Morning Church & North Rocks - 28 March 2021

the god i love he is [Music] he is seal it for thy [Music] core let's sing together how deep the father's love for us how deep the father's love for us that he should give his only son to make [Music] face away as wounds which mother chosen bring these sons to glory be [Applause] upon his shoulders [Music] [Applause] [Music] it was [Music] is me life i will not boast in anything no gifts no power no wisdom but i will boast in jesus christ he's [Music] is reward i can't [Music] is [Music] is [Music] one two one [Music] there's only by the work of jesus can salvation be secure it is [Music] knowing he has won [Music] without money [Music] it is [Music] knowing he has [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] our redemption is knowing he has won yeah my name is jack day and i'm one of the ministers here we are so glad that you are with us here today this is an especially exciting morning for us to be getting together as a church for starters it's our first sunday with our new senior minister raj gupta we are so excited to welcome raj we're meeting him and wife nicole a little later on it's also our first sunday together as a church with ease restrictions that mean we can sing we can sing together here hallelujah praise the lord we can sing unmasked if you want to wear a mask you please feel very welcome to you are free to but they're not mandatory for many of us this is gonna be our first time singing together as a church in over 12 months so praise god that that wait is over as we come to seeing in just a moment i want to remind you just one of the reasons that the bible gives us why we as christians are people who have something to sing about this sunday is traditionally called palm sunday it's the sunday before easter because on the very first sunday before the first easter our lord jesus rode into the city of jerusalem on a donkey and the crowd spread palm branches on the road before him and as that happened the gospels tell us the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise god in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen hosanna save lord blessed is the king who comes in the name of the lord peace in heaven and glory in the highest friends our king has come we have a king to praise and worship together and now at last this crowd of disciples here we can finally praise our god in loud and joyful voices so please with all god's creatures would you stand with us as we sing [Music] so [Music] all creatures [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Applause] [Music] hallelujah [Music] little things that create a blast and worship him in humbleness the father praise the son [Music] [Music] hallelujah rejoicing praise [Music] god [Applause] [Music] he shall return [Applause] [Music] oh praise him hallelujah [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh man because it's been so long we're gonna see another one the chorus of the saved [Music] [Applause] all the angels rejoice that is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] is is [Music] sacrifice in [Music] his acclaim will result [Music] is [Music] is [Music] is [Music] fixed on jesus [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] is [Music] the holiest place [Music] so let us our sins [Music] is join the song in our three [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] please take a seat [Music] how good is that my heart is still singing friends it is so good to see so many of you here at church if you have come in since we started my name is jack and i'm one of the ministers here it is a privilege that we get to meet together in this way to listen to the voice of our god to build each other up and especially today to sing freely together praise god it's exciting we get to welcome people here for the first time if you are new here at some pools it is great to have you here we regularly pray that new people would join us so you are an answer to our prayers and we look forward to saying g'day to you afterwards let me also say hello to those tuning in to on the live stream uh to our regulars uh it is great you can be with us this way we miss you we along for the day when you can be with us in the room as well and g'day to you if you are new online today perhaps you're checking out some pools for the first time either sunday morning or maybe later on the week we hope that you enjoy your morning with us too as we kick off we're going to have a qr code come up on the screen great for you to if you have a phone to scan that now that'll get you all the resources that might help you in our service this morning so you'll be able to see an outline for the bible talk that raj will be bringing to us be able to see the link to our connect card which is a way for you to communicate with the staff team here at church so you pull that up now and have that ready for later on and as we come together like this to meet with god how wonderful is it that we can draw near with confidence not because we stand on our own merits before god or how good we are but because we have a king who rode into jerusalem on a donkey and who also walked outside jerusalem carrying a cross that he would take our sins on his shoulders we know that we fail to serve our king as he deserves and as we come together we're going to say words of confession as we return to our lord as we turn to him and trust before we pray this prayer let me give you a moment in the quietness of your own heart to call to mind the ways that you have failed to honor jesus as your king today this week this very hour let's pray these words together from the screen heavenly father you have loved us with an everlasting love but we have often gone our own way and rejected your will for our lives we are sorry for our sins and turn away from them for the sake of your son who died for us forgive us cleanse us and change us by your holy spirit enable us to live for you and to please you in every way for the glory of our lord jesus christ amen friends the bible assures us with the wonderful news that as high as the heavens are above the earth so great is god's love towards those who fear him and as far as east is from west so far has he removed our transgressions from us in jesus christ our lord amen as we draw near to god with that kind of confidence we're going to continue praying to our heavenly father as heather comes up to lead us now we're going to be praying for our world and for our church thank you heather let's pray together friends most holy merciful and just god we thank you for the life and death of our lord jesus christ that because of his death resurrection and ascension you are pleased to pour out your grace on us sinful people that we are thank you that this brings all who trust in your promises into a right relationship with you that it makes us your adopted children righteous and perfect in your eyes and who will one day live with you in glory please help us to live in such a way now that others will be encouraged to seek jesus too father we bring the peoples of papua new guinea before