9th July 2023 All Age Service - Dave Food - The Church is home for....

To get straight into worship. Count down with some crazy dance moves and then

let's get into worship. And that's what we did. Thank you Cherry,

and thank you Salma. Thank you Jonathan for leading us in worship this morning.

I think God is doing a new thing in Armage. If you ask

these guys who are leading worship this morning why they're here, they would tell

you it's God. Cherryan came for a job. That's what he thought.

If we do the job for months, and then he realized why he was

here and Cherry and there's more to come. There's more other people God's going

to bring to us as we reach out and as we start to broad us

more and more God's word across the nations. I think I counted seventeen different

countries watching us this morning so far. So you know, there's something going

on. There's something going on in Armage. There's something going on from here,

and I'm just so excited by that. And one of the things that

are On Friday, we had a prayer meeting and the technology didn't work,

and I was saying to Jonathan, We've got to make it work because people

are joining us remotely as soon as it doesn't work, then it doesn't work.

We've got to make it work here. We've got to make it work

at home. We've got to make it work online. We've got to make

it work for people later because God's doing something. So our series for July

is the church is stop dot dot and I really want to start off my

piece and building upon what Simon was sharing last week. And the church is

home for question mark the church's question. The church is home for well,

let's explore that. So let me pray and let's get started. Father God,

thank you that we're gathering around your worth this morning. Thank you you

inhabited our worship. Lord, you're here by your spirit. Thank you that

you're speaking to people. Thank you that you're speaking to hearts and lives.

Thank you that you're touching circumstances and situations. Thank you God that you are

changing things for good for your glory. And so Father, we open our

hearts, we open our ears, We open our eyes to see more of

you, to hear more of your word and to capture it, Lord God,

and do something with it, we pray. And so, Father God,

as we gather around your word today, help us to understand more of

who you are in our lives. Help us to understand more of who we

are in your kingdom, and help us to synchronize with your spirit. We

pray in Jesus' name. Amen. I guess most of us know Psalm twenty

three pretty well. The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in

once. So anybody know the last verse? Yeah, well done, Surely

goodness and mercy. Let's go there, then, Jonathan, Surely goodness and

mercy shall follow me all the days of my lives, and I will dwell

in the House of the Lord forever. Firstly, forever is not a short

time, people, Forever is not a short time. If you've ever sat

in the present, if you ever sat waiting for a bus, you ever

sat waiting somewhere and you feel like that's eternity, you know what I mean,

Where you start tapping your fingers, where you start looking around the room

and you start wondering, you know, when something's going to happen, when

the train is going to arrive. You know, it feels like eternity.

I can guarantee you it's not. It's just a glimpse of eternity. We

will dwell in the House of the Lord forever. If I told you you

were going to live where you live right now forever, I think you'd probably

make some changes, wouldn't you. I mean, there are probably some.

Let me give you an example. You've put some stuff away in your kitchen,

and it's put in certain cupboards in certain ways, and then you know,

you just find it. Something happens and the way you use your kitchen

changes. Maybe you're easy to have exchanged. So consequently, now the porridgeots

and and the milk are in the wrong cupboards, but you just live with

it because that's the way it was. That's the way it is now.

If I told you you were going to live like that forever, you probably

make some changes. Would that be true? Okay, maybe you've already got

your kitchen already perfectly laid out, in which case, fantastic. But if

you've got to dwell somewhere, now, let's explore this word dwell. Dwell

does not mean visit, We visit a hotel. I had a conference in

London this week and I was staying in a hotel in London. You know,

I got my bag, I opened it up, I hardly took anything

out until I needed it. I didn't even put it in the wardrobe.

I was only there one night. What's the point. But when I get

home, or when I get home from holiday, everything goes back in the

cupboards. That needs to go back in the cupboards. Because this is home.

This is where I dwell, this is where my center of the universe

is. This is where everything goes out from here. It's where I'm anchored.

