This morning we heard from Tony, who brought us a sermon from Job, the book we have been reading in our daily SOAP readings. As we went through Job, we saw how Job was hedged in by God and put into a corner through his circumstances after he refused to listen to God and deal with what God wanted him to deal with. God will speak to us individually, then if we don’t listen then, he will use a messenger and finally cause us to listen through circumstances - as Job found out.
Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar are Job’s three friends who try to help him with his problems. However they only hinder Job and end up making him angry. Job now has to deal with two problems - his health and his friends.
Now that Job is in this position, we can learn from the way he deals with it and apply the keys of Job’s victory to our life.

1. Job was convicted of heart (Job 19:23-27). He knew that his redeemer lived, he believed in the resurrection. He had absolute assurance of that fact.
2. Attitude of mind (Job 23:8-12). Job praised God when he didn’t feel like it. Keep praying and reading the bible when you don’t feel like it.
3. Confessions of his mouth (Job 13:15a). Preach and believe what is in the word It doesn’t matter if you haven’t been healed, the bible teaches healing, so preach and believe that.
4. Job’s final challenge (Job 13:15b). He had to change his attitude toward his friends.

After Job realised all this, God finally spoke to him. Job repented (Job 40:3-5 and Job 42:7-9) and also changed his attitude toward his friends. God then restored him with twice as much as he had previously. Our challenge is to deal with hidden fears (1 John 1:5-7) and wrong relationships (Mat 5:44) because they damage our salvation, our prayer life, our healing process and our communion.
This was a great sermon that was especially relevant to our SOAP readings. If you’re not doing your SOAP readings, you’re robbing yourself of some great opportunities for God to speak to you.

In the evening, Pauline took us through 5 elements of friendship - love, honesty, respect, loyalty and trust. She invited the congregation to share their thoughts on what they thought each element was made up of. As we progressed, we saw that each element was found in all the other elements.
Respect involves building Godly character and accepting one another. Honesty means telling the whole truth and not leaving bits out. Trust is having a belief in something and also trusting who is saying it.
All the things involved in natural friendships are invovled in our relationship with God.
How are your friendships going? How is your relationship with God going? Are there any elements of friendship that you need to work on?

Make sure you get along to church next Sunday morning! We are launching REAP! This is a strategy that is going to see many people come to Christ. We are also going to be talking about our vision and goals for the coming year. It’s going to be great! Along with that we will also be commissioning a few of our key leaders as we head into the new year.
See you all there!

Today we had a great day, just spending time with God and being reminded that God just wants a relationship with us.
We started the day with a great time of praise and worship through song and spent an extended amount of time in communion with God. After this we had communion, where Carol reminded us that we need to check in with Jesus everyday. Pauline then extended this theme during the sermon. When we spend time with God, he wants us to have a relationship with Him. He wants us to tell Him exactly what we’re thinking. We can be as close to Jesus as we want to be, it’s up to us to make the effort and spend time with Him. The book of Psalms is a good example. We see how David ranted, raved and had passion - all the range of emotions were there. He had a genuine relationship with God. Expressing doubt is a good way to develop a relationship with God. After you’ve expressed your doubts, God can speak to you and allow faith to develop. Love God and follow Him because He has set your free. Allow this relationship to overflow to others and reach out to them. It is easier to minister and reach out to others when your heart is connected to God.
Rom 8:1-17 was the basis for Alan’s evening message. Through Jesus, our past is gone. Walking with the spirit allows us to set our minds on the things of the spirit and when we do that, the flesh will drop away. Walking with the spirt brings joy and peace (Rom 8:6) and it is this spirit that guides us and lives in us. The spirit of God needs to be our controlling influence. This spirit of God that raised Christ from the dead is in us, gives life to our bodies and leads us into sonship and a relationship with God. As a father, God’s love for us is perfect. A father’s love for his son is not perfect, but he will still cherish his children. How much more then, does God cherish us. We are His sons and He will look after us and loves it when we come to Him and develop a relationship with Him.

