3 May 2026
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Today Harry wraps up his series on Ephesians, with this thought provoking, heartfelt look at what it means to live out our faith in community.
Well, I feel a bit sad today because this is our last message in the in Ephesians. I just love this letter. I think it’s my favorite. I know you shouldn’t have favorites, but this and John’s gospel at this. And uh I’m encouraging you again to memorize this book. You said impossible. All things are possible for God working through you, memorize it. There’s only 155 verses. Only? Romans, whoa. That’s nearly got 155 chapters. No. Yeah, memorize it.
This might be only for one person in this place, but I really feel I’ve got to say that today, memorize this book. It might be, who is it? Might be all of you, but it might be one person, memorize this book. It will bless you spiritually, I promise you.
The thing about memorizing, when you’ve memorized chapter one, and you start to memorize chapter two, you’ve got to keep chapter one going. Then when you memorize chapter two, you start on chapter three and you got to keep chapter one and two going and so on and so forth. So you keep chapters one, two, three, four, five going while you start memorizing chapter six. Simple. The Lord will help you.
There’s so much in the scriptures about meditate on this word. When? Day and night. Who said that? Day and night, day and night, Victoria, Amen. Meditate on this word day and night. I think if we went back in time, we’d be amazed at the spiritual standard that was. And slowly over time we’ve lost it, you know, we’ve lost it. We’ve got more carnal, more worldly, more wrapped up with all the things, the distractions of the world and that’s grown gone cold. We’re miles away from the word of God. Meditate on this word day and night. And then you will be blessed for sure. Prosperous and successful, and I’m not talking about material prosperity, that might come. But spiritual prosperity. Meditate on this day and night and you will be blessed.
So, this is our concluding message and I just remind you some of the great things that have been said about this book of Ephesians. One of the divinest compositions of man. Somebody else said the very divinest composition of man. As he’s inspired by the Holy Spirit. As Ian reminded us in our prayer, we’re all dependent on the Holy Spirit. The crown and climax, the crown and climax of Pauline theology. That’s the Apostle Paul, amazing theologian. 13 books in the New Testament. Amazing, one man so in tune with God that he’s written 13 books that we’ve still got today. That’s amazing. It’s amazing we’ve got this book. After thousands of years, we’ve got this book still. It should be the center of life in this nation. It used to be. It should be again. Pray for that. Somebody else said the crown and climax, the crown and climax of Pauline theology. Somebody else said the quintessence, the quintessence of Paulism. And so it goes on and this is one I picked up this week. Pound for pound, pound for pound, Ephesians, I’ve lost it. Where’s it gone? There it is. Pound for pound, Ephesians may well be the most influential document ever written. Only the Psalms, the Gospel of John and Romans have been so instrumental in shaping the life and thought of Christianity within the history of Christianity. But those works are much longer. Ephesians is only six chapters, 155 verses. And John’s gospel is 21 chapters, Romans is 16 chapters, the Psalms, there’s 150 books in the Psalms, but this one little book, massive impact on people’s lives and I promise you, it will make a massive impact on your life. If you feel you’re just, you know, a bit like this in the Christian life, back and forth, back and forth, lukewarm, a little bit warmer, so on and so forth. Get into this book and get this book into you and it will transform your lives. I promise you. And you can come back to me next year and say, it’s worked. Hallelujah. Then you can give me a fiver. No, that’s a joke.
So, we’re going to have a quick scan through the whole book today. Where does this book start? Where does this book start? It starts with God. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It starts with God and that’s where we should start. Every one of us start with God. Start your day with God. You’ve got a problem, start with God. You got a difficulty, start with God. We often forget to pray, don’t we? We’ve got a problem. We do all these other things and then we say, oh, I didn’t pray. Start with God.
The whole Bible starts with God, doesn’t it? In the beginning, God. Amen. In the beginning, God. That’s where we’ve gone wrong in this nation. We no longer start with God. We start with everything else. We don’t start with God. Why don’t we start with God? Because we’ve moved away from God. We’ve moved away from Jesus Christ. We’ve moved away from the Holy Spirit as a nation. We used to say grace before every meal. We used to have assemblies about God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit in this in in school every day. We used to have prayers, Bible readings every day. Where’s it gone? Where’s it gone? How do we get it back? We’ve got to pray, folks. Pray like you’ve never prayed before. Pray that Jesus Christ will come back to the heart of this nation right to the center.