And so church should be similar. Church should be a place to call

home, a place for equipping. I hope that every Sunday somebody gets something

to equip them for the week ahead, a deposit, something that's ready to

be used, but also a place to settle. I bumped into I was

in Stafford last week. Thank you for praying for me. It was just

great to be with another life Link's church and minister there. Haven't been able

to do that for quite a while, but as things are changing, we're

stepping up and we're stepping into new things and stepping into things we haven't done

for a while. And just had the liberty to share with the church there.

And I was talking to the past drafter. His name's Dave too,

and we've known one another four decades. We went to youth County. He

was a youth leader and I was a youth leader, and we'd probably known

one another thirty years. And he was telling me about someone who visited his

church who said, I love this church. I've been coming for a few

weeks now, but there's nothing for me. And I thought, how do

you answer that kind of question? He said, you know what I said.

I said, if this is where God's calling you to, first thing

you have to resolve in your own heart. Is God calling you here?

Is this way you should be calling home? Because if it is, then

maybe you need to be building some of the things that are lacking. I

thought, that's a brave thing to say, because we often want to go,

oh yeah, please come and we'll change things for you. My sister's

church, my sister's church many years ago, unfortunately went through a breakup and

ended up being two churches and one group of the church. They met together

and they said, tell us what you need and we will be everything that

you need. He said to the group that was there, said tell us

what it is that you need and we will we will take that. That

church is no longer sadly, because they were trying to promise to meet everybody's

needs. And what we need to do is align ourselves with God's purposes.

And the people who need to be attracted, and the people who want to

call us home will call us home, and those who don't, well,

you know that's what God's calling us to. But you know what I'm really

keen to encourage people to say, decide where you're going to settle and make

yourself at home. I say every time I get involved with all Holloway and

the students there. At the beginning of the new year, there's a church

fair and there's an opportunity to greet students. And what I say to every

student I took to when I get the opportunity, I say, find a

church, plug in and make it your home. So don't spend six months

looking around for twenty different churches. Pray, try a few out, find

one that's good, that feels a good pay would be, and then settle

down, decide to serve. But you know, church is also not for

the people who are here. We are not here just for us. If

we're just here for us, we're a clique and we will serve ourselves.

And people say I don't like the color of the walls. Oh, I

don't like the flavor of the coffee that church serves after church and wars things

like that. Well, okay, we can change some of those things,

but you know, they're really not the important things. And I am so

inspired by the way worship is growing, our desire to pray, our internationality.

I am so touched by the fact that I see more and more nationalities

connecting with us. And I think that's a glimpse of heaven. I honestly

think that's a glimpse of heaven, because that's the world we live in.

We live in a very very multicultural, multicolored world. It's not just a

place for us, it's a place for those who are seeking. Do you

know each one of us should have a friend who is seeking. Let me

ask you. We find I find as a Christian, I find as a

Christian that my circle of friends gets smaller. You know, people come to

christ people get plug into church, and I know less and less non Christians.

I don't mean I touch people, you know, connect with people.

I'm not talking about work and acquaintances that no people I can have as a

deep conversation with it. The church is a place for seekers too. And

please, I haven't made it yet. I'm still seeking. I'm still seeking.

I've still got questions to ask God. And it's also a place for

the wandering stranger, someone who hasn't got a hope, the refugee, those

who need something where they can just say, do you know what, I

don't have a home and I need to find a home. The Church is

all these things can be, all these things are we like this when in

two Chronicles he says this two Chronicles verses one to three. When Solomon had

finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the

sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple, and the priests

could not enter the House of the Lord because the glory of the Lord had

filled the house. When all the children of Israel saw how the fire came

down and the glory of the Lord on the temple, they bowed their faces

to the grounds on the pavement and worshiped and praised God, saying for he

is good, for his mercy and jewels forever. And when God's presence is

around there, we just have to respond in our way to God's presence.

Sometimes that all results on us lying on our faces on the floor. Sometimes

that will result in us hands in the air, eyes closed, and completely

lost. I once remember being at a conference and the worship leader was up

the front and they were quite clearly lost in the Lord. You know,

the band was singing, but this worship leader hands out. They were just

away with God. God was talking to them, do you know what?