you as the coroner vices spread rapidly in that country we pray that hospitals and government agencies in papua new guinea will be able to cope with the increasing number of cases that people's lives will be spared we pray that with the growing availability of vaccine in australia that this will be used for the benefits of the people there please enable the australian government to get this vaccine to the people quickly we pray that the vaccine bought from europe will become available too and that it can supplement that which goes there from australia we pray for christians in this country that they'll be both bold and able to hold out the love of god in the gospel to their country men and women we thank you father that the flood situation across eastern australia is easy as the flood waters recede and the cleanup begins we pray for all people involved amid the heartbreak this must entail for so many we pray that you'll give them the strength for the task and keep them free from injury and disease we ask that people will be generous with monetary donations and that aid agencies will use what they receive wisely and will distribute the funds where they are most needed again we pray for christians that they'll demonstrate the love of god in jesus to their local communities and that people in their need will turn to him for both salvation and comfort in their trials we pray for the australian governments at all levels to govern well but this morning we especially bring the federal government before you please give your wisdom to scott morrison and his cabinet as they deal with a multitude of issues help them to govern for all people of australia that we might be a fair and equitable to society where the needs of all people are met and as job keeper ends and people lose their jobs we pray they'll be able to find alternative employment father we pray for wisdom and guidance for the compassion national office leadership team as they meet plan and prepare to continue to serve the children and their families especially in the philippines we ask that you would bless the family discipleship and food security initiatives as local church partners implement them we asked two for safety and peace for the children families and staff in bohu as the rain has made it difficult to reach those who live in these areas we pray also that you'll continue to pray protect compassion staff and children their families from covert and print and prevent it from spreading more quickly finally father on a personal note for compassion we ask for your healing strength and encouragement for edwin johnry and their families as they undergo cancer treatment and for leia after a heart operation now father we as we come to hear your word read to us and then explain we ask that you would give each one of us soft hearts and listening ears so that we understand this part of ephesians please speak to us by your holy spirit and enable us to make the necessary response to what we hear we pray all this in the name of our lord jesus christ amen our father hears our prayers and listens and answers and as a church over the past nearly year and a half we have prayed long and hard for a new leader we have waited and today with great thanks and joy we get to see how god hears and answers our prayers as i mentioned at the start it is with great joy that we met welcome our new senior minister raj gupta to his first sunday with us here at symbols along with his wife nicole and family we're gonna get to meet them now so would you please welcome up raj and nicole well hello everyone this really is a typical anglican church isn't it that is the front rows empty it's um thank you you're making me feel at home this is excellent very good we are so thankful that you're here just checking sorry am i on i'll just keep going we're so grateful you're here as i said we've been looking forward to this day for a long time welcome is absolutely fantastic i'm i'm thrilled to have you standing up the front of church here just really is a great joy um everyone else knows that because this is the moment for me where the cavalry has arrived so you know everyone understands what i'm saying you must have holidays coming up or something we haven't talked about to you i need have i that tomorrow yeah um you've been here in carlingford for you know a couple of weeks now you've been moving in settling in we'd love to hear a little about how are you finding the stay here so far and particularly any any of the local you know calling for the north rocks tourist attractions that you've stumbled upon that you'd like to share with us we are experts in the area we have now lived with at the houses in oatlands and we've lived there for six weeks so we know everything there is to know about the area we still go but to blacktown to shop but anyway we'll work on that as time goes on but um fair enough nicole anything for you any highlights so far well i had the unique experience of actually driving to church this morning so um so i come up nice and close sorry i'm far away i had the unique experience of driving to church this morning i mean you all do have done that for many years but after having lived on site for the last 14 years i'm going oh i'm gonna have to actually find a parking spot that's going to be fun um so no we we're getting we're getting to know the local area and um uh just working out that adjustment of living off-site so yeah fantastic if you want to get a reserve parking space or anything like that you know a man who might be able to help you out that i'm sure you've got ways and means um raj on tuesday night at your commencement service you mentioned to us how you came to know the lord jesus through the ministry of scripture in schools we'd love to tell us a little bit about what is it about scripture what is it about jesus that compelled you to become a follower of jesus yeah thanks jack look my my story um i'll give a short version now and that is i grew up in balmain and so for those of you who know what that means it means that therefore i don't cry you know like neville ran said some time ago i went to birchgrove public school and it it was there that there were three ladies from belmain gospel chapel a brethren church they i now understand how how much how hard it was for them to build up the courage and to go and ask the principal if they can teach scripture they did and through that i came into connection with the youth group they were running and i think really the you know i i think when i was 12 i knew that i wasn't christian um when i was 14 i'm pretty sure what i was you know i was reading the bible i was praying i was um a lot of disciplines of a christian life i sort of had those so sometime over there and in as much as i can identify a key moment it was really hearing that i was a sinner and that jesus died for me and it was just something i realized today that people heaven the bible says they're a sinner if not everyone resonates with that but for me i just i i knew that was the case and as you get to know me you will resonate with that too for me but anyway