31st December 2023 Watch Night Service

We're almost useless. I mean, how good is his mobile phone to you?

When it doesn't you can't switch it on. It might be useful as

a doorstop, but a very smarar door. Yeah maybe yeah, Maybe a

mirror, yeah, maybe a backscratcher. I don't know. But it's funny

how God gives you an illustration just to kick off this evening. I was

standing there thinking, oh my goodness, I have to charge it up.

I've only got eighteen percent. Do you know I don't have to rely on

the phone. I can rely on being not connected through the phone to my

words that God gave me. I can be connected to him directly. And

when I'm connected to him directly, then I don't need this phone. I

mean, I could put it away. I trust him enough, and it's

for me. The end of twenty twenty twenty three and the beginning of twenty

twenty four is a journey of faith. Unless we're journeying by faith, then

we're lost. If we're doing it all in our own street, if we're

doing it all with our mobile phones, if we're doing it we all with

technology. I know, we as a church or love technology. You know

I love technology, But if that's the only thing we're doing, then we're

just broadcasting silence. We're just broadcasting a fruitless message. We're broadcasting a message

that has no seed, that has no power, that will not go any

further. It'll go out there and it will land, just like seed lands,

and then the birds will come along and take it, like the story

of the sewer comes. The thorns will come and overwhelm it, as we

read in the story of the Sewer. But if that seed that has the

DNA that's designed with goes out with the power that God intended, then when

it lands, it lands in good soil, it bears through thirty sixty one

hundredfold. And those kind of things are the kind of things that I want

to press into You want to bring up the first scripture, Jonathan, let

me just share, Sorry, just just go back on the title. That's

possible. I just had. I had a few thoughts as I've breathed into

twenty twenty three, a new year, a new way, you know,

for me, as we press into twenty twenty four, most of us can

look back at twenty twenty three and say, there's been some good times,

but there's also been some less good times, and I just want to encourage

you as I share today. There's a place where there's things that we need

to leave behind because they belong in twenty twenty three, and they belong in

our past. And we might have some scars from them, We might have

some we might walk with a bit of a limp from them. We might

have some memories that are associated with those kinds of things. But you know

what I want to press into twenty twenty four, And I want to press

into twenty twenty four with purpose, with faith, and building upon what God

wants me to build upon. You know, you know there are plenty of

plenty of foundations we can build a but if we don't build on the right

foundations, our building will fall down. So let's bring up our first quick

scripture near Jonathan, and it says in a Colossians chapter three, verses one

to four, if then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which

are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Set

your mind on things above, not on the things on the earth. For

you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ,

who is our life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in

glory. The things that need to remain on Earth, need to stay in

the earthly realm. But you know what, when we lift our eyes up,

when we lift our eyes up to Heaven, we get a different perspective.

God gives us a different perspective. God has a different perspective, and

that different perspective, he's a heavenly Earth perspective. It's from Heaven. It's

from his throne room, and from his throne room, God speaks to us

today. God shares with us today. God moves in our world today.

And if we will only ask him to lift us up, lift us up

so that we can get just a glimpse of his perspective. Do you know,

I've read about this, and I've read about a number of astronauts who've

gone into space, and they said their world has changed, their worldview has

changed, their perspective on life has changed because suddenly they realize that they were

one person on a great big planet in a great big universe. And then

they suddenly realized how insignificant. But then when you look at it from the

perspective of Earth to you got space, and so God could very special,

very special things. But he wants us to have fresh perspective. A fresh

perspective, you will say, okay, leaf subsist behind. If there's some

memories that you don't like that belong in twenty twenty three, bury them,

bury them and leave them in the grave where they belong. Doesn't mean the

memories won't be there, doesn't mean that the learnt experience won't be useful.

Well, we don't need to live. Can you imagine somebody passing and them

sitting in your living their body sitting in your living room. I've been a

bit gross here, but I want to give you an illustration. Just imagine

having a body sitting in your living room. That would be weird, wouldn't

it. But you know, that's what we do when we live with dead

vision, when we did, when we live with the past, when we

live with the things that have died, we have to lay them to rest,

put that. There may be nothing wrong with them, but they're for

the past, and that's where we build first. So we build from there.

