DIY Sunday Service Kit 17/07/22 - 1 John 5:16-20

 Welcome to this week's DIY Sunday Service Kit with everything you need for worship at home.

Here's a quick preview of the sermon, to whet your appetite.

Let's prepare our hearts to worship the Lord

Psalm 90 draws the people out to worship God like this:

"Lord, you have been our dwelling place

                                                                                    throughout all generations.
2 Before the mountains were born
    or you brought forth the whole world,
    from everlasting to everlasting you are God."

Psalm 90:1-2

And the band Sovereign Grace take us on through the thoughts in that psalm with their song 'From everlasting ...'

The Word for the Week video this week is a bit 'herbal' ...

Let's pray

Sovereign Lord, in this uncertain and changing world we thank you today that we are able to come to speak personally with the unchanging and eternal God, Who anchors everything in His eternity and in His constancy of character and purpose.

Draw our hearts out in awe and wonder we pray today at your constancy and loving care for your fragile people.

We pray for Jesus' sake.

AMEN.

Prayer points

• Sri Lanka

Today we pray for Sri Lanka which has been in the news recently with riots brought about by the rapidly rising cost of living and shortages of food and fuel.

This situation has led to the very recent escape from the country and resignation of the President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, and the situation is now unstable and uncertain.

Tolerance and non-violence have historically been watchwords of Sri Lanka. For centuries, it was a Buddhist kingdom that welcomed refugees from India fleeing persecution – Hindus, Muslims and Christians. However, this multi-religious, multi-ethnic country now sees religious extremism and persecution rising.

Seventy per cent of the population are said to be still Buddhist and 1.2% are said to be Evangelical. A recent attempt to bring in an anti-conversion bill in the country is in abeyance, but the proposed legislation has not been cancelled.

Let's pray for Sri Lanka in its current troubles, for:

• The establishment of a government that will act in the interests of the people to secure the provision of sufficient food and fuel for this developing economy at a price that its people can afford
• The disarming of the spiritual powers and principalities that heavily influence a very religious society. Beneath the layers of Buddhism and Hinduism lie an ancient cocktail of spirits, gods and demons which are not at all good for the people's spiritual health.
• The exposure of the realities underlying Buddhist extremism. 
  This has taken shape as a very ethnocentric Sinhalese response to Tamil intransigence and to waves of Christian “proselytism”.
  But it has also been used to polarize society, to unduly influence politics and the military, and to marginalize and suppress ethnic and religious minorities.
  Pray that such extremism might create disillusionment and generate interest in the gospel.
• In particular we pray for Cristian leaders in Sri Lanka in these troubled times, particularly for Ajith Fernando who serves as Teaching Director of Youth for Christ in Sri Lanka after being National Director for 35 years. These days his main responsibilities in YFC are counselling, mentoring and teaching staff and volunteers. His grassroots ministry has been and is primarily with the urban poor but he mentors many Christian leaders across the land and helps them through the traumas that their ministries are engaged with in these troubled times.

Lord in your mercy hear our prayers for Sri Lanka, for the new political leaders that it needs, for its good governance that its people and particularly its poor might be well-served and for the courage, faith, fortitude and wisdom of its Christian leaders. May your Word be applied powerfully to many hearts in Sri Lanka in these troubled times.

• Iran

Iran is currently embroiled in a crisis with the US and other Western countries over its nuclear programme. It has breached limits imposed under a 2015 international agreement that began to unravel after Mr Biden's predecessor, Donald Trump, abandoned it in 2018 and reinstated crippling economic sanctions.

Iran has been moving steadily closer to Russia and is now one of its few allies over the war in Ukraine.

The U.S. said this week it has intelligence to suggest Iran plans to supply Russia with potentially hundreds of drones for its war in Ukraine, some with combat capabilities.

Iran has reportedly said technological co-operation with Russia preceded the war, without confirming or denying the US claim.

In terms of the tensions in the Middle East, Israel considers the Iranian nuclear programme to be its greatest threat, though Iran insists it is peaceful. On a trip to Israel this week, President Joe Biden pledged that the US is "prepared to use all elements of its national power" to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.

The spiritual situation in Iran is that the Islamic Revolution of 1979, led by Ayatollah Khomeini, created the world’s only Shiite Islamic theocracy and profoundly changed every aspect of life in Iran. 

Today, however, many of those who committed their lives to Islam and Islamic rule are filled with despair. This disillusionment has opened new doors for the gospel, which is sweeping across the nation via Christian media and bold evangelists in Iran’s growing house church movements. 

Nevertheless, the government continues its attempts to thwart this move of God. Christian leaders and pastors are often arrested, tortured and imprisoned, and their families are harassed. Some, left with no other options, choose to flee the country.

It is illegal to own, print, import or distribute Bibles in Iran.

Creative ways to give access to God's Word are proving successful, often using advanced Information Technology as well as broadcasting, and there are many accounts of the Lord speaking to Iranian people in dreams and bringing them to faith in spite of the lack of access to printed Bibles.

Pray for Iran:

• For the protection and the prospering of persecuted believers in the underground house churches
• For the innovative ways being used to communicate the Gospel to be greatly used of God
• For the rulers of Iran to seek and find security and greater prosperity in alliances with peaceful Allie on the international scene
• For the peace of the Middle East and the security of the entire region

• Westminster

Finally, let's pray for the Conservative Party leadership contest at Westminster, about which we know a great deal already.

• Pray for the right candidate to be found
• Pray that this person will be able to unite not just the various wings of the party, but the country in going forward in righteousness and truthfulness 
• That the new leader will renew the prizing of the values of discipline, integrity and compassion in public and private life
• That in keeping with Proverbs 14:34, righteousness would once more exalt our nation and that the sin which is a reproach to any people would be rejected and repudiated by our people.

Lord in your mercy, please hear our prayers for our troubled world, which we ask in Jesus' Name.

AMEN.

Here's the studio cam from the recording of the sermon

Now let's respond to God's Word by singing ...

Let's conclude in prayer

Father we thank you that you have fed our souls in worship and from your Word.

We pray that in the course of the coming week we shall chew these things well, and renew our fellowship with you often so that we may be fed further, according to our needs as the week develops.

Grant that we might know growth in grace and sense often the presence of your Holy Spirit, prompting us and helping us to walk in your ways and to serve you in the world the you have made.

We ask for Jesus' sake and for His greater glory.

AMEN.

If you would like to support the work of y GRWP by worshipping through giving please feel free to click the Stewardship link below and if you'd like to get in touch please email me or alternatively text or phone.

HoWChaplain@gmail.com

07748 644958

May the Lord bless you very richly this week!