(Post Speech Notes)
Worship was a little more than I expected. Didn’t expect one of the singers to go on her knees. Old worship move, she probably got this elsewhere, but I suppose it had its intended effect. Or maybe she was really brought to her knees.
I’m not surprised. The song that was playing at the time was a good one: With All I Am, by Hillsong, way back when Darlene Zschech was in their group. There aren’t a lot of sweeter words for a minister to hear – ‘Jesus, I believe in You.’
We have more and more folks being brought to the pulpit to testify and exhort on giving, and on Holy Communion. As I was listening to them I was expecting to pick up even more reasons why I probably should already have some guidelines on these said portions of the worship service… but to my surprise, I enjoyed what the assigned folks had to share.
Because, indeed, by the blood of Christ we have been reconciled, and as such we are brought to worship, as the song goes: With All I Am. For the giving portion we were also treated with a testimony of how God brings us through fire and trial into abundance.
When it was my turn to speak I remember encouraging everyone else in the congregation that the time given to them on the pulpit can be seen more as an opportunity than it is a chore. Because, I said, who else can testify for God’s goodness in your life, better than you? And it’s not even a question of technicality (grammar and accent and public speaking prowess); literally nobody else can explain better than you, because you’re you.
With that out of the way I gave an update to everyone regarding other ministries we’ve been giving help to, as well as giving the congregation a heads-up on who else may need our help… and then we prayed as an opening to the message to be delivered.
I thought it would be a good idea if we not only dwelled on the Word of the Lord for us this year… It would probably help us if we also visited the messages of other Pastors during this season.
Andrew Farley shared, in his last message on the last Sunday of 2023, which was also the last day of 2023: That it shouldn’t always be the case that we adapt the slogan, ‘New Year, New You’ every time we transition from one year to the next. With the help of ChatGPT, and for lack of time, we were able to have an idea of what he wanted us to focus on, instead.
What we pulled up was a message that emphasizes the idea of celebrating the newness brought about by the grace of God, all within the context of the New Year; In other words, before we even take action for ourselves to assert this ‘new you’ according to our point of view (which, for most people, implies going on a diet, and/or a fitness regime – pretty much stopping bad things and starting new ‘good’ things), perhaps it’s in every New Year celebration where it’s timely for us to understand (and appreciate) what Christ made new for us, through His finished work:
First, we have a New Covenant: Dr. Farley emphasizes the better promises of the New Covenant in contrast to the Old Testament laws. Here I emphasized that we’re no longer under a covenant which is dependent on our works, but we are under a new covenant which was established by Christ’s finished work, and maintained though Christ’s righteousness.
Next, Dr. Farley reminds us that we are New Creations: He discusses the concept of believers being a new creation in Christ. Here I explained that, indeed, part of our being new creations is that we are no longer the old creation. No longer are we sinners doomed to die, but we are made temples of the Holy Spirit.
Going down the list, I began to see how it all may be tied together. Because after Dr. Farley reminds us that we are new creations, he then tells us that we have a New Heart and Spirit. The following verse is explored: And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26); This is focusing on the idea that through Christ, our being given a new heart and spirit was fulfilled at the point of salvation.
It’s here that I emphasized something else that Dr. Farley is fond of sharing – that is, that if we try to sin again after being saved, it doesn’t feel as good as it used to; Proof that we do have a new heart and a new Spirit unto righteousness, which suits us more.
Not only do we have a New Covenant, and not only are we made New Creations with a New Heart and Spirit, but we also have a New Commandment: Jesus Christ explained, in the Gospels, that the Law can be summarized into two: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, body and strength,’ and ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’. I regret to have just said, in passing, that we couldn’t do this. We couldn’t love the Lord with ALL our heart, and much less ALL of our being… but now that I think about it, I should have mentioned that trying our best doesn’t count. It’s all or nothing.
Fortunately, I do remember emphasizing that the Old Commandment brings us to the end of ourselves, that we would find reason to seek God, or rather, to seek Christ, who is the end of the Law, and the fulfillment of the this Law. Thus, the New Commandment comes from Christ Himself, and He says we are to believe in the One God has sent, and we are to love one another, as He has loved us.
