7th July 2024 - Communion Service

We start a new theme in July. We're looking at the unseen. There's

a lot of stuff. The Bible talks about things that we do not see.

In fact, my last scripture of what I want to share this morning,

very clearly speaks about hope and faith. Let me pray, Lord,

as we gather around your word, Father, I pray that Lord, we'd

hear fresh from your Father. I pray that every one of us, those

are listening now, those listening later, those in the room, every one

of us would get some a download from heaven. Father. We pray for

impartation of your word, not just a hearing of your word, but in

receiving and a planting of your word in our hearts. In Jesus' name,

Amen, do you know there's an unseen world? Now? We have a

pond in our back garden and it has fisher it. And do you know

what happens if you've got a pond with fish in it. There's a heron

that will come and try and feed in your garden. So we put up

from time to time, or Junior puts up very strings across the pond to

try and distract the hell of discourage the heron from coming now the heron cannot

see them. It comes down and then feel something touched its legs or its

wings, and it flies off again. There is something, you know.

There are different spectrums, there are different things that we can see. If

I take my glasses off, I will walk into things because I can't quite

see. So when I'm talking about the unseen, I'm talking about things we

don't focus on. You know, when our focus is clear, we see

something clearly. You wake up first thing in the morning, your eyes are

full of sleepy dust. Oh what's that? You know? But I also

want to believe and declare that it's not just about a natural thing. It's

about a supernatural thing. Because there is also a dimension that we don't talk

about other enough, which is there is a spiritual dimension to life. You

and I are men and women of body, mind and spirits. I've had

the privilege over many years of sitting with people who are dying. And I

remember sitting in St. Peter's Hospital many many years ago with a lady called

Almah, and she was in the hospital bed. Her children were with her,

and I had the privilege to visit, and they said that she's not

got locked. And some we got to pray together. We got to pray

with her. She was semi conscious. She opened up her eyes as we

prayed, and I was standing at the foot of the bed, and she

looked at me, and then she clearly did not look at me. She

looked over my shoulder, and this beautiful smile appeared on our face. It

was nothing to do with me. I'm sure she wasn't looking at me.

She was so focused. She was looking up here, and there was this

beautiful smile upon her face. Right, she just glowed and she went,

do you know what. To this day, I still believe Jesus was standing

behind me and saying, Alma, come be with me, you know.

And it wasn't just how body stopped. The spirit left. You know that

the smile disappeared immediately, the glode disappeared immediately. You know, we are

spiritual beings, and we are spiritual beings because God wants to connect with us

body, mind and spirit. Paul went through quite a lot, he wrote

in Two Korean Pens, Chapter four. He wrote, this, therefore,

do not lose heart. Outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is

being renewed day by day for our light affliction which is but for a moment

for us, far more exceeding and external weight of glory. Whilst we do

not look at these things which are seen, but are the things that are

not seen. For the things that are seen are temporary, but the things

that are not seen are eternal. Now, pauls a man of the world.

It's been a nasty guy, and then he came to faith and he

went through a lot of persecution, a lot of persecution. We'll look at

some of the things that he went through in the moment. But here he's

saying, do not lose heart. Church, those who are listening, do

not lose heart. Despite what you're going through. Do not lose heart.

Do not give up. God is able to do immeasurably more than we ask

or imagine. So even though the outward man is perishing, anybody got a

perishing body are? They're things that you you can't do now that you used

to be able to do when you were younger. You know, I had

the privilege of being on the beach this week. I love building sand castles.

Julia would tell you, I'm a sand castle fanatic. If there's a

child there, I will build a sand castle and you know Jay very wise.

He said, you're not as young as you use She was right,

you know, otherwise I would have just moved a ton of sand, and

then the next day I would have been because the outward man is perishing.

Yes, God, it encourages us. It's a temple of the Holy Spirit,

so let's look after it. But do you know what I still feel

twenty twenty five, thirty thirty five, I don't know. Somewhere in that

region inside I still feel like that. I feel like I can do things.

And that's because the inner man is being renewed. Do you know what

if you are tired on the outside, God can carry you through. If

you've had a dreadful week, as cherry And was talking about, God can

carry you through. One of the greatest testimonies that we can have is to

live out our lives with our eyes focused on God. Sometimes if your test

if your life us a question and somebody says, how can you be so

happy in the midst of these circumstances? How can you be joyful? How

can you be peaceful? What my answer is because of Him, I said,

I'm not looking at this, I'm not looking at the circumstances around me.