we'll come to that and and so i i responded to the grace of jesus christ and really um i just kept lapping up learning from god's word meeting with god's people um and here i am today yeah and we praise god for that nicole we'd love to hear a little about your journey of faith as well and particularly what is it about being a christian that just sings to you you know what's the best thing about following jesus well as you mentioned singing i wasn't that wonderful to be able to sing today i'm so happy to be able to um sing god's praises this morning um i have a slightly different story to raj i grew up in a christian family i grew up actually in the salvation army in north west new south wales in country new south wales so i don't remember a time where i didn't know that jesus loved me jesus loves me this i know those kinds of things but i do know that there have been times when my faith had been has been tested and i've been had to work out why why do i follow this is this just because i grew up in a christian family is this i've gone through this for my kids as well to work out is it is this the culture that i've just been brought up in is this what it is but when i i think it's very appropriate actually as we look at this time of year as we look at easter when i look at the cross and i look at what jesus did for us there where i see love and mercy flow down all of i mean all the songs are coming into my heads now in my head now aren't they things like that where i look i look to the cross and i think where where else have we to go but to jesus and he is the one that humbles us but rescues us and gives us um grace upon grace upon grace more than we deserve and i think the more that i look at the cross is the the more i realize that this is this is the way to go this is jesus is the one to follow um and uh why would you turn away from it so there you go yeah thank you for sharing yeah there's so much more that we're looking forward to getting to hear from you in the weeks and months ahead just one last thing uh this morning raj as you arrive here at carlingford and norfolk as well our north rock's brothers and sisters are watching on the live stream uh we'd love to hear you know how are you feeling about starting here at some pools and what are you going to do here that's what everyone everyone wants to know that's the question everyone's buying i'm sure i've been asked that question for a long period of time um what am i going to do look worth me just saying as i get into that uh north rocks people are watching on the live stream hello to you guys and other people watching on the live stream as well and i just i know sam said something last week and i just want to add my own words of thankfulness to dave kuhn who has been acting rector here for almost 18 months or so dave's done an amazing job and as i've spent the week sitting in different meetings and getting to know things i just said paul's is a very large and complex i don't want to say the word beast but words i should not have used on day one anyway sorry we know ourselves it's okay um so thanks to dave for for being acting wrecked over that period of time and north rocks people i think i'm with you on good friday really looking forward to being with you in person um on that occasion what am i going to do well i think i said this on tuesday night i think um god's word is just foundational for every single one of us and my primary role is really to help us and lead us by teaching the word of god and so as i come that that really is foremost in my mind i'm delighted to be starting ephesians today and and prayer i i want to really be someone investing in prayer um and you know in terms of particular strategies and so on i have a deep conviction that the lord has left his people in this world to reach people with the gospel of jesus christ so many people are perishing in our world and well how we're going to kind of do that with what god has entrusted to us both individually and corporately i don't really know the answer that that's something i'm i'm looking forward to talking with you guys about um and people at north rocks and listening to live stream across our congregations um i'm i'm the new kid on the block and so it's sort of how am i feeling it's a bit weird to be the new kid on the block i've got so much to learn and yet i'm pretty sure we share this conviction that jesus christ has come into the world to save sinners yes and and that is a message the whole world needs to hear and our time is limited in this world and we need to reach as many people as possible um and so i'm just looking forward to the journey of working with all of you guys um seeing god's people use their gifts he's given every single one of us gifts to use we'll see that in ephesians in a number of weeks time um and it's going to be an exciting journey i'm sure and we look forward to being on it with you we're going to pray heavenly father you are so good to us we praise you for your faithfulness we thank you that we've seen that in our lord jesus and his death and resurrection that we might live we thank you for raj and nicole we thank you for how you have brought them to know and trust and love your son and we thank you for bringing them here to join us we pray you'd help them as they settle in and adjust and get to know us please sustain them for that mammoth task and we pray that you would work through raj and through all of us as we seek to see more and more people come to know and trust our lord jesus and find life in him we pray all these things in jesus name amen i mean it's so good to have you here would you please thank raja nicole and raj will be joining us again in a moment as we come to hear from the scriptures before we do that we are going to read them and hear god's voice so as alison comes up to read ephesians 1. please grab your bibles out and turn open there we're also going to be enjoying question time with raj after the sermon so if you have a question about anything you see in the bible or anything he says you can text that in to the phone number that will be on the screen i'm gonna read ephesians chapter one thanks alison good morning everyone today's reading is from ephesians chapter 1 verses 1 to 14. paul an apostle of christ jesus by the will of god to god's holy people in ephesus the faithful in jesus in christ jesus grace and peace to you from god our father and the lord jesus christ praise be to the god and father of our lord jesus christ who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in christ for he he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight in love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through jesus christ in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of his glorious grace which he has freely given us in the one he loves in him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins in accordance with the riches of god's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure which he purposed in christ to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under christ in him we were also chosen