Without a doubt, God is calling us to a new level in Him. The way to do this is through an intimate relationship with Him, which can only be developed by spending time with God and sharing our lives with Him.

Hopefully your SOAP readings are going well. Those who are doing it are really enjoying it and God is speaking to everyone through it.
In a couple of weeks we will have Vision Sunday, where we will expand our vision and goals for the church this year and launch REAP. Make sure you don’t miss that!

What a week! We had a great prayer day on Thursday and the strategies that came out of that day will set the ball rolling for the year to come! REAP will be coming, which is going to be the catalyst for something great in the Kingdom of God. God will use us in a mighty way as we apply the principles of REAP. Don’t know what REAP is? Well stay tuned and all will be revealed! On Sunday night we had one person give their heart to the Lord and another recommitt their lives to the Lord!!! YEAH GOD! The even better thing about that is that they were friends of somebody whom we had specifically prayed for at our Thursday meeting. God is doing great things and we are going to REAP a mighty harvest for the Lord this year!

Our Sunday evening speaker was Carol, who again brought a challenging message for us all to consider. Doing your best is what matters. God calls us all to different areas in our lives and sometimes these are areas that we may not necessarily want to step into. It is in these circumstances where we need to give 100% all the time. You may not become the best in your field, but if you have given your best, then that is all that God will require - your best will be good enough. God will equip and help you to do your best and you need not feel inadequate. As people step out into these new areas, it is the responsibility of all of us to encourage one another. What areas is God calling you to step out into and give it your best shot?

In the morning, Alan continued the faith message from the previous week. He expanded Heb 11:11-12 and Rom 4:16-22. In Heb 11:11, we read how Abraham considered God faithful. It’s not the strength of our faith, but God’s faithfulness that counts. When we gain a greater revelation of God’s faithfulness, through reading His word, we will build up our faith. We believe in a God who calls things that are not as though they were (Rom 4:17). The 5 keys to faith from Romans 4:16-22 are:

1. Faith requires confrontation. Abraham looked at the circumstances, acknowledged that in the natural the facts made it look like it was impossible, but still chose to believe God.
2. Faith requires persistance. Even when things went wrong, they persisted pressing into God.
3. Faith requires maintenance. Abraham was strengthened - he allowed his faith to grow. Feed your faith with the word of God, be around people who will encourage you.
4. Faith requires praise. Give glory to God, even when things aren’t going well.
5. Faith requires persuasion. Abraham was persuaded that God was faithful and he believed that God was faithful.

God is going to do some amazing things this year. As you continue in your walk with God, ask yourself are you giving God your best. Are you giving God your best praise, your best worship, your best effort in the things He has called you to do, your best effort in SOAP bible readings, the best effort in building your faith? All God will ever ask of you is your best, which will be good enough for Him.

If you can make it, get along to the Thursday prayer meetings. If not, get along to a service next Sunday. The next life changed could be yours!

Today we heard from Tony, who shared from Heb 11:8-16 on the 4 secrets of the faith of Abraham.
1. See the promises. Heb 11:13 (NKJ). Abraham saw the promises. Jesus saw the promises. He didn’t see the price, but saw the ending. To see the promises of God, you need to spend time in the word and meditate on the word.
2. They were assured of them. (Heb 11:13). The Holy Spirit is our guarantee that the promises in the Bible will come to pass (2 Cor 5:5). To be assured of the promises, spend time praising God, thanking Him for the promises. Praise makes the scripture a living reality in our hearts.
3. Embrace the promises (Action). Heb 11:8 sees Abraham going as God commanded. He then had to see where to go next, but he moved and placed himself in a position where God could use him. It’s easier to turn a moving ship than a stationary one.
4. They confessed. Don’t let your vision die. Confess it, talk to people about it. Mat 6:21 says that where our treasure is, there our heart will be. What do you talk about? Do you talk about your vision or your passion?
Abraham saw the promises, was assured of them, embraced the promises by action, and confessed the promises. God was proud to be their God. When things get tough, don’t look back, keep pressing on toward the goal. (Heb 11:15).

