The Friendship Table (without the table!) with Hanna Hobbs & Friends | Hillsong Church Online

[Music] okay good morning everybody and welcome to the sisterhood friendship table we are so glad that you are joining us here this morning i'm happy to be here it's going to be a great time together i hope you're well just in case we've never met before my name is hannah and i am one of the pastors on team here at hillsong church and like i said i'm just happy to be here at the friendship table this morning it's gonna be great um i'm also very thrilled to be in the company of some great women this morning you might be able to see their faces already but first of all i would like to introduce to you the fabulous hospitable thoughtful encouraging kind belinda singh belle are you there hello good morning good morning it's so good to see you i love seeing you always my friend and next we have this is i'm really interested i hope you guys are too the next we have the hilarious authentic hearty compassionate and entirely endearing mel wade mel i'm like wait is it is it me or dee no it's me yeah it's you how are you guys i'm good i'm really good it's nice to be here and be with you lovely ladies so good i'm so happy to see you and last but certainly not not least you're going to enjoy this one girls sometimes angelic always mischievous worship warrior herself people's pastor i'm down blondie how are you today i am so good so good what an honor it is to be at this table today with all well these amazing women especially the one in the green dress i don't know about you i personally am feeling like today is going to be trouble how do you feel it's certainly going to be trouble i don't think i think you're very brave putting us all around the same table brave again for anyone who's jumping on even just now um we're happy to have you here at the friendship table this morning it's going to be a great morning and again my name is hannah and we're going to have a great time today it's very exciting um so first of all before we launch into our topic today i want to give a special shout out to the mother dove and girls i've been doing some art and craft at home proud i'm proud of you hannah well done pastor bobby i hope you're watching right now maybe this is a sign that i have too much time on my hands i don't know i need this wow is that a fan it's not like it's like a bobby like i love it i also have another one do you want to see it yeah please bobby hannah your craft skills are amazing maybe next level neck level i'm going to hold this up and just give a shout out to pastor bobby i hope we love you pastor bobby we love you sends her love this morning to all the girls who are joining in and um i i was thinking about this maybe i'll take this down because i'm going to try and be serious and then [Laughter] but um i was thinking this morning like this series we've been doing as a sisterhood is about the fruits of the spirit and i think for sure it's fair to say without any kind of exaggeration that bobby kind of exudes and exemplifies someone who walks in and displays the fruits of the spirit she is loving and patient and kind and generous and all of those things so bobby we just wanted to say hi and also we love you and can't wait to see you again soon so there you go one more time and let's just hold this up again how good does she look with the glitter background yeah it's already good but the glitter glitter it's perfect game changer okay so girls today we have been charged with the mission of tackling this topic the fruit of faithfulness and um we've all been chatting i guess over the last few days but our angle this morning is um to specifically even zone in on uh faithfulness towards the future what does it look like to be faithful towards the things that are yet to come and um i was just thinking this morning it's no secret that the last two years have presented some significant challenges for everyone across the planet and um somehow it's funny i was just thinking today i just thought of this somehow in the midst of the last two years i developed this little habit i don't know when it started but whenever i'm on the phone with people particularly if we're having maybe a conversation about something that someone's trying to overcome or i'm being honest about something that i'm going through we'll finish the conversation and i find myself saying okay like i'm ending the call okay well we press on we press again we say bye and go i was thinking about that just going you know um when it comes to the fruits of the spirit and specifically talking about faithfulness i think it is that ability within all of us to want to press on and press on into the new thing that's still ahead so galatians 5 22 the fruits of the spirit scripture it says this but the fruit of the spirit is love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness that's us and self-control and against such things there is no law um so i just thought for a couple of minutes before we talk together as a group just to encourage you guys around this thought of faithfulness for a second so um what we see here is the bible teaches us that when we live god's way there will be like evidence that starts to appear in our lives the method translation says this and i think this is kind of cool much the same way that fruit appears on an orchard there will start to be noticeable changes in our lives that happen when we walk in step with the holy spirit and so today we're going to zone in on that faithfulness thing specifically and i wanted to think about faithfulness just for one second because i don't know about