I'm looking beyond them because okay, stuff comes, things happen, but

I do not lose heart for our les. Affliction is but a moment,

you know. The troubles and worries that come, they can pass. And

it's amazing how we focus on the little blips of discouragement and we forget about

the big blips often of encourage normal normality. I hope and pray that everybody

who's listening today can say this week that you've been naturally supernatural, that we've

worked in the spirit despite the natural things. So we do not look on

the things that are seen, but the things that are unseen. For those

that are unseen, those that are seen or perish. Now, let's have

a little look at the kind of troubles that Paul was in in Two Corinthians,

chapter eleven, verses twenty four to twenty seven. From the Jews.

Five times I received forty stripes around as one stripes whipping not nice thirty nine

times. Three times I was beaten with rods. Anybody want to sign up

for this? Once I was stoned three times, I was shit wrecked,

not just one. Three times. I wouldn't want to get on a ship

before, if I'm monased with you, and night and a day, I

have been in the deep journeys, in journeys often in perils of waters,

in perils of robbers, in perils of my countrymen, in perils of the

gentiles, in perils of the city, in perils of the wilderness, in

the perils in the sea, in the perils amongst false breadthren, in weariness

and toil, in sleeplessness, often in hunger and thirst, in fast things,

often in cold and nakedness. Boy, what a list? Anybody wants

to sign up for this? And what is he saying to us even though

the outward man is perishing? This is in the exact This comes in the

same chapter he talks about taking communion in exactly the same part of the letter

he wrote about communion and all these things. He's saying, press in despite

all this stuff, I'm pressing on. I'm pressing in in weariness and toil,

sleeplessness, often hunger and thirst. How many times have you or I

that I'm a bit hungry. I can't do anything because I'm hungry. Now,

there are times when I no doubt you have had some need come to

you. A person a phone call, something happened, and your natural response

is please not now. Can't you see I've had a busy week. Don't

you know my pockets are empty, that my bank account's only got this much

in it, and you're asking me for more? Do you know what?

I think? The Father is looking for hands that are ready to serve him,

and he's looking at hearts that are ready to give. I sense for

us as a church. I know we're meeting in here and we will meet

somewhere else at some point later on this year. We're working on that at

the moment. But do you know what I said? God's going to stop

giving stuff to us. He's going to stop giving. And sometimes he's saying,

are your hands ready? Yeah? If our hands are full of stuff?

I hadn't thought about what I just shared. I'm now tying it into

what I'm sharing now. What are your hands full of? What are your

hands holding? If your hands are full of stuff, then God can't give

us something else now. For I know this will be culturally a bit left

of field, But there used to be a TV program on at five o'clock

on a Friday night children's program called Crackerjack. Anybody remember it, Jill,

will you remember it, Robi, you remember it? Other people you'd probably

never seen. It's a children's program and it was a fun type of program.

And one of the games they played was called Cabbages and Kids. And

the reason it was called Cabbages and Kings was they got asked a question.

If they got the question right, they got given a prize, a game

or something nice. They got the question wrong, they got given a cabbage.

Now when you think about a little child and they're standing on this box

and they got asked the question, Oh wow, I've got a game boy.

Great, they're holding the game boy and then they go a question wrong.

Now they get given a cabbage. Now they've got to hold a box

and a cabbage greatly. Cabbages. Think about cabbages. They're round, they

don't stack up nicely. Then they get another question. Right, Now they've

got a box and a cabbage and another box, and if they drop it,

they lose everything. And so they asked the question. You word asked

do you want another question? And they're thinking, well, I want to

win more. You know, there were many times when there were children with

a box and a cabbage, and then another cabbage and then another box.

So they got two things, but they want three things. And what are

their hands full of? Cabbages? Full of stuff? Full of stuff that's

no good. I just want to ask us what are our hands full of

today? Are there things we need to put down? Are there things that

we're doing that somebody else should be doing? Because do you know what?