having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will in order that we who were the first to put our hope in christ might be for the praise of his glory and you also were included in christ when you heard the message of truth the gospel of your salvation when you believed you were marked in him with a seal the promised holy spirit who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are god's possession to the praise of his glory well friends i hope you got that qr code earlier on if you didn't it's up here again you can download an outline we're going to have to talk this week about handouts and all that kind of thing as covert situations change but for now there it is and north rock's people great to have you uh tuning in as well is it my imagination or is it cold in here okay let's pray father we thank you for this opportunity this morning there's so many things happening this morning father we can sing again um it's a delight for nicole and i to be here on our first sunday um so many of us have had weeks in which different things have been happening and distract us but father we pray this morning now that you might calm our hearts and our minds as we come to your word father we pray that you would work in us deeply in this remarkable passage we pray that we might share the outburst of of praise that paul gives as he reflects on the blessings that he has received through christ and father we pray in jesus name amen well friends i want to on day one introduce you to this this is a histomap of world history and i got my hands on this some time ago it's never leaving my hands because you can't get them anymore and here it is and i've given you a bit of a snapshot on the screens just so you can get the idea what it basically does is trace how the balance of power in the world has changed ever since year dot until now and uh you don't need to follow for details although some of you are thinking about your your cultural group i'm more interested to see this and i understand that so might and what it does you see when um when an area a nation has greater width that country at that point in time in world history has greater influence and what you see uh so you know we start off with the egyptians that the pink kind of bit over here um is really more than half of the width of the whole thing it was the egyptian empire that dominated in the early days and time goes on and you see well they may have dominated then but then they shrink and another nation comes up and over here we then at around about 800 bc or so the assyrian empire comes up and you're able to go through right until the modern kind of day in the 20th century where you see this blue kind of section where the united states comes up now i find this really helpful as we are thinking today in ephesians chapter one about the future and when we see something like this put all together like this for us we see no matter how which nation of the world may have been dominant at a point in time a point in time will come when things will change and they will fade away and you see that all through world history you see i've just given a snapshot on the screen so you get the idea of how this kind of thing works now there's a couple of exceptions to this one country which is really important for you all to understand over on the right hand side on my left your right over here in this pink you know there's an exception it just it doesn't do too much it just goes all the way through ever since she died until now it's never spectacular it's the country of india well done well done and for those of you who care to look more closely at this in fact this happened to me i was preaching once i was introducing this and i looked down and i saw this pink kind of thing of india and i got down to here and i thought oh india has this kind of you know resurgence over this the pink really expands and i looked more closely and there it was the gupta dynasty was in rule at that point in time and then the gupta dynasty went and india faded away into anyway now i need to say as well china is another exception india never does too much um we won't talk about qriket we'll say that for another day because you know exceptions come in but look the point is nations rise and nations fall and you think about the future and we think about where we currently are in world history and we look on the world we see countries like the united states dominating we see countries like china and i want to encourage his friends the education of world history is no matter how things might look now in the future those nations are bound to collapse and we see other nations come up and so it begs the question for us as we think about the yes i want to put on a jumper too i understand that it's it's um next next week perhaps friends as we think together about the future ephesians 1 is going to help us understand what we should look for in ephesians we see something that is just so magnificent and so much more valuable than anything else we can possibly imagine it begins with the apostle paul who wrote ephesians pondering the blessings that god has given in fact pondering is not really the right word because as we go through in the next few minutes we're gonna see he's not pondering he has an outburst he has an explosion of praise to god he just can't control himself as he tries as he starts to think about all that god has done for him and all that jesus coming into the world has achieved and so we start in verse 3 where he just he can't contain himself and he cries out praise be to the god and father of our lord jesus christ who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in christ for he chose and he cannot help himself but elaborate on the blessings that have come from god he is so taken with these blessings that he praises the god and father of our lord jesus christ who has sent his one and only son into the world to die on a cross and these blessings they far far outweigh anything and everything else he can possibly imagine and i want to suggest friends um this there's a depth that's added to this explosion of praise when you remember that when he's writing these words in fact he is in prison despite such crippling circumstances such oppressive circumstances he cannot help but burst out in praise about the blessings he has received from the god and father of jesus now we we gave her here this morning it's been a long year hasn't it it's been a long 12 months someone pointed out to me the other day that tuesday night um tuesday for my commencement here at saint paul's um 23rd of march was actually the anniversary one year anniversary of when everything was shut down from covert last year my first 35 months is i should have picked a different date [Laughter] it's been a long 12 months does anyone remember before covert last year we had this thing called bushfires covert of course has impacted all of us in all kinds of ways and as we now come out of covert well we had this other thing called floods i am only so aware that so many have struggled over the last 12 months for a whole bunch