliverance [Music] from my enemies to low my fears are gone and i'm no longer a slave to fear i am a child of god and i'm no a slave to fear i am a child of [Music] call god each by name and you know each one of us [Music] foreign [Music] i've been born again into your family [Music] your blood flows through [Music] i am a child [Music] i am a child of god [Music] over here [Music] you split the sea so i could walk right through it my [Music] fears and see i am the child of god [Music] you split the sea so i could walk right [Music] [Music] [Applause] i am [Music] [Music] my fears [Music] [Applause] [Music] i am a child of god and i'm no longer slave to fear i am a child of god lord thank you that that is true of every one of us as we give our lives to you as we encounter you we become to those who received him jesus said he gave the right to become children of god no longer a slave to fear and lord thank you that we can trust that promise as we go from here and i want to pray god's blessing on you at home as you're watching on live stream and on god's blessing on everyone who's come here today [Music] these are not just words there is power in the blessing you can bless other people and i proclaim now god's blessing on you god's blessing on your health god's blessing on your home god's blessing on your workplace on your work colleagues on your family on your friendships god's blessing on your sleep god's blessing on everything that you're involved in the blessing of god almighty who rules and reigns in this universe the blessing of god the father who loves you intimately more than any human relationship the blessing of god the son who loves you so much he came and died for you so you could be forgiven and set free the blessing of the holy spirit who's come to live in your heart and to fill you today with love so that you can go out and make a difference in this world in jesus name amen [Music] oh man what an amazing service hilarious um but profound worship as well but if you've been affected by any of the topics that were raised in today's service then you can find further support by heading to hdb.org forward slash further support um but if you'd like someone to pray for you right now then you can do so by you can have someone pray with you by following the link that has appeared on the screen now and if you are just joining us on the live stream welcome we're so glad to have you with us my name is ryan i'm jess and we're really glad to spend this time together and if this is your first time joining us if you're new to this church community we'd love for you to get involved in all that's going on in the life of hdb church there's a qr code that would come up on your screen you can find out more information hdb.org as well you can and um as you'd have heard throughout the service alpha is starting on the 22nd of september you're all going to be going to sleep tonight and that's all you can think about alpha 22nd of september um but i just want to reiterate what's been being said is that we want to invite you if you haven't done alpha before then come along either in person to hdb brompton road or join us online and youth alpha as well we're starting youth alpha on the 22nd of september so if you're in school years six to 13 then join us by heading to http and you can find the way to sign up then i actually did alpha i came to brompton road and did alpha when i was in year 12. and i encountered the holy spirit and now i work for htv so um it's an amazing thing um but as dez was talking about in his talk if you've already done alfred you're like actually i've already done it i'm not sure if that's right we want to be people that invite our friends along as well so why don't you join us for the 1102 prayer initiative which comes from luke chapter 11 verse 2 which talks about thy kingdom come and um set your alarm for 1102 am or pm your prerogative up to you and pray for those three friends that you want to invite to alpha every single day come on and during today's service we spoke about baptisms and if you'd like to find out more information about baptism maybe you'd like to get baptized head on over to hdb.org forward slash baptisms to find out more come on and you could also subscribe why not subscribe while you're there clicking around subscribe to http church youtube channel you'll be the first to know what's coming up in hdb chat oh guys my favorite part of the week is doing that ding um it's been a fantastic service i've loved it i hope you guys have an amazing week it's also so encouraging to read your comments in the chat so um just keep saying hi it's so lovely to connect with you all um and we'll be back same time same place next week have a fantastic week bye [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: HTB Church

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Length: 76min 32sec (4592 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 12 2021