9th June 2024 All Age All Nation Service - Baptism as a Personal Perspective

You've been speaking about baptism this month, and I want to talk about being

bathed in something. I want to talk about being bathed in silence. We're

going to practice some silence this morning. Okay. So let me just give

you a little scripture here from some forty six first ten. It says this,

be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted in

the nations. I will be exalted in the earth. But it starts with

be still, now, children, Joel Hope, any of the other children

here. If I tell you be still, what do you do? You

try to be still, don't you? But can you be still? Okay,

let's try let's church, let's try it. Not just the children,

everybody. I'm going to ask you to be still right now. Now.

This wasn't musical statues. I'll release you from that. Do you know what

one of the reasons some of us struggle to be still was we still had

things in our hands. There were people that had stuff in their hands,

and there were things that were going on, and do you know what,

sometimes it's difficult to be still, But you know, sometimes we need to

put things down. Sometimes we need to put things down. And let me

encourage you be still and know that he is got so just by telling you

be still, that doesn't make you still, because let me just ask you

a question. Now. Okay, your body might have been physically still.

What was going on in here? What was going on in here? Lots

of thoughts, lots of Okay, my body's still, but my head's running

around with lots of ideas. Okay, I'm not going to ask you to

be still again, but you know what, it starts with a few steps.

I was planning to do this. I was planning to give you a

time and say, okay, ego, let's be still for these few moments.

Oh, maybe that's not working. Is that working? Okay, doesn't

matter. I was going to say, be still. Now. If i'd

put a clock up there was ticking, you'd have all looked at the clock

say, oh, we're getting closer, We're getting closer, We're getting closer.

I'm nearly there. I've nearly done it. Yes, Now, would

you have been still inside, you'd have been focused on the clock. Hebrews

chapter ten, verse twenty two says, so let us come near to God

with an honest and true heart. Let us come near with faith that is

sure and strong. Our hearts have been sprinkled, our minds have been cleansed

from a sense of guilt, our bodies have been washed with pure water.

That's why I want to talk about being washed in silence. Anybody remember a

song with silence in the title, and silence is golden silent night, sounds

of silence. I'm showing my age there, Simon and garfuone call, now,

what are the sounds of silence? It's it's interesting because actually we live

in a world that is full of noise. You go into a shot,

there's music playing, and that music's meant to playing at a speed to make

you walk around the shops. And if they want you to linger, they'll

play slow music. If they want you to move through quicker, they'll play

faster music. But do you know what, switch it off? I want

to encourage you. Most of us probably just have stuff on in the background

sometimes, but once in a while, it's just good to switch off the

noise. Yeah, and if we switch off all the noise around us,

we'll probably start to hear trains and planes in the distance, you know.

And then when the when we can zoom out, when we can zoom out,

the planes and the trains. Then maybe we'll start to hear some birds

singing, and then as the birds go to sleep at the end of the

day, maybe you'll hear some rustling in the garden of insects. But do

you know what we wants to be quiet? We have to start with a

bit of a process. We need to start by quietening our mind first of

all, because our mind will impact our heart. Do you know what if

I make you stressful, your heart will beat faster. You are not you

are you are not quiet? And still so do you know what? The

way I quiet my body is to quiet my heart. One of the ways

I quiet my heart is just to focus sometimes on breathing. It's not a

bad thing to do. Just breathe in for seven seconds, hold it for

seven seconds, breed out for seven seconds, hold it breathing. Just that

kind of cycle. Something like that gets you very centered. I'm not talking

about meditation and anything there. I'm just talking about breathing. Guys. It's

okay. But you know, if we center, if we think about it,

we can quiet our body. But you know, one way to quiet

our bodies, to quiet our hearts, and sometimes to quiet ourselves, we

need to put some things down. I'm not just talking about physically putting things

down now. Sometimes we need to mentally put things down. And one of

the things if I'm focusing and trying to be quiet, one of the things

I will do sometimes I will spend a minute, two minutes, three minutes

just writing some things so that I get them out of my head and say,

I can forget about them now because they're now on a piece of paper,

and I'll come back to them later. And then once that list has

finished dispersing, then I can quiet my mind, quite my heart, and

I will quiet my body. But the other thing about being still and being

washed is it's so much easier to do if you focus on something rather than

nothing. If I say, empty your minds and try and be still,

immediately our mind's try and fill up with something else. And so we're going

to do this again. I'm going to put hopefully a counter on the on

the screen. But I want to give you something to focus on. And

it's verse two of Psalm twenty three, and it says this, And I

want you just to just go wherever you want to go. If you need

to close your eyes, close your eyes, if you want to stare at

the back of the chair in front. That's fine if you want to look

at your hands, however you want to do this, I'm going to ask

you just for one minute, just to be still and focus on this scripture.

And it says this in Psalm twenty three, verse two. He lets

me lie down in fields of green grass. He leads me beside quiet waters.

Let's just be still just for one minute and allow God to speak to

you. H m hm hm, h m hm. And I'll end with

what it says in Psalm forty six. Be still and know that I am

God. I will be exalted amostimations. Peace still and know that I am

God. Just those two short phrases, be still. I just encourage you

to do that. But how do we know God is God? Well for

each one of us, there will be something different today. God will show

himself to us. They reveal himself to us. So be still and know

that I am God. Okay, before we come to part two, and

Rob's going to come and share with us about baptism that come before him.

And listen to his word. And I have titled today's as Baptism a personal

perspective. I would like to share with you first of all, what actually

Jesus went through as an example of him being baptized. He could not have

started his ministry without being baptized. And we're going to first of or look

at Matthew chapter three, verse thirteen to seventeen. So Matthew chapter three,

thirteen to seventeen, and I read then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan

to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying I need