of reasons some of them many of them springing from covert there's been sickness there's been mental health challenges there's been the impact of isolation that many of us have not even thought about before until we've been isolated for the last 12 months or so there's financial challenges which we prayed for earlier relational challenges church just as paul was in prison whatever your current circumstances may be as you look at the cross as you ponder all that jesus christ has done for you i wonder if as we look through ephesians chapter 1 the first half in the next few minutes i wonder if your heart and your soul might might have an explosion of praise to god in exactly the same way that the apostle paul does as he realizes that we have been given every spiritual blessing in christ in fact if you're a bible underliner i know physical bibles we don't you know all of that but if you are a viable underliner i want to encourage you underline verse 3 especially the word every it is the most profound experience that we can have knowing the blessings that we have in jesus christ now we're going to start to go through i'm going to explain a little bit like a diamonds because what happens with a diamond is you you look at a diamond from a distance and you can see its value but then what happens as you get that dominant you bring it up close and you stare into that diamond you appreciate from a particular angle the one way of looking at that diamonds and ephesians one it's almost like we get that done when we look at it from a certain angle and then we twist it around from a slightly different angle we look at exactly the same thing we appreciate it in a slightly different way and that's the image i'm going to go with as i just go through these now i understand for women that one probably works you know a little bit better if you're a bloke i was trying to think what might be an equivalent the best i could come up with was think about a car now i thought to myself particularly maybe for some of the asians among us you might like to think about fried food or some something that you consider to be valuable that you can appreciate from different angles that's the point of what's happening here in ephesians one not with fried food don't get distracted on that not with cars but when it comes to the blessings that we have in jesus christ and so verse 4 as we look at this diamond from one angle we see the blessing that christian people have been chosen and predestined before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight isn't that just extraordinary yes have you ever looked out on a cloudless night at the cosmos it doesn't work so well when you're in sydney and you get distracted on you know with the lights and so on but have you ever been pondering one day perhaps out in the country looking at the cosmos looking at the creation not just of the world but of the universe and your heart and your soul it just goes to god and you revel in the creation of god and the effort that he's gone through my friends in ephesians one that's the concept that's been taken and it's being applied to us as christians it is not just that god knew that you would choose jesus it is actually the case as it says here in ephesians 1 that god determines and he plans and he made the circumstances of your life such that there would be a point in time where you would hear about the gospel of the lord jesus christ and the blessings that are available and his death on the cross and his resurrection from the dead and he actually not even just did that he determined that that that you would then have the veil lifted from over your heart and over your eyes so that you could understand and so that you could respond doesn't that just knock your socks off i'm i'm someone who had the privilege the absolute privilege of being present for the birth of each of my three children many of you will be similar although sorry not the birth of my children the birth of your children and i remember on each occasion i just marveled in what god has done in in how incredible human life is many of you can resonate right my friends that is the power of god by which god worked so that you would come to know jesus christ he didn't just know that you would choose jesus he determined that you would choose jesus i could talk for a whole talk just about that but i need to turn that diamond around a bit as ephesians does we come to verse 5 where we are predestined to be adopted to be god's sons and daughters through jesus christ it is not a birthright that we have for we are born as people who are rebels from god we live in opposition to god and my experience as i talk to people is for the vast majority of us we look inside ourselves and we know that there's things we're deeply ashamed about and deeply embarrassed about and and we keep looking inside our hearts and looking inside our souls and we know that it comes back to us living as rebels from god from as far back as we can remember verse 5 is trying to help us understand the privilege we have as being adopted from being rebels to experiencing his grace and it's massive the more you think about it in the old testament you know people couldn't even look at god but then jesus he came into the world he lowered himself to come into the world and now we have the privilege of being adopted as his sons and as his daughters how extraordinary is that the grace of god is freely given it is not even partially deserved and sometimes i wonder as we're looking at this diamond of ephesians 1 i wonder if this is one of the hardest aspects for us to grasp because there is a growing view it seems to me that that we can think and we can fall into this that we are basically good right that humanity is basically good and so to realize and to fall before the cross and to think and to acknowledge that we have contributed absolutely nothing to our salvation it can be really challenging the bible helps us understand that we are rebels from god who so desperately need grace we have not been born as god's children but we have had the extraordinary privilege of being adopted in but i need to keep moving and shift that diamond around again as we come to verse seven here it spells out the blessing simply in him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins church redemption is not a common word these days you don't walk around in the street and you know were you redeemed yesterday or you you just don't use that word it goes back to the days of slavery when someone was a slave and someone else would come along and and by their freedom and the term used is they were redeemed when the bible here talks about what's happened to us with god we have been redeemed by the blood of christ we have been freed because of the blood of christ from being slaves and this is what this diamond is all about some of you will have noticed how many times in ephesians one of these first few verses it talks about christ by as the means by which the blessings come it talks about in christ and through christ in the one he loves through his blood we're only halfway