Sometimes, and I believe it's maybe true about me, there are some people

who look at something and saying, well, I could do that, but

Dave's doing it, so I don't need to do it. I want to

encourage you. If you've got a place to serve, a gift, you've

got offer it and let's see what happens. Let's see what God will do.

Do you know what? Because actually, if I and I'm just using

myself as an example, if I'm doing something just because I'm doing it because

I want to serve, and there's somebody else who's sitting in the wings saying,

well, I'd love to do that, but Dat's doing it. Just

think about it. If that person comes, oh great, they'll do it

better than me. Great, fantastic. But that phrased you and me up

to do the other thing that's in our heart to do, because we can't

take a new thing when our hands are full of an old thing. Working

with the unseen? What is God seeing in you? What does God want

to show you and me? God wants to show us opportunity. I'll give

you a couple of examples that happened in the last twenty four hours. I

had a message saying, does anybody have a use of a printer? You

know? I felt I should should say yes. I thought I had where

it might land. It didn't land there, but I'd now have a printer.

I wanted to give it away. I don't want to hold it.

I said, I've got it because someone needs it. So if someone in

the room, someone listening online needs a laser printer, I want to give

it away as quickly as possible. Somebody messaged to me this morning and said,

you know anybody who needs a grand piano. I'm not joking. I'm

not joking, you know. And they said, my husband was a beautiful

musician. We'd like to give it to a church or to somebody who appreciate

a grand band. I'll be honest with you. You know you need to

have a big house to have a grand Yeah. My singing teacher when I

was younger, his front room was just the grand piano in a space to

stand and that was it. You know that that took up the whole of

the front room. All I'm saying is just using it as an example.

I sense God's going to bring stuff to us, and it's not for us

the horde, it's not for us the whole hold on to. It's for

us to give away. And I then sense God's stirring us to be a

generous people. I see generosity in our midst. I see people being generous

in so many ways. So I want to say to you, please,

if you're God's encouraging you to be generous, be generous. It's a counter

currency to the kingdom. It's a currency of the Kingdom, so it's a

countercurrency to the world generosity. People say, why are you doing this,

Well, just because I want to bless you. You know, we're on

Magna car today. Just a few weeks ago, we were giving out seeds

and some people say, why are you giving out seeds. Well, we're

getting out seeds because we want to plant seeds of hope. Well can I

give you some money, Well, you can make a donation if you want,

but there is no transaction here that requires that you give us any money,

because we just want to bless you. Claim who's our who's our apostolic

oversight? He talked about something that happened in his church a few years ago.

Now, somebody in their church worked for a choplu company and he got

given a palette of chocolate, a palette of chocolate bums, and he was

asked, do you know anybody who could use this? And he went,

yeah, I do, And so he gave a palette of chocolate to the

church and the church said, what are we going to do with this?

He said, we could sell it, yes, but why is the father

giving us a palette for the choplate. They used to regularly do car washing.

The young people in the church regularly used to do car washing outside the

church in the parking lot. They'd have a big sign up saying come in

get your car washed. And it was about fundraising, fundraising for the young

people. They asked the young people, what would you like to do with

this choplers. You know what the young people said said, we'd like to

give it away. Now here's the thing most people don't understand. A free

gift if I try and give, if you try and give stuff away for

free on the If we stood on the high street and said free chocolate bars,

some people would take them, but other people would go, what's what's

the trick? What's the com So what happened was they put a sign outside

the church saying car wash five dollars, and so everybody pulled up. They

were cars were getting washed, the young people washing cars, and as they

left they were given the chop. They paid their five dollars and they were

given a chocolate bar. But here's the thing. On the back of the

chocolate bar was five dollars, so it had cost them nothing and they've just

given away a chocolate bar. Do you know what? There were people who

drove out of the car wash, drove down the road, pulled up against

the side of it, turned around and said, you made a mistake.

There's five dollars to attached this. Let me give it back. No,

no, no, no, it's yours. And they were completely confused by

this generosity, said, you've watched our car for free, and you're giving

us a chocolate bar. Why do you know what? There are people in

church the following someone who said I want to be part of a group of

people who can be this generous. There were people who came to church and

said, I don't know what it is about you, but something about this

car wash has confused me. I've got so many questions. Can you help

me? Can you answer? Church? I just sense your generosity is the

currency of the kingdom. Love is the currency of the kingdom, and they

often go together. Do you know one of the things about generosity is we've

got to be full of thanksgiving too. Yeah, if you're generous, then

it don't expect thanks, but enjoy thanks when it happens when somebody blesses you

and does something. Thank you. Do you know what? We do appreciate

thanks, don't we? We do appreciate thanks, But do you know what?