you or you girls either but um sometimes this is a weird thing to say maybe but for me growing up it's not henna it's not well okay i'm just being honest growing up in youth ministry in church every now and then someone would call people out and speak a word of encouragement or a word of knowledge a prophetic word over people and any time uh that happened to me and someone said you know what hannah you're just faithful i would be like oh like i was kind of hoping for something more exciting than faithful yeah yeah so i want to dig into that today because i don't know i suspect for a lot of people it's not necessarily the most exciting work hey you're so faithful it doesn't necessarily make us us go yes that's so exciting but i want to talk about faithfulness and kind of like flesh it out a little more for a second so um when i think about faithfulness and what the bible teaches faithfulness is about these things so have a listen to this faithfulness is about trust and loyalty ultimately towards god which is so wonderful faithfulness is course correcting our tendency as humans to be unfaithful i don't know what it is something in our flesh nature we have a tendency to drift away from god and be unfaithful and it's our ability to course correct that tendency and bring it back to being faithful towards god um faithfulness is about listening to his voice and following him um it's about obedience and assurance in who god is and what he's yet to do i think it's clear obviously that within even just the word faithfulness we can see that the word faith is there and um i think it's worth mentioning this morning that faithfulness it actually does require faith it requires faith and it requires us to believe and walk and trust in god even when we can't see it yet so it's not just the word we used to describe someone who's done something for a really long time or even just someone who's stuck it out i think faithfulness is a word we use to describe a person who is loyal a person who's focused and unwavering in their faith um a person who's obedient towards god who is the type of person that takes a second to listen for his voice and then to act on it and walk it out i think faithfulness is is uh the sign of a person who's a lover a lover of god and constantly committing to keeping their hearts soft and in that open not mushy state that's the wrong thing but like a person who is constantly cultivating their love for god and i think ultimately faithfulness is um the kind of person who is growing to become more like god who is entirely faithful and i think it's worth mentioning that today as well that i'm so good under all of that we're not just trying to zone in on hey this is how you become a faithful person but actually we serve a god who is entirely faithful there's not an ounce of his being that is unfaithful to us and there's so many scriptures that teach us about that like the god who will never forsake us i've been reading recently the story of hosea and gomer and that picture a faithful husband who chases down his bride even to the point where she's deep in the depths of sin and returning to her and his of her is just relentless and i think that is um just an incredible reminder that today even if you don't feel like a faithful person the good news is um you know we serve a god who is completely faithful so there's my little girl to kick us off and thank you yeah one thing i if if you know me a little bit you would know that i'm i've got like a slight faith face time addiction i think i just yep facetime people and one of those people that i love to facetime whether she loves it or not i don't i don't know but it's stevie at all hours sorry sorry date in front of everyone sorry but d you know one of the things i love about anytime we get to talk is we always have a laugh and we catch up but i i don't know whether you realize this but you always manage to just kind of share something that god has been speaking to you about and over the last couple of weeks um you've been talking a lot about that scripture in isaiah that says behold i'm doing a new thing but you had a fresh take on it can you talk a bit about that this morning sure thanks hannah um as i it's in isaiah 43 19 but it's the verse before in verse 18 it says forget the former things do not dwell on the past so what's uh i feel like god's been challenging me you know it's almost this thing of okay what do i need to change what do i need to do in order to get ready for the new thing you know what do i need to do in order to get ready for the new one that's the biggest i feel like god's been challenging me on that so forget the form of things do not dwell on the past it doesn't say don't forget the past it just says do not dwell on the past very powerful because it's interesting that scripture like we often hear people say behold like god says to us behold he's doing a new thing but we do kind of tend to overlook that part that says like so don't dwell on the old like leaning to the new um but dee i mean us obviously so loved such a loved part of our church and um i think one of the qualities that people would know you for and something that stands out obviously about you is like your relentless commitment to what god is doing in his house and um just showing up time and time again or like through a bunch of different seasons it's looked really different over the years um so if you were to encourage people today like how do we stop dwelling on the way things were or getting stuck in that old way of thinking and faithful kind of towards the future and what god is doing next do you have any thoughts yeah