It starts with God. Blessed be the God and Father. And it starts with the Trinity. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed in heavenly realm with every spiritual blessing, Holy Spirit. You only get spiritual blessings from the Holy Spirit. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the son, giving us every spiritual blessing, Holy Spirit. And if we’ve got that focus and that balance in our lives, we’re going to go far. He starts with God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
And in this passage, this one passage is loaded. Even if you just memorize this passage that Ian read, it’s loaded with teaching and doctrine and theology, amazing theology. And it covers three time scales, eternity. We’re talking about the eternal God, folks. No one can match our eternal God. No one. He’s outside time. How how do you fathom that out in our little minds? The eternal God who’s outside time. He’s before the beginning, he’s after the end. He knows the end from the very beginning.
And you know what? Do you know when these blessings took place? Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who blessed us in the heavenly realms. It wasn’t in the earthly realms, it was the heavenly realms where he blessed us. Why was that? Because there was no earthly realm at the time. And this will take some thinking.
And it says, for he chose us, every one of you, all his people, he chose us. Praise the Lord. He should this should make us feel amazing. It should not make us feel proud because we’re going to tell look at what we were before this happened. Before we came to Jesus Christ. For he chose us in him. And everything’s always in him. Everything’s always through the cross. Everything’s always in Christ. He chose us in him when? When did he choose us? Thank you, Roland, before the foundation of the world.
Now, don’t trouble your little minds. I’ve been trying to work it out and it nearly have to you’ll blow a fuse if you try and work it out too much. He chose us in him, Jesus Christ, before the foundation of the world. How awesome is that? Before the foundation of the world, he chose us. And I’ll tell you something. You know when God determines to do something, he’s going to do it. Do you know that? When he says this is my will, he is going to do it and he’s going to bring it to pass and it will happen. And he chose us in him before the foundation of the world because he can do that, he’s eternal. And don’t say, ah, ah, he chose us because he saw we would believe. No, it doesn’t mean that. The whole context goes against that. The word chose goes against that. He chose us full stop.
God chooses. Do you know that? Whether you like it or not, I love it. He chooses. What did he say about Israel? I did not choose you because you were great or many people because you was the least. You was the least. God chooses us to the praise of his glory. God chooses us because it’s according to his pleasure and will. It gives God pleasure to choose you. Does that make you feel good? Well, let your faces know, folks. You look a bit serious today. He chose you not for anything you did or would do or have done. No. That would go against it. He chose you according to his pleasure and will.
Didn’t Jesus say to the disciples, you 12, you didn’t choose me, but I chose you. Huh? Were the disciples there fishing away. Oh, I wonder when Jesus is going to come and call us. When’s Jesus going to come and call us, guys? No, they were so wrapped up with fishing, they had no concept of Jesus Christ coming along, follow me. Calling them, follow me. If you are worshiping Jesus today, Jesus has come and said that to you, come, follow me. Come, follow me, and I’ll make you fishes of men.
How did Paul introduce this letter? Now, let’s remember what Paul was like. I’ve said it enough from this pulpit. He was a reprobate, wasn’t he? He said, I was the chief of sinners. I was a blasphemer. I was a violent man. Do you want me to go on? He was pure evil that guy. He was destroying the church of Jesus Christ. And how does he start this letter to the Ephesians? Paul, an apostle by the will of God. You are sitting here today because of the will of God worked in your life at some point. Paul, who used to be Saul of Tarsus, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. Amen. Gordon, by the will of God. Stella, by the will of God. Ian, Rose, Christine, Diane, Ian, Roland. My mind’s gone blank. Justin and Benita by the will of God. That’s the danger thing when you start going around the room, you suddenly have these blanks and forget your name. Janet, by the will of God. All of you, by the will of God.
So, we see the work here of the Father. The Father chose us in his son before the creation of the world. And he has a purpose for us in choosing us, and this is the purpose that we become holy and blameless in his sight. Amen. Holy and blameless in his sight. Now, you might think that’s impossible, but it’s God we’re talking about. And I know one thing about God, he gets his own way. He does.