Do you want to bring up the next scripture? Nathan, I've got

no control on my phone, so as we press into that perspective, yes,

please? Yeah. In Romans, chapter fifteen, verse thirteen, May

the God of your hope. Now I'm gonna make this really personal. Twenty

twenty three and into twenty twenty four. May the God of your hope not

my hope. You know we can leave, we can we can lean on

other people's capacity. You know, some of the people in the room are

brilliant cooks. For those of us who are not brilliant cooks, we lean

on your capacity. You don't lean on ours, because you'll have cheese on

toast if you lean on my capacity or cheese on toast with mushrooms or something

like that. You know, that's what that's what you live with. So

we lean into your gift and your skill, and so we can also do

the same in terms of gifts and faith. May the God of your hope,

now you can lean into my hope. You could do that for a

while, but it will not sustain you. And what happens when I'm not

there? So I want to encourage you. Find out your own hope,

get your own hope, grass, grasp hold of your own hope. So

may the God of your hope so fill you with all joy, not just

a little joy, but all joy and all peace. In believing through the

experiences from the potpost through the experience of your faith, that by the power

of the Holy Spirit, you may abound for me. Abounding me is not

just enough. Abound is another one of overflowing excellence, fullness, you know

it says that, and be overflowing, bubbling over with hope. If you've

ever held, if you ever held your cup out for a refill, people

will their handshake you, handshaking, and we did this awkward bore into the

cup, and maybe you get get a half full cup because they're afraid of

spinning it and you're afraid of them pouring it onto your hand. But you

know what, you know, God does not scold us. God does not

burn us. God does not put us in a place of risk. Put

the cup. Put your cup in a place where you say, fill me

up, fill me up, Lord, Not just here, not just fifty

percent, not sixty percent, seventy, not even ninety nine. I want

to mean so full that there's a little bit that overflows, because that means

you get a bit of my overflow. Now, a little bit of splashback,

if you might call it that. You might call it splashback. But

do you know what if you go to a well in the inner desert,

if you go to the Sahara, if you go to the Namibia, if

you go to other places dry places in the world, you will find there

are oases and they'll often have a well in those oasis where they've dug down.

They've got down the water. Now, as they pull the bucket up,

they get water. They pull the bucket up, and as they pull

it up to pour it into their water bottles, they spill a bit on

the ground. They spill a bit more, and they spill a bit more.

Do you know what happens around that well? It's green and full of

life because there is an overflow from that well. That means that there is

life that abounds. I want to believe as a church that we will blow

out of twenty out of Virginia Lodge. We won't fit in here. I

talked about that a couple of weeks ago. But there will be an overflow.

Just as a stupid little example, every time I come here, I

pick up some litter. Every time, even if it's inconvenient, I'll pick

up some litter. Now you might say, well, okay, that's just

keeping the church tidy. That is true, but you know what that is

litter that comes from the community that I'm picking up and I'm putting in the

bin. And I'm putting it in the bin because I want to bless the

community. I parked outside about five or six months ago, and as I

parked outside, there were little silver bottles on the car park, little silver

gas bottles, maybe twenty of them. And I thought, Okay, who

on earth has been sitting here sniffing the gas? And my first thought was

they're such terrible people. They've thrown rubbish all over the car park. And

then God touched my heart. I said, there's someone sitting in your car

park who's so lost in touch with the world that they're sniffing gas just to

survive, just to lift, just to numb themselves in some way or other.

And so I put on Facebook. I said, yes, there were

some gas bottles in the park, and yes I picked them up. But

if the person who used these gas bottles would like a coffee, I'd be

available to have a coffee with them. I haven't ever had anybody respond yet,

but do you know what I think? Sometimes God wants to push us

to a place and saying are you available, Are you available? Are you

available? And that's I want to bring to us as a church as we

press in the twenty twenty four Are we available? Now? You know I

can absolutely guarantee that that availability will not fit into my diary, probably won't

fit into your diary either. It'll be inconvenient. It'll be just as you're

going to the shops, It'll be just before you want to go to the

loo, and you can't standing there thinking is this going to go on?

Much wrong? But I don't know whether I can hold on? But do

you know what? In those moments, God will give us the grace.

God will give us the words. It doesn't have to be a two hour

conversation. Sometimes we can say one thing and that one thing genuinely touches that

person's life, and they bring you up a few days later, or they

message you and say, do you know what you said? This? It's

been eating away at my mind. I can't I don't know why, but

you said something and it's just stuck in my head. It's become an earworm.

Your hope, the God of your hope will fill you with all peace,

with all joy, with all purpose by his Holy Spirit. Let's just

bring up the next one Jonathan, you know, as we press it into

twenty twenty four. Yeah, yeah, this wasn't there one before that?

Isn't there some notes somewhere? Oh yeah, thank you. Okay, I

knew I didn't put something in there. But we as we press into twenty

twenty four, there are some things that we need to let go. There's

some things we need to now, do you know what we hold onto things

we like. We don't necessarily hold onto things that are good for us,

And there's a difference. There are some things we like that are good.