i have um i think one of the biggest things is thought patterns changing your thought patterns i feel like too many of us allow the enemy to camp like literally camp in our minds and because our minds just one of the strongest things when you think about it our imagination our thoughts you know um so i remember one thing pastor rob preached years ago he said with every thought there's an emotion attached to it you know out of that whole sentiment that's the one thing i remember so be mindful of that like and just remember with every thought there's an emotion attached to it i feel like moving forward one of the things i like to do is every day remind myself of god's faithfulness i feel like when you start from there just every day remind yourself of god's faithfulness um and then the second thing i would say is be grateful gratitude man i'm telling you it'll definitely um help you move forward um and i think it also opens up enlarges you as well you know um and i think the third thing is stay expectant you know like ex for me every day i expect god to speak to me i expect to be a blessing in some way shape or form so yeah but i think just off the top of my head remind yourself of god's faithfulness be grateful and stay expectant yeah beautiful good love it's so good and like i don't know it was just coming to mind then as you were saying that like take those tips on and try to outwork them in your life because i mean for you dee obviously for those who don't know you're a worship leader in our church and i've seen you walk into rooms um with thousands and thousands of people and lead that and like lead us into an atmosphere of faith and i've also seen you walk into smaller rooms and do the very same thing and i want to encourage everyone who's joining in today like uh sometimes we do need to like this sounds a bit random but like interrupt the atmosphere of our lives we can just fall into this like this is how it is or whatever and i think what you're saying dee gratitude and expectancy if you stir that up it's going to help you walk faithfully into your future with this kind of lifted bar of faith and what god do yes beautiful so can i can i say one thing i remember this is something that pastor brian one of the very first things i heard him say when i um transitioned to hillsong church when you're faithful with what god has placed in your hands he will fulfill what's in your heart yeah just the thought i'd like to share yeah and that's why we call her the people's pastoring okay that was so fun we've been talking a bit over the last day or so and um i guess the thing um that i was hoping that you could speak into belinda is um i i guess i shared this scripture with you but hebrews 11 verse 1 says faith is being sure of what we hope for and being certain of what we do not see yeah quite a confusing scripture if you think about it but it's not confusing at the same time and so i guess what i'm thinking about is um there are people on the call on the call joining in with us today um and they're faithful people but they're not seeing a lot of i guess evidence of their heart's desire around them perhaps their circumstances don't look like the dream of their heart just yet and so i guess i was wondering if you bell could just encourage people this morning how do we press on and continue in faithfulness when it doesn't there's not a lot of evidence around us to see it's things are changing and the tide is turning i love like i just am so um honored to be able to just share today but i think when hannah reached out to me and um shared that faithfulness was the topic of what we talked about i was just so excited because the reality is for me this is the overarching testimony of my life and it's not that my life has been perfect um it's not that my life has um i i don't know anything but you know i turned 50 in november last year and i um he also just turned 50 as well you know the one thing that i can declare having lived half my life now is that god is so so good and has been so so faithful in my life and i have time and time again been shown by him faithfulness miraculous ways i've seen him work in areas of my life that i would never have anticipated in my childhood there were aspects of it that were so incredibly beautiful and perfect i grew up on a farm in country new south wales and for me that was just you know the dream childhood there were also parts of my childhood that were birthed in trauma and i have spent years and as an adult working through those things and so gently over years and time and faithfully god has delved deep into my life and peeled the layers away and faithfully restored me to a place that at 50 years old i can declare that i am the freest and the happiest and the most content that i have ever been in my life i am not perfect my life is not perfect but again time and time again um you know as a little girl on that farm and as a young teenager growing up on that farm and and coming into encounter with god you know he breathed um dreams into my heart back then and wristers in my you know ears back then that did not make sense to me at all because i was literally a teenage girl living on a big farm outside of a tiny country town and none of what i was seeing in my heart then made sense later i am living in a place that i am humbled by because i look back and i go these are the things that he sewed into my heart back then and that i could not see and i think we unders you know misunderstand um the power of time as christians and um and yet it's reflected time and time again in the bible you know it was time that took jesus from you