In the evening, we heard from Alan. We saw how Abram’s start of walking with God was submitting to his father (Gen 11:27-32). His father led him out of Ur and God worked through those circumstances to get Abram into the place where he wanted him to be.
Abram then heard the “call of God” (Gen 12:1-3). At this point, Abram and Lot decide to separate. Often when you hear the call of God, you need to be separated from the selfish ambitions, desires and needs in your life. When you lay these down, God will expand the vision he has given you. This is reflected in Abram’s life, when God challenges him (Gen 13:14-15), but only after Lot has left. Abram could have whatever he saw. We will be limited by what we see - in both the natural and the spiritual.
God moved Abram through his circumstances. Once he began to move, God was able to lead him. He got rid of the Lot’s in his life and God was able to speak to him.

There was an air of excitement today at church as we gathered as a church for the last time for 2006.
Our music today rocked and we had a great time of praise and worship. One of the prophetic words spoken during this time was to dream big dreams. God is in the business of doing the impossible, so dream big!
The communion message by Carol reminded us that it’s not the beginning or the end of our life that is the most important, but rather the pages in between. As we come into 2007, its up to us to write the pages of the book between the beginning and the end. We can look at the example of Jesus who can teach us so much from the pages of the book of His life.
All this laid the perfect foundation for Pauline to come and bring the Word. I’ve heard many sermons on dreams and desires and it is easily one of my favourite sermon topics. Naturally Pauline brought an excellent word. As we come into the new year, we need to reflect on the year just been. Examine our lives and see whether we have anything out of kilter. If we, have fix those, then continue to dream. We all have God given dreams and desires deep down which He will use for His glory and God is a God who wants to see us acheive the dreams He has given us.
After we dream big, we need to take steps to get toward the goal. Use every day as a learning curve. Let the passion drive you. Develop a passion to see the community reached and use your God given passions and desires in the community. (Ps 37:4)
We saw how Joseph was given a dream by God. He held onto that dream even when it looked like it wouldn’t happen. God was with him throughout the chapters of his life and even when Joseph was going through the hard times in his life, he was driven by his love for God and his passion to see that God given dream fulfilled. Joseph didn’t become bitter, but made the best of those circumstances.

This year we have a responsibilty to light the community with the love of God. If we don’t want God to use us, then why are we here?

Later on that day, we gathered for a fellowship tea and once again we had great food and fellowship. After we’d eaten, we counted down some of the most popular songs we’d played during the year. This was broken up by testimonies from different people who testified to some of the awesome things God had done during the year in their lives. While the church may not have grown numerically this year, the growth in our members has been extraordinary and lays a great foundation to build on next year. Perhaps the most amazing part of the night was the impromptu words of encouragment and thanks spoken over Pastor Alan. As a church we have been through some tough times over the last 18 months and we have been blessed to have a man of integrity and compassion lead us through them. He is a man who has a heart after God, who dreams big dreams and is not afraid to chase the dreams he has been given by God. It’s not always easy to stand against strong oppostion, however Alan has done this with his integrity intact and his character strengthened. Thankyou Alan for being a great guy, having a heart after God and the courage and character to bring the church to where it is today. Without you, many of us would have fallen away and failed to grow as much as we have. You have challenged us, inspired us and encouraged us. I am sure that God will bless you and Sue as the church moves to the next level.

Dream big dreams coming into 2007. Seek God and ask Him to give you a passion for the things that He wants you to do. Be encouraged that God can do exceedingly abundantly more than you can ask or think!
2007 is going to be a great year. God is going to move in our community and He is going to use us to do it! Amen! DREAM ON!