You know. You've probably got a favorite jumper, you know, and you

know if you were wearing it and somebody said I want your jumper, said

no, no, he's my special jumper. I like special jumper, you

know, because it's precious, because it's nice and warm. Okay, that's

fine. But there'll be other things that might not be good for you and

me and we need to let them go. It might be a memory,

do you know. Sometimes we replay memories again and again and again. We

go back to that good what we thought was that place where we felt good

at the time. But you know, sometimes feelings diseased. I wouldn't trust

my feelings. If I'm honest with you, I trust God's direction and trust

God's words. How I feel, that's another matter, because that depends on

how I was at the time. It depends on whether I was in a

good place at the time. And you know, our memories play play with

us. You know, we remember through a particular lens. They talk about

rose tinted glasses. We remember something in a particular way. So there are

some things in our past that we need to we muscle otherwise. It's a

bit like imagine you have there are a peg in the grounds on August twenty

twenty three, and it's a piece of elastic that connects to you, and

as you step into twenty twenty four, you're connected backs. And I don't

know why I picked that date. I think I've randomly picked that date.

But if that date's speaking to someone in the room or someone who's listening later

August it's twenty five third. If there's something that caught your attention, if

it's pushing you back back, well you either need to pull the peg up

and give me power over you and God can help you do that, or

you need to cut the time. Otherwise, what will happen is you'll run

forward into twenty twenty four and suddenly, pin you'll be back in the memories

of August to twenty third, nineteen twenty three. And then there are some

things that we need to remember, that we need to build upon. There

are good things that God has done. God has answered prayer in twenty twenty

three. We are not where we expected to be. I look at these

great people in the room. I think most of you I didn't know a

year ago. The majority of people in the room I did not know you.

God knew you. And actually I think I'm right in saying that some

of you were already here and we were praying for you, and the answer

to our prayer was already here and we didn't even know it. You know,

that's God. That's the way God does things. And sometimes we just

need to open our eyes up to what God is doing. And there will

be people you and I will meet on the high street of Egham. There'll

be people that you and I meet in our workplace and we'll share something.

There will be people you meet on the railway station. You're just to have

a simple five minute conversation and suddenly something will happen, something will be some

connection will happen, and so we need to build upon the remembered bits,

the good bits, the bits that God has done. That's what testimony is.

Testimony is God did this. Often in scripture you hear about somebody creating

a pile of stones and saying, this is a memorial and I will call

this and God, you know, there are various servants of God who called

places different special names. Pennile as an example, just that as one small

example in the Old Testament. I want to encourage you build your own piles

of stones. Have a think as we end twenty twenty three, what is

it you want to remember from twenty twenty three? What are the highlights,

what are the moments? And some of our memorials, that's another way of

putting it, some of our memorials will not be good times. You know.

I looked back. I did a project it's probably ten years ago now,

where I looked back over the fifty years of my life fifty plus years

at the time, and I looked back at the times, the good times.

I also looked at some of the bad times. And then over at

the top of that I overlaid when God had blessed me, and God had

done things. And many times God blessed me in the middle of a difficult

time, you know, in those dry times, in the barren times,

God spoke to me a word that has carried me through months, years,

sometimes decades. There are things that God has said to you and to me

that will carry us into our seventies, eighties and beyond. And so I

mean, think about it. Think about the men and women of God.

You know who still shine at seventy five, eighty eighty five years old.

Keith Hazel, who started the Life Links network that we're part of. You

know, he's still radio, He's still rady in his last dates. He's

still radiated the love of God. You know his wife, and now I

still play scrabble with her. In most weeks, I'm playing scratt and she

still thrashes me. I've playing scrabble with her online. I'm using the technology.

But you know what, I'm blessed as a woman of God who lates

her and her husband laid foundations in my life that are now carrying through decades

later. And I don't know what you're like. I don't know what your

garden looks like, But you know when you plant things, do you plant

things for the next summer just to look good now? So sometimes we'll go

to the gardens engine. We'll buy plants that are ready flowering. We'll put

them in the ground and they'll be good for three months and then they die

because they finished flowering. And that maybe some of them will be ready for

next year. Some things will put in the grounds and they're not ready for

this year. They'll grow and they'll flower next year. But you know,

there's some things we'll plant the seed and in a hundred years time there'll be

a beautiful tree in your garden. You and I will not be alive to

see it. But we're sewing for the next generation. And so not only

do I want to say let's forget certain things, let's build on certain memories,

but let's also take a step of faith, let's take a step of

courage, let's step into twenty twenty four. You know what's I mean.

I've got my diary open for twenty twelve. I've already got some diary.