And the band eventually stopped playing and it got to a place of complete stillness.

Complete stillness, you know, the kind of moment when you would use

the phrase that you could hear a pin drop. There weren't people coughing,

there was nothing. That was just a complete stillness, and a holy hush

came on the room. As that holy hush came on the room, a

prophetic word rang out, spoken out across the room. God was speaking to

his people. Once the word was spoken, I think we stood there for

I can't count because I didn't look at my watch. It was that precious.

You know, when it's precious, you don't look at your watch.

But I was just there and my eyes were closed, and I would guess

it was about seven or eight minutes of complete silence. It was the presence

of God. Here's the interesting thing we heard after the meeting. There have

been a couple of people who'd walked in just before this moment of silence.

They've been attracted by that. Just literally walked in off the street, heard

the worship and walked in and they joined this holy huddle. They weren't believers,

they weren't Christians. They just heard the music that sounded good. They

came in and they stood there. And as they stood there, and you'd

think stood there in eight minutes silence, Well, how could that communicate you

with them? Do you know what we heard later from testamsin they both become

Christians, the two people who walked in over time, but it started with

that engagement with God, that holy moment. There are places and times where

we don't need to rush on because it's this kind of stuff, and that

doesn't just happen in the worship center. Doesn't just if I understand what I'm

reading here, even those outside were falling on their faces, And if I

read into the revival texts, if I were read into revival in the Hebrides

in Wales, in America, over different times, there were people who fell

on their faces in the streets I know, I have a church in Mexico

where they were they met. They got to a place where they were praising

or worshiping every night of the week, and there was their church building was

in a block and they started getting the neighbors coming around and say, can

you please stop playing the drums. We don't have any drums. And so

they said, eight o'clock last night, and again this evening at eight o'clock,

the walls start shaking in our in our houses. What are you doing.

I said, well, we're just worshiping God. And that the neighbors

so did not believe them. They said, come in and evidence what's going

on. And then if you want to walk back to your house and come

back again. And some of these neighbors came into the worship meeting, then

went back home again evidence that the walls were shaking, and then came back

in again and said, Okay, it's not drums, but I don't know

what it is, but I want to stay the evidence of God's presence.

And maybe because they didn't want to sit in a wall where the walls were

shaking. I don't know, I really don't know what is church. Well,

let's look at what scripture says, as we look in Romans chapter twelve,

Verses four and five, in the human body, there are many parts

and organs, each with a unique function. And so it is with the

body of Christ. What do you christ the Church? For? Although we

are many, we are all being mingled into one body in Christ. This

means that we are all vitally joined to one another, with each contributing to

the others. We are vitally connected. You know. You might be a

bone, somebody else might be a liver, somebody else might be a heart.

And then that the sin news that connect us together to make us work

together, you know, And we read other scriptures that talk about, you

know, how the body needs to function together. A hand cannot function without

the nose. The nose cannot function without the feet. We need one another.

And so church, what is church? For? Church is a place

to worship with just evidence that this morning, Now, can you worship home

on your own? Yes, of course you can. Actually, I ought

to just recap here because I've said this many times before, but church is

not a building. This is a building, and I'm absolutely sure, and

I'm being frank with you this morning. There are times when I've been here

setting up church on a Sunday morning. I've seen a car pull up outside

and they're not waiting for someone from the station. They're looking at the building

and then they're looking at in their phone. I'm thinking what's going on here

and seeing it a couple of times now, so I think I know what's

going on. I think we're punching above our weight. We're doing more than

a small church based in Egan might do. We're doing things that other churches

aren't doing. That's why people are being attracted to what we're doing. But

I'm sure they're looking at their phone, they're looking at the website, they're

looking at the live stream, and they're looking at the building and going.

And you might do the same some Sundays. You might think, Okay,

where's this going when it's going outside this building. Ultimately, I mean we

meet here at the moment on Sundays, and if everybody who is part of

our CF turned up here on a Sunday, we would not fit in this

room statement of Truth, with Spanish group, with remote people, etc.