through it's just going to keep going and friends as we're going through and perhaps even now i hope what's happening in your heart is you're realizing again or afresh first time perhaps that the things we regard as blessings in this world they really pale into insignificance when we fully understand what god has done for us as we realize that we have received every spiritual blessing in christ but we need to keep shifting that diamond around verse nine god has made the mystery of his will known and this operates certainly at a corporate level as as for us god has given us his word so that so that we can understand that jesus has come into this world but you know it also operates at an individual level the diamond of god's blessings it is not a diamond that we have stumbled across by our own means let me put it like this if you know jesus christ as your lord and savior you only know jesus as your lord and savior because god has determined that you would know jesus christ as lord and savior i had a well a number of wonderful meetings with some paul staff team recent days by the way it really is a wonderful staff team you know that right it's a great staff team and i well one meeting someone just made the observation it's one thing for someone to understand that jesus rose from the dead but it's another thing for that to impact their heart my friends that is what god needs to do maybe you're here this morning and you've realized just intellectually that you know jesus has died for you you know the blessings are there but there's something stopping you there's something stopping your heart embracing jesus christ for yourself what that is is you need that veil lifted from your heart and from your mind so that you might know that you are a rebel who has been saved by grace that's what i've called this series i'm going to keep playing on that term a little bit here in ephesians 1 that's where we start we're rebels who have been saved by grace as ephesians goes on we're going to see where rebels who have been transformed by grace and then as we come to the end of ephesians we're going to see where rebels who continue to stand in grace and as paul starts knowing that he is a rebel who has been saved by grace he cannot help himself there is this explosion of praise and it's all the more when you realize the purpose of god's creation it's not a resurgence of a gupta dynasty as wonderful as that might be the purpose of god's creation the destination of god's creation we're told in verse 10 it is to put to bring unity in all things in heaven and on earth unto christ the other day at our place there was a a plumber came to do some work we got talking about you know what i do and all of that kind of thing and in my line of work that's that's i like that because it's it gives me an opportunity to talk about what i do and he said to me raj that's great you know i feel for people that this world it's a good place but more people need to respect this world and do better in this world and had all of these thoughts going around my head my primary thought was maybe more things should go wrong in this house you know in for the plumber to keep coming back so we can keep talking oh hang on i went away and i came back into ephesians 1 and i thought to myself no that's not what the bible says the bible says this world is passing away this world verse 10 it says all things are going to come under the unity of christ when he returns that's the destination of this world and it might not look like it at this stage but the nations of this world will fall as all things are brought under the unity of jesus christ and paul he he goes through this he realizes this and that's what is the foundation for his outburst of praise and these last couple of verses they show us that these blessings they cannot be limited to intellectual truths or intellectual words but they are deeply personal in verse 11 paul says as he starts to realize how deeply personal they are for him he says in him we he's talking about himself at this stage we were also chosen having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will he has had the privilege of being among the first to be transformed by grace but you know very quickly he realizes as regularly said the other night so well it's not about him very quickly he realizes it's not about him for him it's a way then of directing praise to god who has been acting so intimately behind the scenes to do all that is necessary for salvation to be his and we come to verse 13 and i just find verse 13 breathtaking right here it's not just talking about the truths here it's not just talking about the apostle paul here it says and you and when it says you it's talking about us and it says and you were included in christ when you heard the message of truth the gospel of your salvation when you believed you were marked in him we for seal the promised holy spirit and my new friends at some pools i just i want to encourage us if you've come here today thinking what's raj going to say is the new senior minister um i'm saying the same message right this is what the bible teaches us the unchanging message of god teaches us and it goes way below the intellectual when you grasp the grace of jesus christ it changes everything we realize as we hear the message of truth that we too can be rebels who are saved by grace and i just want to say to you guys um today on my first day as you realize that one word wow that's what paul is realizing as he goes through that's why he has this explosion of praise to god he realizes the diamond of those blessings as he looks at the same thing in different ways he realizes that can all be his and i want to encourage you today if you're here if you're listening on the live stream or if you're listening at north rocks or somewhere else or during the week if you don't yet belong to jesus or if you're not sure if you belong to jesus i just want to encourage you these blessings they can be yours i at my former church there was a guy one day he he called me he said raj i have to come and see you i said sure looked out of time he came over said what is it mate i call him tony he came in i said tony what is everything okay he said oh raj yes everything's delightful i just needed to see you and i just needed to say to you i now understand that jesus died for me now i had mixed feelings about this for reasons i will explain but first i said to him oh tony tell me more about that and he said well i was doing the christianity explored course which is of course we had at our church here we have introducing god and there i was in a small group of people and the person who was running the course he just helped me understand that jesus died for me he helped me understand the blessings in the language i've been using he understood he was a rebel who has been saved by grace now why do i have mixed feelings because here's someone who was at church for decades ever since i was at that church and i thought this is true i just thought to myself oh tony i've been saying that message most weeks in most sermons and you haven't