Again, go back to Saul of Tarsus. This guy, he thinks he can destroy the church of Jesus. No chance. Saul, Saul, it’s hard for you, Saul, to kick against the goats. And I tell you what, if you happen not to give into God, not to give into Jesus, not to give into the Holy Spirit, not to give into the Father, it’s going to be hard for you. Go, go ahead, come on, rebel. Go on, rebel. And I’ll tell you what, it will be hard for you. You will spiral down. You will spiral down. And you can fight till you’re right there in the pigsty, but you won’t win. He will win. So, why don’t you give in now? Why rebel and rebel and rebel and rebel? And then you’re going to end up in rock bottom anyway, and maybe you’ll come to your senses down there. Why don’t you come to your senses here? Why go all the way down?
I feel like saying that to some people I know. Not here, of course, you know, you you’re almost perfect here, I know. I feel like saying that to some people. They’re so kicking and against the Lord and against his ways and you see him going down and down and down and down. I saw a guy in Ardwick back in 1999. I said, you need to give up the drink. I used to have a problem with drink. You need to give it up. He said, I can handle it. I can handle it. I can give up any time I want. I see him 30 years later. He’s still. It’s sad, isn’t it? Why didn’t you give into Jesus in 1999? You could have been preaching now in front of thousands of people. Give in to the Lord, folks. Don’t fight him. He’s going to win.
So, God the Father has chosen us in him to be holy and blameless in his sight. He’s chosen us to adopt us, predestin us to be adopted as into his family. And he’s chosen us to do good works, which he has prepared in advance for us to do. We’ll come back to that in a minute. That’s the work of the Father choosing us. 1 verse 3, 4, 1 verse 4, 5. Predestin us.
And you know, it says in Romans, it’s a beautiful verse in Romans, using these same sort of words, for those God for knew, those he knew from eternity to eternity, he also predestined, listen to this one now, to be conformed to the image of his son. Think of that, folks. You might feel rubbish about yourself. Don’t look at yourself, look at him because he’s going to make you into the image of his son. What does it say when we see him on that day, when we see him face to face, we shall be like him. Doesn’t the scriptures keep repeating and repeating and getting the same message. I think it’s because we’re slow learners. You keep having to have it said to you in all different ways and different places.
He is conforming us, every one of us. And if I see any doubt on your faces, I’m going to say it again. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. And I’m going to say it again. I see doubt. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. And again, I’ve got to say it again. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. And I’m saying it again. I still see doubt. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. He is going to conform us to the image of his son. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. He’s going to conform us to the image of his son. I’m exhausted. But he’s not exhausted. He keeps on working to that end. And you can fight and you can kick, but he will conform you to the image of his son. So, why not go easy? Why make not why don’t why don’t we make it easy on ourselves?
Let me ask a question. Will God fail in his purposes to conform us in the into the image of his son, to make us holy and blameless in his sight, to bring us into his family and adopt us as his sons? Will he fail? Will God fail? Have you ever heard of God failing? I mean, you’ve been Christians longer than I have, haven’t you? Some of you. Has God ever failed? Will God ever fail? He’s going to do it then. Amen.
So, we have the selection of the Father, and we have the sacrifice of the Son. 1 verse 7. In him, the son, there’s so much of in him, in him, in Christ, in Christ Jesus, in the son, in this Do you know what I do? I if I if I want a passage of scripture, I I go into Bible Gateway. So, I want one Ephesians 1 verse 3 to 14, instead of writing it all, typing it all out as I used to do in the old days. Have you heard of copy and paste? Have you heard of copy and paste? I’m a very slow learner in these things, you know. But I I discovered copy and paste. But the one thing I can’t allow to stay the same when I’ve copied and pasted it is when I just can’t do it. I something inside me won’t allow it. When there’s a small H for he of God, you know, or he of Jesus, or he of the Holy Spirit, or his, him, his, he. I have to change it into a capital H.