But you know, over time we need to make room for the next thing.

We've already taken most of the tables out. We made room weeks ago

and said let's make room. Let's make room, let's make room. You

know, our small groups are not limited by anything, you know. They

small groups could grow to one hundred people. There are people who come to

our small groups who don't come to anything else. They're building in relationship.

They're connected out of connectedness to us. Yeah, and whatever building we will

move into for Sunday celebrations, maybe once a month to start with, but

we'll start exploring those things. So this is not the end goal at all.

But if we get focused on buildings, we're focused on the wrong thing.

It's what happens in the building when we gather. It's what happens,

you know, over WhatsApp, you see somebody shares an encouraging test. Let

me give you a simple example. I was away last Sunday. Somer Charlotte's

children came to Sunday School. They had a great time playing study, they

had a great time, and they're great artists. So they shared some pictures

and those pictures got shared, and then a story got shared, then a

testimony got shared. All out of one Sunday school. What we do here

today echoes in eternity and so church not a building. Church is a place

to worship. And so that means those people are joining us online because they're

joining us as church. They're at home, but they're still part of church

because they're choosing to be with us. And if they choose to worship at

home, they're choosing to worship as part of church. Church is a place

to grow. I don't just mean in stature, but I mean spiritually too.

Do you know there is no such thing as the perfect church, and

if you find it, do not join it because you will spoil it.

And I can say that about myself as well, because we're imperfect people.

We're broken with sin. We mess up, we get things wrong, we

misunderstand. If I privately went around to each one of you and said,

have you ever had a misunderstanding with somebody else in church? I think we'd

all probably put our hands up and say yes. But the thing is not

that you had to misunderstanding. What happened as a result. Did you have

a conversation, did you resolve it? Have you been able to move forward?

Because that's where growth happens. Growth happens internally because we learn to grow

together, we learn to be together. We learn to live together. Church

is also a place to serve. I've dropped using the V word, or

I've tried to drop using the V word actually volunteer, because volunteer kind of

suggests that it's our choice. Well, scripture says, find a place to

serve, and serve. It's a place to pray. And one of the

sides of a healthy church will be a church that prays, not just on

Friday nights, not just before church on Sundays, but pray throughout the week.

And I get excited when I hear prayer being answered. I get excited

when I hear prayer being answered. But church is also a place to gather.

Now I want to call this out. I said this last week in

Stafford. I felt it's a season I'm walking in at the moment. It's

very interesting to listen to people's language. So if you invite someone to church

where they are Christian or not, if you invite them to the church you

go to, they will start by talking about your church. I came to

your church today because it's not their church. It's not their church. It's

your church because you invited them. You know, if they keep on coming,

it'll move from your church to our church or even my church, and

so I want to encourage you to listen to the language. Now. I

do not want to limit this because I've seen this hap with non believers,

people who are on a journey of faith, where they come to church and

you start hearing them use of the language of this is my church. They

haven't become Christians yet, but we're all on a journey. And so church

is a place to gather. Church is the place to grow friends and make

friends. The church is also a place to encourage one another. And let's

look at a couple of scriptures to do this. Firstly, in James chapter

five, verse sixteen, it says, confess your sins or trespasses to one

another, pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective favored

prayer of a righteous man achieves much. Where does that start? Starts with

find someone to have a chapter. Say Hey, I've had a pretty crummy

week this week. I got angry with my boss, I had some dreadful

thoughts. But pray with me, pray for one another. I use this

very regularly. I don't think I've said this for a while, so I'll

say it again. When somebody asks you how you are. Sometimes you don't

want to tell them. It's not convenient. The kids are around, you're

in a busy place. Actually, if you started talking, you know,

you'd burst into tears. I call it the third way. If people ask

you how you are, I could say I'm great, thanks very much,

and tell you that they're great. Maybe sometimes it'll be actually, you know

what, let's pretty crummy. And you get there, you get you ask

them how are you and they say I've had a dreadful week and this is

happening, and that's happening. And you almost want to look at your watch

and think, okay, this is twenty minutes now. But there is the

third way, and the third way says, actually, I've had a pretty

crummy week this week, but I can't talk about it right now. That's

honesty, that's integrity. But it's real. And the reason why it's real

is not just that's the way. But the person who's listening, if they're

a part of church, will probably think something like this. They'll think,

Okay, I need to pray for Dave, I need to pray for Juliet,

I need to pray for Jonathan whoever. The conversation was going on.