We live in a world where people don't say thank you. A number

of times I've stood and I've held the door open and people have walked through,

and I've stood there and there's more people walking through through, and I've

stood there and holding the door six seven, eight people have walked through,

and eventually I go thank you, and I let the door shut. And

sometimes the last person through looks at me and goes, oh, yes,

thank you. Now it's almost like I felt like they thought I was the

doorman that I got paid for the people who work on the door at church.

For those who greet people at church, thank you so much for doing

that. You are the first face of what people often seen. Actually,

that's probably not true in the digital well, probably the first phase is the

website and thank you for all those people who are helping with all that we're

doing on the website, social media, all that kind of stuff. I've

heard, and I think Clem mentioned this, it's people choose whether they want

to return to a place in the first seven minutes. I've heard also that

in job interviews, people decided that first five minutes whether they like the person

or not, and they spend the next fifty minutes confirming or disc not confirming

their first assumption. Now, seven minutes does not start when the service starts.

Seven minutes starts typically from when they're trying to find they're trying to find

a parking space, they're trying to find their way in how they get greeted

on the door. So for those people who smile and greet people and the

thank you so much, we need more of you. We will need more

of you. We will need more of you. So please, if you're

a smighty happy person who likes the Greek people and make them feel welcome,

let us know. We'd love to have more people. I'd love to have

people. I'd love to have somebody at the end of the road as well

as somebody outside the door. You know, we're working on some banners at

the moment that will be at the end of the road and we'll use them

in other places. Okay, let's look a little more about the struggles and

the things that we wrestle with. Job. Anybody wants to sign up to

Joe's Club, No, let's have a look at an example here in Job.

It says this, but he knows the way that I said when he

tested me, I shall come as gold when we get tested, and we

probably want to go. No, I don't want this. You know that's

the place that we get tested. You know I've done this a couple of

times in my life. I might encourage you to do it as well.

Draw a map of your life. Just get a piece of paper, do

this as a sketch. Just draw however you want to create it. Just

draw a map where you were born and where you are now, and then

maybe on the map put the other places that you've lived, and then put

some of the things that influenced your life. You know, I was encouraged

to do this probably ten twelve years ago, and I put all the places

that I lived, and I've put some of the years, and it's good

to reflect upon the journey that I've been on. And then my coach encouraged

me to say, they've put down some of the good things that have happened

in your life. Think about one or two of the things you've wrestled with,

some of the things you've struggled with, some of the big things.

I put them down as well. And then he said, now look at

your journey and look at where things changed radically. Do you know what?

I thought it was only going to be in the good times that things changed

ralively. There is only you when a fantastic event, something you know,

promotions, things change about Do you know what when I reflected upon my journey,

most of the times when something significant happened, or when I've been through

a trial, through a tribulation, through a testing moment. But he knows

the way that I take. When he tested me I shall come forth as

gold. Now why is gold uses an ad illustration? Gold is used in

illustration because he's beautiful, but it's also valuable. It's precious. And I

just said to the father says the job here, I'm going to bring out

some beauty. I'm going to bring out some precious nests in you. Did

you know this? You there's gold in them there, hills. Let's go

back to two Corinthians and read on just one further. Verse two Corinthians,

Chapter five, verse one says this, for we know that if our earthly

house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from Gods,

a house not made with hands, eternal in heaven. I wonder how many

of us look in the mirror in the morning. I think you're looking beautiful

today. I'm not talking about anybody. I'm not talking about your wife or

your husband. I'm talking about looking at the mirror, looking at yourself.