know the baby that he was you know as he entered the earth to when he started ministry it was time when you think about the journey of joseph and all and everybody in the bible it was about time and faithfulness i think um to me speaks of time it speaks of trusting and expanding but it speaks of time and you know i um went through a marriage that subsequently ended in divorce and in time um and simply by standing and trusting and not perfectly i have seen god be so faithful in my life and restoring the brokenness that came as a result of that and then also bringing you know a beautiful husband into my life i have two incredible teenage children who because of some of the hurt in their childhood i've watched them really struggle as teenagers and i am now starting to see with time and god's mindfulness and according to his promises i'm starting to see them journey through that and lie and flourish again it's a mix of trusting and standing but it's also mixed in with the power of time god is who god is i have learned in my time that god is god and i come back to that every single time when i don't understand things when circumstances are swirling around me that don't make sense i know the one true thing in my life is that god is god and that god's ways are perfect god's ways are not my ways god's timing is not my timing but god's ways are perfect and god is faithful to his prayer um you know i had um in my 50 years i had three miscarriages and lost three babies and they were all devastating experiences to me and i was thinking about that recently because i've had an example just recently where i've looked back you know in the midst of that great great loss um and confusion and anger and times i really question god um you know and i've had some dark seasons in my life where it was really an effort to stand and in fact i would say that if it wasn't for my friends i wasn't really standing on my own held up my friends but god has been so so faithful and i look back now even miraculously how he restores he promises that he will restore and the bible is filled with god's promises and then individually he whispers incredible promises into our lives and whilst we may not see them in seasons and we may not you know see what we're hoping for in the moments that we want them i can testify that god he is so faithful amen and it will come to pass there are things in my life that i dreamt back as a teenager that still haven't come to pass and i dare to believe that in my lifetime because i am only halfway through this magnificent crazy life that these things will still come to pass and it may not be the way i see or in the time that i see but i know my god is faithful and um my great passion so good and also um thanks for sharing today i feel like um you know every time you kind of open up and speak faith over people it comes with such a weight and power and it's such such an authentic thing and i want to just bring an encouragement just off the back of belinda's few minutes there and say you know if you are carrying a heavy heart this morning you're you're joining in on this and watching and you are disheartened or you know the bible talks about hope deferred can make the heart sick but if you resonate with that today um you know we'd just love to pray a quick prayer review bell will you pray a quick prayer over the girls too beautiful that's that's me today just something yeah i just really feel the holy spirit is here amen i just father god i lift up every woman every sister wherever she is in the world right now and lord i lift her up to you i lift her dreams father god her hope he use her hurts lord i lift her circumstances her families her relationships her career every single aspect of her life father god her health lord jesus you know who she is intimately and right now i sense that you are holding her in the palm of your hand father god with the perfect plan for her life and father god i hear you saying that you have it all under control that she can rest father god knowing that your timing is perfect that you have her lord i thank you jesus that right now you will envelop her comfort with your peace father god that you would bring rest to her heart and her mind that she would just be able to surrender knowing that you father god are our father our great great lover our great nurturer counselor father god does only in and may the testimony of her life be the declaration of your great faithfulness over every single area in jesus name amen amen amen okay mel hi hi this is so fun all right so um mel i shared this little quote with you i'm going to read it out um yeah this book let me find it here um it's called the relentless tenderness of jesus i don't know if you can see that oh no no no [Laughter] i found it tricky times here anyway um and i want to read this out and then ask you a question mel but um i this is the quote from brennan manning it says the next time you are tempted to doubt god's faithfulness write your own psalm of thanksgiving remember when he rescued you from darkness and turned your darkness into light um and i kind of i love that remembering remembering the faithfulness of god and so i guess for you mel um how do we keep doing that how do we keep remembering his faithfulness yeah you know i'm sure you've got many stories of the faithfulness of god in your life but how do we keep it at the front of our mind yeah i mean when you sent me that quote i just the first thing that came to my mind was that songwriters by faithfulness morning by morning new mercies i see and um i started singing it out loud and so did belinda she obviously sang to the