I need to pray for them because there's something going on, and there's something

we can do more than pray. And that's just in a moment next convenient

time saying, hey, you shared you'd had a tough week last week.

How's it going now? And if they still say it's still tough, well,

I prayed this week. And sometimes I think it's very important that we

kind of share that we prayed. I know Matthew says, go into your

private room and pray, and I know Matthew says that, but you know

what if God wakes you up and put someone in your heart and you pray

for them. If I've messaged a number of people this week and just said

I was thinking of you, pray for you today. And what's very interesting,

not surprising, but very interesting is the number of times people said,

I'm so pleased that it's right now today because this is going on, or

I can't talk about it right now, but there's something going on, so

keep on praying. The devil loves to put us in a corner, keep

us in a place where we think we're on our own. You know,

simple little things like a text or a message, saying, I'm praying for

you. I thought of you means hey, you're not alone. There's an

army behind you. I wonder how many other people haven't told them that they're

praying for them, And just one or two people say, God woke me

up in the middle of the night. The only person I could think about

was you. So I prayed and I felt peace and went straight back to

sleep again. You share that, and they're saying, do you know,

I had a really tough night last night. I couldn't get to sleep because

I'm not peaceful about these things. You know, That's that's really you know,

share your seems We've gone another pray, the effective fervorent prayer of a

righteous person achieves great things. And then a scripture that I love and I

always think of Jill when I read the scripture, and it's because Jill and

I were in tenor Reefs together on a mission trip with Hazes and other people,

and I remember being in this Spanish church and we were between the morning

service and the late morning service, and there was coffee and Jill was sitting

there on a sofa chatting to someone and I just turned to somebody else who

was from the local church and just said, there's the lady over there who's

sitting on the sofa speak any English and not as far as I know,

and never and Jill had this lady chatting away that really animated conversation, and

you know, Jill was communicating. Jill was encouraging this lady. And I

don't know how much she understood in the natural, but do you know what

we can encourage someone without having to understand the words they're saying. If you've

ever had Isabel greet you after church or around church on a Sunday, she

says encouraging words, sometimes in Spanish, but you know what, it's always

an encouragement. And I received that deposit she wants to encourage me. If

she wants to give me a deposit encouragement, I'll take it. I'll take

it every time. So Hebrews Chapter ten, Verses twenty four and twenty five.

Let's us consider how we may spur one another onto love and good works,

not the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some,

but it's sorts in one another. And so the more as we see that

they approach it. Now, I want I want to tackle this thing,

because this particular scripture is very interesting in the world of postcode, not forsaking

the assembling of ourselves together, gathering together. I think there's something tangible that

goes on when you meet as a body. There are things that you can

do here physically when we meet you cannot do online. You know, if

one of the ladies or one of the gentlemen's wearing a nice eau de cologne

or a perfume, you cannot experience that online, but you can be blessed

by it in church. You know, there's a nice smell in church.

You know, maybe that might be the holy fragrance. I guess God could.

I guess God could do that. I guess God could create the same

fragrance in multiple places, all at the same time. So that's possible.

But there is something tangible that goes on when we physically meet. But there's

also something tangible that goes on when we intentionally gather online too, if you're

just popping in a visiting but when we choose to connect, there are people

who are connected to our cf who say this is my church and have not

physically been to this building, but they intentionally gather. They joined the prayer,

they joined the WhatsApp prayer, they encourage one another. And so church

is so many things, and I want to come with a scripture that I

want to kind of close this out because I want to live on the edge

of where church wants to be. I don't want to be a comfortable church.