So you're precious, and you might want to try this for a while if

you if you struggle, and some people do struggle with self worth, take

some post it notes. If you've got a mirror that you look at regularly

first thing in the morning, put some post it notes around it, saying

you're precious. You need go and find the scriptures that speak to you,

and then go and look in that mirror and read those things as you're comb

in your hair or doing your lipstick, or whatever it is you do in

front of a mirror. I know some people just like to look at themselves

in front of a mirror. Yeah, it doesn't take me long to do

my hair, I can tell you. But God loves us. We are

precious. In Psalms, David wrote this, the days of our lives are

seventy years, and if by reason of strength they are eighty years, yet

they boasted only in labor and sorrow. Before it is soon cut off,

when we will fly away. Scripture encourage us to talk about three score years

and ten. You know, if we're living beyond seventy, it's a bonus

in my opinion. Just in my opinion, I just have an expectation of

God. I'm going to press through till then and then every year after that.

I'm looking forward to being with you. But why am I remaining?

Because He's got a job for me to do. Because He's got a job

for me to do, And so I want to encourage us as we press

himTo thinking about the unseen. There are spiritual dimensions about things that we do

not know. And I'll go back to my illustration of the heron and the

strings that discourage it from There are things that we cannot see that discourage us

from things that God wants us to do. You know, in the modern

day world, you can have an alarm system where you can't see anything.

And you've seen it in Mission Impossible. You see Tom Cruise walks in and

then he puts on special glasses and now he can see all the lasers and

now he's kind of walking down the path that it's trying to avoid triggering the

alarm going off because he wants to get in to the place that he wants

to get into. You know, there are places that God wants us to

go and the enemy doesn't. And there are things that will stop us our

confidence, our faith. Sometimes our mountains will be put in front of us.

But do you know what to God, a mountain is a mole hill.

He created the mountains. He created the earth that creates the mountain.

I mean I geologists by training, you know, and I know how the

world works. It creates volcanoes, that create mountains. You know. So

the world is creating mountains all the time, and you see mountains disappear,

landslides and those kinds of things. So I want to say to you,

if you're facing a mountain, just see it from God's perspective. Just see

it from God's perspective. If you're facing a mountain, it's a mole hill

to him. So let's get on his side. Let's get his perspective.

Let's say, Okay, show me the way. Do I need to go

round it? Do I need to go over it? Do you need to

take it away? Whatever it is. But I'm going forward. I'm not

going to camp at the foot of this mountain and wait until something happens.

I'm going to press on Lord. I'm ready to take the next step.

And he might say, Okay, I'm going to deal with the mountain.

Or he might say I want you to climb it. I want to go

with you over the mountain. He might want us to tunnel through it.

But there are obstacles. Sometimes they're seen, but many times they are unseen,

and that's when we need our brotherhood and sisterhood of faith to pray.

I met with some of the guys yesterday for our Men's Breakfast, and we're

going to rename our Men's Breakfast. I said, let's push into something here,

let's do something together. We're going to call our Men's Breakfast band of

Brothers, and we're going to do it because we're going to commit together to

do something more, do something spiritual. We used to have a men's meeting

that used to share about dreams and visions. Shoulder, who some of you

will know, he used to be one of our elders. Many years ago.

He felt God called him to play golf. You might think, well,

it's just an aspiration, but do you know what. He genuinely felt

a call from God to start playing off. He'd never played golf before,

so he said, okay, I'm going to do this. He shared it

with the men, and we said, we want to be part of this.

So the men put some money into a pot and bought one of his

golf clubs. So we were part part of the vision, part of the

dream. Now he went from no handicap at all to I think it was

a handicap of six or eight very quickly, very very very quickly, and

he had some significant conversations with people about faith on the golf course. I

think that's something we need to get better at. It's walking with you know,

there's been prophecy in this place. There's been prophecy over people. Let

me encourage you as it talks about in one timnty one seventeen. You know,

wager good warfare with the prophetic worth that's being spoken over. You don't

just file it away to collect dust. God's spoken And this is why it's

it's we need to take it from the unseen to the scene. We need

to draw it out and say, this is what God said. I'm believing

it. I'm believing it because because of the last scripture that I got from

Hebrews chapter eleven, verse one, that says, and we know this,

this is my memory verse for this week. Let's turn there now and maybe

we'll even read together. You know this scripture, don't it now. Faith

is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.

Please note not see, not seeing. That's what That's what our theme is,

the unseen, the things that are not seen. Faith is a substance.

Faith is something you can touch. When people see faith in you,

they respond. When they see faith in the church, and I want to

be part of this church. I want to be part of what's going on.