Do you know what? In this passage, you can do it yourself. It took me ages. There’s so many he, him, his, he, him, his, him, he, he, him, his. So many of them. And I was doing all these capitals. Oh, not another one. Because that this passage is all about God and what he’s done. And it’s the sacrifice of his son. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. Redemption, we’ve been bought by his blood out of slavery to sin. We were slaves to sin, folks. You might say, well, I was better than that person. That’s not the issue. The issue is between you and God. He’s a holy God, very holy, pure, without blemish. He’s never even told one little white lie. He’s never even had one little rubbish thought. He’s never had one vicious judgmental thought, not one in all of his life. He’s never looked at that person and said, look at that plunker. He’s never done that, God. He’s pure, holy, blameless, without one little spot of sin. And he says, we were slaves to sin. And through the death of his son, that’s the purchase price paid to redeem us out of this empty way of life being slave to sin. He’s redeemed us.
In him, Jesus Christ, the son, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. Hallelujah. Do you know, I was so blessed in this little study because that word for forgiveness in that verse, it’s the same as the word in Luke 4:18, where Jesus is saying at the start of his ministry, the spirit of the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. And what does he say? To give freedom for the prisoners. Freedom for the prisoners. Freedom is exactly the same word in the original language of Greek. It’s exactly the same word as forgiveness in this verse we’re looking at. So, he has come to proclaim forgiveness for the prisoners. That’s all of us, folks. We were all prisoners. We’re all in the prison of sin. And he’s come and proclaimed freedom in Jesus Christ. Oh, that should be the that should be on Sky News, News at 10, BBC News every day. It’s the greatest news ever, isn’t it? Forgiveness of sins, folks, through Jesus Christ. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. Who said that? Ruby. Who? Stella, all right. Not only do I need to get me ears sorted, but my eyes also.
Listen to this beautiful verse in 1 Peter. Think of all Peter went through. Think of him at rock bottom when he’s denied Jesus. But look, what did we say earlier? God’s chosen you, Peter, to be holy and blameless in his sight. He’s just denied Jesus three times. Is it going to happen? Is it going to happen? It is going to happen, folks. He’s denying Jesus here.
Right at the end of his life, oh, don’t tell Mandy I was running then. He was dying for Jesus, and they reckon tradition, I say, he was upside down. Come on, he’s gone from denying Jesus three times to dying for Jesus upside down. Is that not God working out the wonders of his will and glory and making his life holy and blameless, isn’t it? How are we going to finish? None of us know. I pray to God it’s not upside down on a cross. But I’ll tell you something, if we’re obeying God and keeping there with him, we’ll have the grace to do whatever he calls us to do on that day. And we’ll be like Stephen if we have to be. If we’re being stoned to death, our faces will be like angels if we’ve kept right with God. I believe that. I’m not trying to depress you here, folks, but he will give the grace to do whatever he calls us to do. But it’s not yawning yet, so we’ll keep going. That was a joke.
So, that’s the selection of the Father, the sacrifice of the Son. What does the Holy Spirit do in this passage? What was it in the Good News Bible? What did they say? Oh, stamp of ownership, yeah. Well, the original word is sealed, the sealing of the spirit. And I was going to say a few meanings of this word seal, but it’s already told us in the Good News Bible. Here, it signifies ownership, ownership.
When you believe in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit comes into your life. He indwells our life with his permanent presence. Yes. He baptizes us with power to share the good news especially and to be bold for him. And he seals us. It’s the sealing ministry of the spirit where he says, you are mine. You now are mine. I have bought you. How ridiculous going back in time to 2,000 years ago, if a slave just been brought out of in the market of slavery, God, I don’t like talking about this subject, but it was a reality then and some of the words Christians say, you are not my master.
Some people want to believe Jesus for the forgiveness of sins, but they don’t want his Lordship. It’s not happening, folks. It’s not going to happen. He’s our Lord as well as our savior. He’s our master. He has bought us by the precious blood of his son, Jesus Christ. Peter says this, for you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. What a what a remarkable message. What a what amazing good news. We have been redeemed from that empty way of life by the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without defect or blemish. And now we are his. The Holy Spirit sealed us with that seal of ownership.
Listen to what it says in 2 Corinthians 1:21-22. Now it is God who makes us stand firm in Christ. It’s God who’s going to do that. Now it’s God who makes us stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us and put his spirit in our hearts as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come. So there it is. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us and put his spirit in our hearts. Put his spirit in our hearts.