And I'm sharing this because I just want to share in part, I

don't want to be comfortable church. That means that sometimes there will people who

come through the door who aren't the same as men. Maybe they've got an

ear full of metal or spiky green hair. I'm just making up now.

I don't know whether you'd find that attractive or different. But yeah, there

will be people who join our church, who join r CF who do not

look like you or me. And that's great, and that's great. But

if we're going to push out the boundaries of what church is, we will

meet messed up people. We will meet broken people, We will meet broken

circumstances, and that means we need to get our hands dirty, you know,

if we need to. If you've got a blocked strain, when you

can keep on hoping it's going to go away, or you can get the

gloves on and you can get it unblocked, and it's dealt with. Sometimes

dealing with blockages is a messy thing. Sometimes dealing with people is a messy

thing. Do you know what, If there's mess, there's life there.

Used to be a prime school teacher, many many years ago, and sometimes

my classroom looked a mess. Sand over here, played O over here,

cut paper over here, three children reading a book over there, you know,

a couple of children disagreeing somewhere else. It looked like a mess,

but it was full of life. Do you know what? If we want

everything in order, do you know where? I'd recommend you going the graveyard,

the graveyards in order. There's plenty of stones there about the lives that

have been lived. And in some graveyards it's tidy and me but I want

to push out the boundaries. I sense that God is starting to do that

in our midst in lots of different ways. And therefore I'm really open to

questions say, well, what about this and what about that? Let's just

alide ourselves with God's purpose and let's do that. In Isaiah forty one,

verse ten, this is a scripture I've been lingering around for a while.

I know it well, fear not, for I am with you. Be

not dismayed, For I am your God. I will strengthen you. Yes,

I will help you. I will hold you with my righteous hand.

But fear not. One of the biggest challenges to something new is fear.

We don't like change. Let me just give you a simple example. You

used to drive to work, this, used to drive to your friends this

particular way, and then because of some major roadworks three months that road is

now going to be closed, you cannot travel that way. Your first response

is, who do they think they are digging up the road. This is

inconveniencing my route to wherever I'm going. Do you know what, when the

road gets finished and the roadworks have all gone, I'd be interested to see

whether you still go the old way or the new way. M hmm.

Just a thought. Fear not, for I am with you, not me,

not Dave. God. I am with you. God is with us.

Be not dismayed for God, For for God is our God. God

will strengthen us. Yes, he will help us. Yes, he will

uphold us with his righteous churches. Aman pray m hm. And I'm going

to start with that with I don't know whether your picture. People, I'm

going to start in prayer without asking you to imagine a blank sheet of paper,

and then you're going to draw a picture of church on that blank sheet

of paper. And maybe maybe some of us need to go away and do

this in our own time. Draw a picture of church and then just write

some words around it and see, you know, because some of the things

we will write will be things that we would like to see in church but

are not yet there. Some of the things that the things we see in

church we don't want to see in church. But it's a dirty, messy

place, church's life. But however we draw church, where would you draw

yourself on the outside, looking in, on the inside, looking out on

the inside, with hands reaching the outsiding, Welcome, come join us,

Father God, I pray you'd enlarge our vision for everyone who's listening. You'd

enlarge our vision of what you want to do in this church. Father,

Would you enlarge our vision of what we can do to play our part?

Would you enlarge our vision, Lord God, to serve you to pray,

to reach the community, to reach the lost, to see miracles on the

streets of ego and beyond. Father, to hear testimonies coming back from other

nations of the impact of your word going out from this place and your worship

going out from this place. Father, on a prayer and edgy prayer,

that there would be no nation that is not touched by something that happens here

over the next decade, Lord God, no nation, because your scripture says

you want to reach all peoples in all nations, and there are still people

to be rich. Thank you for the technology that enables us. Father,

help us to play our part. So Father, help us to be encourage

us, help us to be prayers, help us to be friends, and

help us to serve for your glory with prayer in Jesus' name, Amen, Jerey two