whole family every single day so she told us earlier everyone off with a song at the end of this yeah we might just sing a song but um yeah i'm just i'm looking at these of them just reading the verse okay but it says um the steadfast love of the lord never ceases his mercies never come to an end they are new every morning great is your faithfulness and um i was out walking i i go walking every morning and i was out walking this morning and i was just like you know you have kind of thoughts about what i wanted to share but i just felt like god said to me about this about how his mercies are new every morning the way that we can trust that god is faithful and that we can keep it in the forefront of our mind and that we you know i feel like right now there's a lot of doubt over whether god is faithful or not but just like the sun rises every single day and it goes down every single day that's how faithful he is it doesn't matter what you do i can go outside and scream at the sky i can yell scream like go bananas and say don't you dare rise again tomorrow it's still gonna the sun's still gonna rise even the sun even rises when uh it's it's cloudy there's smoke we can't see it's raining it's a horrible day guess what the sun's still rising you just can't see it and i feel like that's the same with god's faithfulness for us and that sometimes right and and you know the world's a little crazy right now we all kind of know that and it's like actually guys if you ever feel like you are doubting god's faithfulness and who he is well then just go outside and look at the sky and just know that the sun rises and it goes down and if ever that stops happening then get back to me but that's how facebook but that's how facebook is but um i'll just have a little look um yeah like there's nothing that any of us can do no human on earth can change the sun going up and the sun going down and that is exactly the same as god's faithfulness towards us and it also says in the bible that he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins yeah and and forgive us of everything and i feel like that's something for some women out there today is that just like the sun goes up and the sun goes down he is that faithful to forgive us it doesn't matter what you've done where you've been you know the the smoke haze in your life or the rain that's pouring in your heart or whatever is going on he's faithful he is faithful he is faithful he is faithful and he will carry you and he'll be with you and he is never going to forsake you or leave you no you may not see the sun every day but the sun's still there you know what i mean it's like no you may not see the moon at night sometimes but the moon's still there and i think i know it's a really kind of simple thought but i just thought that's how faithful god is and for me yeah you know like belinda and andy all of us have had different things in our lives stuff's gone on whatever but the sun's still come up yeah this is still new every morning every morning i wake up it's new it doesn't matter what happened the day before like dc is leaving the path behind it's new it's a promise and we need to grab hold of that promise and believe that god is with you and never will forsake you just like the sun will always rise and the moon will and the dark and yeah that's my kind of thought for the day guys um yeah it's really really good i feel like that again is just an encouragement to a whole bunch of people today yeah and um you know i said if we kind of ran on time maybe we could just do this one little extra thing but i and we're going okay for time so we're done um but i was just thinking just kind of quickly as we start to wrap things up um you know for me personally if someone were to say to me like what's one story in your life or memory that you have that reminds you of god's faithfulness or what makes you think of him um the first thing that came to my mind was you know i remember i made a decision to follow jesus at 13 and it all became my whole world went from black and white to color you know um and i remember reading the scripture about you know david would play his heart before saul and the evil spirits would leave the room or whatever and i used to take my guitar because i play guitar and i would sit in my parents backyard and just play for hours and hours and i remember as a young teenager like sensing um just the presence of god the presence of god and um just feeling him around me feeling his presence and being aware that god was with me and i can honestly say that exact same experience of his presence is something i still experience now it's the same thing i when i'm i'm now a wife and a mother of two uh little people little people children anyway um but i still sense it it looks so different now sometimes it's in the car and we're driving and i'm talking to my kids but i sense the presence of god no sense faithfulness you know and um do you guys have a specific memory that comes to mind i don't know mel yeah i mean for me i i was thinking about my children and just some little things that have happened with them of recent days and just how i have to keep trusting that god is faithful and just recently my son had to go to hospital and we were so both of us were a little bit nervous because we had to go in the middle of the night he was in a lot of pain and i was just worried that the hospital is going to be full you know there's covered whatever and i just had a little prayer in my heart on the way saying god please just don't make it scary or lots of people or whatever and um i just felt i remember thinking i remember like