No longer do we love for God to love us, but we love because Christ loved us. You’ll see this pattern as we keep going, because we also are New Wine in New Wineskins; Another perspective to how we are New Creations, not only have we been made new from the viewpoint of the end of our old selves, but we have also been made new in the sense that we have been made suitable ‘containers’ of the Holy Spirit.
Sad to say I didn’t really dwell too much there, and jumped right into how we have Newfound Freedom: According to the AI that transcribed Dr. Farley’s words, and then ChatGPT that summarized it for me, here’s where he explores the idea that Christ set believers free for freedom, encouraging them to stand firm in the liberty provided by the gospel.
At the time I didn’t really dwell about it but now that I have my reading through Genesis and Exodus in mind, I’m brought to realize that the Israelites back in the day did have freedom – in the form of their freedom from Egypt. Symbolically we’ve been led to understand that their freedom from Egypt is also a sign of our freedom from ‘sin’ and/or the gods of this world (pushing in how we point out that the gods of egypt were all rendered powerless by God’s plagues upon them)…
…But the freedom we’ve been led to understand and appreciate here was not freedom FROM anything, more than it is freedom TO something. In other words we haven’t just been set free FROM sin, but we’ve been set free TO righteousness unto eternal life.
I’m thinking this has more elaboration as we wrap up what Dr. Farley shares to us, because the next new thing we talk about is a New Kind of Forgiveness: The following Scripture is highlighted: “For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.” (Hebrews 10:14); This is emphasizing that believers have been perfected for all time, with no ongoing need for forgiveness.
I focused more on sharing that just as we are able to love because Christ loves us, so we are also able to forgive because Christ forgives us, and forgave us first. Just as the woman caught in adultery, He does not condemn us – therefore, we go, and sin no more.
We also have a New Way to Think: The summary says that here Dr. Farley ‘encourages believers to set their minds on spiritual truths, emphasizing the transformative power of understanding the depth of God’s grace.’; Here, however, I thought that because we have been made New Creations, we’ve also been given a new way to think, in the sense that once, we thought we do what we do for God to love us, but now, the way we think is that we know that Christ loves us and forgave us, so we are able to love and forgive.
In other words, we’ve been brought from a self-dependent way of thinking, to a Christ-celebrating way of thinking. As such, we’ve also been given a New Way to Serve: Dr. Farley emphasizes that we are now serving in the newness of the spirit, contrasting it with serving under the pressure of obligation or earning blessings.
We no longer serve for God to love us; we serve because God loves us. As such, we no longer serve for God to bless us, nor are we serving to avoid God’s curse… No, we serve out of the overflow of blessings we have, and the absolute forgiveness and redemption from the curse… we serve from Christ’s finished work.
Finally, Dr. Farley concludes with our having a New Hope: We are eagerly awaiting the return of Christ, emphasizing the anticipation of receiving a new resurrection body.
I was pretty pumped up by that message, which I honestly went through just moments before I shared about it… This next message by Joseph Prince was not from a complete transcript, but rather, from highlights… but I think it was more than enough, because we got a lot of value from the verses that were shown:
And he sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him, and wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ And he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready; there prepare for us.”
Mark 14:13-15
I shared what Pastor Prince had to share: First, if we find ourselves in ministry where our thirst is being quenched, then we should stay there. Wherever we find ourselves, the ministries we are directed to are not without water in the form of the Holy Spirit.
Second, let us not be surprised if we are led to somewhere, where everything has already been set up. Just as the Israelites were led to wells that have already been dug up, so we’re also led to the upper room, one that is ‘furnished and ready’.
Finally, I did notice that Pastor Prince proclaimed 2024 as their year of the Upper Room; Not the Year of finding water and furnishings, but the focus was on the upper room. I then mentioned that Pastor Prince pointed out how miracles and renewals and revivals happened in the upper room. The example of 1 Kings 17, for example, tells us that Elijah revives a boy in the upper room. And in the New Testament, it’s also in the upper room where Peter tells the dead Dorcas to get up (Acts 9).
Now at this point, I transitioned to my message (that is, my own personal revisiting of the first verses of Psalm 20), but not without telling everyone that I hoped that they were being refreshed in our worship services as well. Cringe, I know, but I just had to tell everyone within the sound of my voice – if you aren’t being refreshed, then we ought to know.
After the service, there were other observations and feedback that I gathered… But I think I’ll stop here for now.
Until the next post, God bless you.
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