My wife and I we spent a couple of hours yesterday talking about when we're

going to plan to go on holiday, because if we don't plan to go

on holiday. We won't go on holiday because how about going on holiday in

a month's time? And I'll look at my diary and go, I'm sorry,

I'm busy that way will I'm not go? What about the following weeks?

You go, I've got an appointment there. We have to plan to

make room. And I believe as a church, one of the things we

all need to do is to plan to make room for friends, for people

to ask all good questions, for people who need prayer, for people who

need support, for people who need discipling, for people who need a touch

from God. Now do you know what, If we're going to be a

lightning rod that brings a touch from God, then we've got to be in

touch with God. There's no point in not saying, God, would you

let your lightning strike me today? We actually, you know, God looks

out for people. He looks out for a safe place for his lightning,

his power to land, because he knows that if he lands in you,

and we'll do something with it, we'll share it with somebody. We'll listen

to a still small voice of calm, and we'll speak a word of life

into somebody else. And so step into twenty twenty four with courage and with

confidence, make room in our hearts, in our lives, in our diaries,

in church services, and as we do that, not only to press

forward, but to be bold and take courage. Now, where do we

take courage from? It's a phrase we of the the news take courage,

my friends. Yeah, but where do we take it from? We need

to take it from God. We can sometimes take courage from one another.

But you know what if I start stealing Jonathan's courage, If I start drawing

from him and say, oh, you've got so much, such good courage

that I Jonathan, have a bit more. I'll have a bit more,

suddenly he'll start to go. Do you know what? I'm not sure today

because he's not carrying courage unless we're connected to the ultimate source. Is exactly

the same issue as my mobile phone, which is where I started, you

know, and actually it's still going. So that's Johnny good. But you

know, if we're not plugged in, Now, how do we keep our

phone fully charged? We plug it in entaily. Don't plug it in when

you've nearly run out. That's not I mean, I understand that the best

way to keep a good battery life in your phone is to let it run

to nearly to empty and then plug it in, but don't let it run

to empty and run out and then, oh, my goodness, where's a

power socket. I haven't got one. I'll have to do without my phone

for three hours. And then somebody's saying, I was trying to ring you,

just to imagine if if we're so down on the Holy Spirit and God

says I was speaking to you, but you weren't listening. Your hearing aids

weren't in, you weren't tuned into me. You missed, you missed my

words, you missed my conversation, and now you've missed that person who was

walking past. The opportunity's gone. Do you know what when those kind of

things happen. I kicked myself. I don't literally kick myself. I just

go, oh, I'm so miffed with myself. I'm so peeved. Yeah,

I don't want to do that. I don't want to look back and

have regrets. And so I can look back over twenty twenty three and you

may want to take stock and just say, you know, ah, there

moments in the year where you had regrets and rather than lingering there, leave

them in the past, but allow that to spring you forth into twenty twenty

four and say, do you know what regrets? I have a few,

but too for you to mention. I want to press into twenty twenty four,

empowered by the Holy Spirit. And I want to say to you and

to me, let's go together into twenty twenty four. Let's step into twenty

twenty four, and let's make twenty twenty four the best year that it can

possibly be. So let me probably just a few fourths, just a few

ideas, But Father, thank you for the year that is coming to an

end. Today. Lord, we want to say thank you for the good

bits, the lots of good bits, and the pretty rubbish bits as well.

Father, we want to say, help us to sift out the good

from the bad. The things you want us to remember, the memorial moments.

Father, help us build brick upon brick, precept to prop precept,

memory upon memory. And Father, help us to leave behind the rubbish that'd

be consumed in the fire. Let us use the ash to mark our history

and press into the fullness of twenty twenty four. And I want to say

to Church and those who are listening. You know, even I've got a

bit of a croaky voice right now. I want to say, twenty twenty

four is a year full of opportunity. Twenty twenty four is a year full

of purpose if you would just step into it. Don't step into your flip

flops, step into your work boots, don't step into your slippers. That

means you're going to put your feet up. Step into your Wellington boots or

your trainers. Ready to run, ready to work, ready to dig,

get dressed, and be ready, as Simon encouraged us this morning, be

ready for Operation Breakthrough. Be ready for what twenty twenty four will bring.

Be ready for what God has lied you and me up for. There'll be

people who will sit in this room. There'll be people will be discipled in

this building. There'll be people who come to our Sunday and midweek gatherings from

around the world. Think about the nations that we're touching. Think about the

nations it's that you've touched. Think about the friends who've brushed up against you

and seen some of your strange behavior because you've been following the King's plan.

You've been following the King's pattern. Press into all that he is, and

be his ambassador, Be be a citizen of the Kingdom, and press into

the fullness of all that He has for you in twenty twenty four. Amen,