with midnight it's dark you know me and cena driving and i remember thinking god just hear and go go just trust me i'm faithful i got it i got you we got to the hospital there's no one in an emergency the nurses were beautiful the doctors was great and then we were there for quite a long time and then one of our old friends um was there and two good news there who i didn't know and came in and made us feel comfortable and and the thing is i just thought even in the small things it doesn't need to be great massive like it was just this little moment for me and my son and we're a bit nervous and but god just prepared away he just made it great and i feel like i know that's kind of a bit obscure to faithfulness but i feel like this is the thing god is faithful in so many areas of our lives like so many you know there's just i feel like there's so many examples i could tell but it's just he's just always there he's always faithful to take steps for us to go before us to be with us to you know make it great safe for us so i love it yeah beautiful we only have a couple minutes but bella do you have a memory that comes to mind i i think um uh you know in expanding on what i just shared about miscarriages um you know for me in that season it was obviously incredibly heartbreaking and um and then last year i i lost a girlfriend very suddenly um and unexpectedly and she was uh literally 10 days older than myself and a beautiful mom and uh so we've taken on board her two children one's actually a 30 year old so he's not really a child but 16 year old daughter but that they're referring to me as mum now and the 16 year old lives with us and you know the amazing thing and all of that we didn't expect that experience at all and it was devastating shocking and you know we've had to navigate some crazy days but i had a moment recently where i went gosh god you know i've got these two incredible children i've got these three beautiful babies that i know are being kept and cared for you know magnificently in heaven but you've expanded my family and i feel like um you know whilst the circumstances aren't ideal i feel like it was a way of honoring the loss that i had with my baby's dog terry when i think about it but just even in that i go oh faithfulness yeah that was a scripture that i wanted to share earlier and just didn't but um you know to timothy 2 13 which is just so beautiful and so god in the way that he is just so incredibly gentle and caring towards us he says but even when we are faithless he is faithful we don't have faith he will still be full of faith that he never and i think that's the overriding promise again of god towards each of us is that he in the gaps where we can't be faithful the way that we believe that we should or need to we don't have to because he carries that gap for us and he will continue to exemplify and be faithful in our lives so good i also just thought you know like if there's anyone joining in and kind of listening in today and we're talking pretty comfortably about god and and him in our lives but if you're if you're listening in and you feel like you know your heart is distant from god or maybe it's even that you've never made that personal decision to accept jesus into your heart as lord of your life um i'd love to pray for you this morning if your heart is kind of feeling that sense of you know what i want this kind of faith i want this kind of confidence and personal relationship with jesus the good news is you can have it today and lead you in a prayer together we can do that right now and um so if that's you today i just want to encourage you close your eyes and i'm going to pray a prayer the girls on the call here are going to repeat it after me but if you're watching on you do the same let's pray this prayer together and um you know we'll leave you in this prayer towards giving your heart to jesus so let's pray this prayer and dear jesus jesus thank you that you died for us on the cross thank you that you died for us so that we could have new life and know you personally so that we can have a new life and know you personally and we commit our hearts to you today in jesus name and we commit our heart here today in jesus name amen amen amen so if that was you and you pray that prayer for the first time today we want to say a massive congratulations and um you can even just put your hands up in the chat and say i prayed that prayer and one of our teams will see you and connect with you and help you get your hands on a bible and you know just step you through the next steps of what it means to walk out a relationship with god and um okay girls i think we're like kind of getting towards the end of this what do you think did we do good i think you're glorious hannah yeah welcome man i think some of us needed a timer this morning was that me no belinda you were awesome thank you [Applause] underneath it all there's a lot of love but girls i've got to say um you know i feel like the the ladies need a song this morning we need to go out with a bang watch this song come on do you see it facing me my day [Music] great well look i hope that was a blessing to all of you guys today it certainly blessed me um we love you happy happy sisterhood friendship table over and out love you guys thank you thank you belinda see you [Music] have later

Channel: Hillsong Church

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Keywords: bobbie and friends, church, hillsong, jesus, live, online, praise, sisterhood, the friendship table, worship

Id: niyHskeWx18

Length: 42min 7sec (2527 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 15 2021