understood and it takes you to go to a course run by this person over here and then you understand and of course i knew that the way god so often works is that people at different times see things in different ways in different places where the time is right and maybe you're here this morning and maybe it's just i put it in a different way or maybe the lord's working in you or the circumstances in your life we've been reflecting on the last 12 months of floods and fires and covert and so on and maybe now is the right time for you to understand these blessings that god has poured out incredibly and i just want to say if that's you friends please do something about us please do something about it if you're thinking to yourself is god really speaking today i want to say hello here you are at a church and we're talking through the word of god we're preaching through the word of god god speaks through his word of course god's speaking to you today but for those of us who have had jesus as lord and savior for many years which i suspect is most of us in the weeks ahead in the months ahead and the years ahead we're going to talk more about reaching our area there's a profound responsibility we have as a church to do that but you know where ephesians 1 starts it's not quite there where ephesians 1 starts is this explosion of praise just sitting and pondering the blessings of god realizing that we have every spiritual blessing in jesus christ and it's a little bit like this my my illustration i hope this works some of you will remember when kathy freeman won in the 2000 olympics who remembers right i could have been there but i wasn't there i regretted my life but the story for another day but just that's not in my notes okay there she got up on the platform to receive her medal and do the lap of honor right and sometimes when athletes win gold medals like that they they take the praise and the glory and the achievement for themselves but other times in kathy freeman was like this she actually tried to defer it she had flags she ran around with not just the australian flag but the indigenous flag as well and she wanted to to shift people's natural attention to her onto something else and in ephesians chapter one it's a little bit like what paul is doing there's incredible blessings that he has been impacted by and that he will benefit from and yet continually as you go through the text what you see is it is to the praise of god's glory and grace the incredible achievement is being deferred into something else namely god and so i want to encourage we're going to have q a in a few moments and there's a text number on the screen you can send them to and so on but i just want to encourage to be deeply impacted by ephesians chapter one and what that means is not going and doing something necessarily what that means is sitting and pondering and maybe experiencing an explosion of praise to god yourself and that might be something that happens over for dinner table it might be something that happens in the quietness of you know as you go to bed tonight or tomorrow morning or in some other kind of context but my dear friends my new friends here at saint paul's this is the gospel through whom we have all of the blessings we can possibly ever want and he puts into perspective the things that we so often think are blessings in this world let's pray our god and father we thank you for sending jesus into the world we thank you that we can now have every spiritual blessing in christ we thank you that you have chosen us we thank you that you have predestined us we thank you that you have redeemed us through christ's blood that we have forgiveness that we have the riches of your grace that you have given us all wisdom and understanding that we know the mystery of your will according to your good pleasure and that we know that all things will end up under the unity of jesus christ and father we pray in jesus name amen verse 3 every spiritual blessing in christ verse 13 and you were also included when you heard the message of truth the gospel of salvation we go back a bit verse 12 in order that we we who were first to put our hope in christ so we belong to the day let's stand and [Music] sing we belong to the day to the day that is for the glory of the king is in our hearts on that day we will [Music] put on faith salvation in our eyes on that day [Music] right [Music] tomorrow [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] alone [Music] the son of god [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] the pride belongs to jesus [Music] let's take a seat opening up god's word with us today thank you thanks for opening up the word with us today we're coming to q a uh we've had one question come in today and it is a good one so let me can i just check check yeah how many questions you normally get come in uh for morning church probably one or two would be our norm yeah don't feel like this you know it doesn't mean anything it's i just thought there's only one question that must have been so clear and yes everything's so therefore there's that's what i should have said isn't it yeah super clear so thank you yeah well let me read the one question we have today because it is a good one and we're always grateful for your questions we love going deeper into the word so thank you to whoever texted this in ephesians 1 verse 3 states that we have been blessed in christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly in the heavenly places but not being in the heavenly places at present what does this mean for us regarding spiritual blessings that we have now living in a fallen and sinful world yeah that's a great question i don't know who put it in but thank you very much maybe someone who came from north rocks or here or i don't know where but or someone's lounge room or bedroom anyway um that term heavenly places with heavenly realms it also comes up bladder and ephesians and uh in fact in a few different places in the versions and um it's not talking about a future place it's talking about a current reality so my way of explaining it's a bit like this i hope this works for you um who's seen lord of the rings so you're not a second class citizen if you haven't by the way that just helps me understand it's on netflix at the moment so if you haven't jump on that it's interesting you know that i was watching anyway okay i watched it last week because for the first time 15 years great times and they're long movies you want leave as well is that what you said i gotta watch the hobbit next time um now in lord of the rings there is this ring there's this particular ring that the character frodo and others put on and when they put that ring on they see the same events that are happening before them in a different way now in a sense what they said what they're saying is a spiritual world a spiritual dimension to current events and so it enables them that just that concept now it's quite dark and so on in ephesians 1 and certainly not dark at all it's it's joyous and it's wonderful uh what that is doing is is we live in a very