I've got people reaching out to me remotely, saying, can I be

part of church? I live in another country? Can I be part of

church? I'm going let's make it. Let's work it out now. Faith

is a substance of things hoped for. So church, let me ask you,

what are you hoping for now? Are you hoping for a case to

be completed? Are you hoping for a promotion? Are you hoping for a

new job because you come to the end of your fruitfulness where you are?

Are you hoping for healing? Because you know, hope stirs faith. Hope

is the the the bed in which seeds can be sown of faith. So

let me pray. Let me pray, And before I pray, with our

eyes closed, I'm asking a big question with our ice closed, those at

home, those listening later, those in the room, what is it you're

hoping for? Sometimes the thing that we hope for we can't even picture in

our minds. It's such a big thing. It's such a big thing.

Do you know what I just since the Father says, talk to me about

your dreams? Talk about your hopes that we can align together. Now.

I want to be really clear here, and my alignment is my dreams being

aligned to God's dreams for me, it's not me persuading God. Oh I

know better. But do you know what when hope stirs deep within you,

you never ever put it down. It never completely dies. Sometimes it becomes

dormant because of other things. But do you know what? What are you

hoping for? Let me encourage you. Just linger there for a moment.

I'm gonna pray, and I'm gonna ask you if there's something that you're hoping

for right now You've pictured it in your mind's eye. I'm not going to

ask you what it is. You and God will know that, But would

you stand would you stand it there's something that you're hoping for. I'm standing

myself. I'm something I'm hoping for right now. So I'm standing. So

Father, I pray for the synchromesh of your Holy Spirit. Father, I

pray for an alignment of our hearts and hopes with you, Father, with

the gear of your Holy Spirit kicking, Oh God, that the turbo boost

of your presence, of your touch, of your empowerment would release us into

purpose and destiny. Father, we come to you with the hopes and dreams

that we have and say, Lord, help us to shape this so it

lines up with your desire for us. Lord God, help us to shape

it so it lines up with you. And Father, help us to take

steps of faith. Help us to take steps of confidence and boldness, Lord,

that we will see your kingdom come and your will be done in our

lives, in our hopes, in our streets, in this town of Egham,

in the places that we live in, in running meads and beyond,

as you call us to touch those other places. Father, I do not

want to limit you in any way. So Father, if our dreams are

not big enough, help us. Lord, But if we're just seeing the

little toe of a giant, Lord, Father, show us the giants standing

with us rather than that which stands against us. Help us to be the

spies that go into the land and see the land full of milk and honey,

rather than the giants that stand against us. Because Lord, we are

able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine. And so Father,

let it be in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen, let's just take our

seat there just before I move on and just keep you my ice clothed.

So just since the Father just wants to do there's someone I know, whether

it's in the room or online, I'd love to speak to you afterwards.

But as someone who's waiting for a piece of paper to be signed, it's

been months and all it requires is the signature, but the person on the

other end is refusing to sign, I want to pray for that person.

So if that's you, let me pray for you afterwards. I'd love to

do that. I'd love to pray with you because I just said to the

Lord says, I'm going to change their heart. I'm going to change their

heart that this will be signed. I'm going to change their heart that this

will be completed, because that's all that's required is this is the one final

barrier. And so Father, we thank you, We thank you Lord for

your provision. Lord, we pray for healing God. There's many amongst us

that are known to us Lord who need a healing touch from heaven. And

so Father, we come with our hopes for health and vitality for our friends,

for our families. Lord, we prayed for strengthened bodies, revitalized bodies.

Lord, we pray for healing touches where tears and muscles have been damaged

in some way. Father, we pray for spiritual surgery the Lord to knit

together tissue that is separated. Father, where the prognosis from the doctor is

there's nothing more that we can do. Father, we come to you and

we say, Lord, do what you can do. When we run out

of the doctors and the medical advice. Lord, we run to you.

We run to you in the first place. But Lord God, we cry

out to you. Lor. Would you touch lives, would you touch bodies,

would it open ears? Would you bring sight to those who are struggling

to see? Nor would you renew hearts and blood flow? Father, we

pray in your name. Amen, we're going to come and take a communion

together. And if you know and love the Lord Jesus is your savior, please do