materialistic world at the moment and yet this is opening our eyes ephesians 1 and other parts of ephesians to what is happening at the same time in the heavenly places or the heavenly realms and so i just want to you know encourage us to think we might not see some of these blessings in a physical sense but in heavenly places in the heavenly realms in the spiritual places these are the very things that are happening so ephesians 1 in some ways it's a bit like putting on that ring and giving us a key to understanding these incredible blessings that are being talked about in a way that we may we may not often see in our physical world so we have it now how good is that what a great source for our praises yeah yeah thank you raj we really look forward to continuing to get new visions over the weeks to come thank you i'll jump back on to here as we head towards the end today a few things happening around church i want to let you know about the first is that obviously easter is coming up this coming friday is good friday easter is this fantastic time for us to remember and celebrate jesus death and his resurrection and something that we want to share with our community we don't want to keep that to ourselves so i'd love to encourage you to join us here on friday morning 9 15 for good friday and again on sunday for resurrection sunday 9 15 as always we would love your help in inviting our community to easter so if you head out the back afterwards you'll see those stacks of postcards together with a map targeting a particular street or two in our area we would love you to grab one of those bundles and and go out letterbox dropping yourself maybe sometime this afternoon it's looking like it could be a nice afternoon good day for a stroll because we want to invite our community to come and hear the life-changing message of jesus so please be there and please help us invite our community to easter the other thing to say is we have a bible reading plan to help you and your family prepare for easter yourselves and your hearts before god you can head to the church website and find that as well awesome awesome is our youth camp and it is going to be huge this year coming up on 15th the 18th of april we love this chance for our teenagers to get together and forge friendships and make memories and learn about jesus and what he's done for us so it's super exciting that we have over 135 youth registered for awesome so far we praise god for that just for some context two years ago we had 122 youth come along to awesome so it's wonderful that even after a hard year last year our teenagers are coming in droves to awesome that's fantastic we are just about full we've had to amend our booking to accommodate a surge in registrations which is a wonderful thing that we've been able to do also want to say thank you for those who have donated financial assistance to help families in need to get to awesome that's a wonderful way to be blessing our youth ministry here at church so we'd love you to be praying for the camp praying for the leaders as the final preparations happen it's a great chance for you to be spurred on to live for jesus so please keep awesome in your prayers got an announcement for the women of our church the equip women's conference is coming up on the 19th of june there's going to be more details in future but at this stage this is basically a save the date saturday the 19th of june to all the women we would love for you to put that date in your calendar great chance for the women of church to be sharpening each other and growing in the faith together so equip on june 19. another thing to say is that here at morning church for the last 12 months obviously in terms of our giving and financial support at church we haven't been taking cash donations through covert with handling money all those sorts of things from today cash giving is back at morning church so for many of us we support the work of church and the gospel beyond electronically and that's still the most helpful and convenient way from our point of view for us to do it so let me encourage you to keep being generous and supporting the work of the gospel that way but for those of you for whom electronic giving is difficult we understand that some of you are in that situation we have a box up the back so at the back of church by the doors there's a box there if you would like to give by cash you can put money in an envelope which is there labelled morning church i have one here as a demonstration there you go that's what it looks like if you haven't seen morning church in print before we'd love for you to take out that opportunity to be supporting the work of the gospel here at some polls we'd love you to take a moment to fill out our connect card as well we'll put the qr code up again uh again the connect card it's a great way for you to communicate with the staff team if there's something happening that you'd like us to pray for you can let us know that if you have questions or feedback or comments and if you're new here this is the way that you can let us know you were here and we'd love to find out that you're here for you to leave us a contact detail so we can get in touch and find out how we can support you help you get to know you i'll give you 20 seconds or so to fill in that connect card now and then to finish up one last time this morning we are going to sing let's stand and sing with joy one my heart [Music] [Music] and it drives away my fear there's a voice that calls me and it tells me [Music] in the [Music] yes i know that you are always [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] with [Music] i was lost but then you came and found me and in love you brought me home i was dead and sin but then you raised me i am [Music] [Music] my [Music] oh [Music] now [Music] i will follow you i will walk by faith you have brought me [Music] me [Music] i will be [Music] take a seat everyone what a joy it's been together together like this today to sing again to welcome our new senior minister to hear the word of our lord to remember the great blessings that we have been given in christ as we finish we're going to head out that way to spend some further time discussing and encouraging each other let me encourage you to stand up and head out that way as soon as you can we need to vacate the room to give chinese church a bit of time to set up they're coming in afterwards and cleaning happens here as well so feel free to have a chat for a while and then the aim is to move out that way pretty soon we're about to stay for well delos on the live stream as well so thank you for joining us and let us end with these words from the book of jude to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy to the only god our savior be glory majesty power and authority through jesus christ our lord before all ages now and forevermore amen god bless we'll see you next time thanks daniel thanks so much

Channel: St Paul's Anglican

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Length: 91min 30sec (5490 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 27 2021