I am his. That’s what we sing, isn’t it? I am his and he is mine. What song is that? It’s an old hymn, isn’t it? Loved with everlasting love, is it? I But also, I am his and he is mine. Are we enjoying this relationship with him? I am his. He’s bought me. He owns me, but also he is mine.
This is a guarantee. The Holy Spirit is a guarantee of what is to come. Who loves their Christian life? Keep your hands down if you love your Christian life. Keep your hands down if you love your Christian life. Yeah? Oh, sorry, you’re scratching your ear. Or what? Keep your hands down if you love your Christian life, yeah? Okay. No scratching ears now, just for this moment. Keep your hands down if you love this Christian life a lot. You really love this Christian life. Keep your hand down. Well, I’ll tell you what, folks, this is, and I don’t mean this in a wrong way, this is nothing to what’s coming. This is just a little deposit of what’s to come, our inheritance to come. I deposit something at the bank, 10%, 10%. There’s another 90% to come.
The sealing of the spirit. Quickly look into, that’s all God’s done. Now we’re going to look into all that we couldn’t do. This is all we couldn’t do. And quickly look at Ephesians 2:1-3. It says there very clearly, and I’ve done this before, I know, but I’m doing it again because we need to get this theology really deep into our hearts and minds. Hearts and minds. Hearts, hearts and minds, hearts and minds. We were dead, folks. We were dead, spiritually speaking. That’s what we’re talking about, spiritually speaking. You might have been alive and enjoying all the things of the world, but you were dead spiritually. I was dead spiritually. And again, don’t say, well, I was better than that person. No, it’s not that’s not the issue. It’s you and God, you and Jesus, you and the Holy Spirit. Yeah, I was dead.
Do you know how I used to say the Lord’s prayer? I used to think I was a Christian. Our Father who art in heaven, be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our trespasses, forgive us Amen. Because we had to say our prayers before we get into bed. And that’s how I used to say them. I won’t tell you all the other things I I used to say, but that’s not a relationship with Jesus. That’s just a routine, a rotor, a ritual. No, this is a beautiful, close, intimate relationship that we didn’t know before because we were dead in our transgressions and sins, following the ways of this world and the ruler of the kingdom of air. Some people don’t like that truth that we were following the devil before we started following Jesus. It’s scriptural, though.
Okay, tell me this, in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve are just going to take that apple. Are they following God or are they following the devil? Let’s keep it simple. We don’t have to have any gray, you know, mushy areas in between. Were they following God or were they following the devil when they had that apple of the knowledge of evil? Who were they following? The devil. And it’s been the way ever since. We’ve inherited that tendency, that more than tendency. What what’s the word I’m looking for? That inner whatever it is, to follow the devil. We were dead.
But this is the beauty and the wonder and the love of the good news of Jesus Christ. God so loved us. You see, God doesn’t see us in the pigsty and say, ah, I told you. I told you you shouldn’t. Yeah, you’re getting what you deserve. Get get deeper in. He doesn’t do that, God. His heart goes in great mercy and pain and love when he sees us all in the mess we were in. And because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy. He’s not rich in revenge. He’s rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ. Hallelujah. He filled us with his Holy Spirit. We were born again. We became new creations in Christ. The scriptures are so consistent. And he made us alive with Christ, even when we were dead in our transgressions and sins. It is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and even your faith was not not your own doing, folks. Don’t don’t let’s get proud about that. No one can boast in this. It was a gift of God. And now we are these new creations, created anew in Christ Jesus to do those good works that God’s prepared in advance for us to do.
That’s all we couldn’t do. All we can do. Uh-huh. This is the crunch line now. All we can do. Are we doing all we can do? All we can do. Well, first of all, do not grieve the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 4:30. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 5:18, go on being filled with the Holy Spirit. Does anybody get drunk here? I know you’re not going to tell me in front of a whole church, are you? That’ll take some bold confession, but it says, do not get drunk on wine, but be filled with the Holy Spirit. There’s your choice, folks. You can get drunk on wine or you can be filled with the other spirit, the Holy Spirit. What do you want? Do you want to be filled with the alcoholic spirit? I’m so sad. I see that guy still today, the one I told you about in 1999 when I told him, you need to give up drink. He’s still drinking away. His face is all It’s all mashed up, red and blotchy and His liver, who knows what the state of his liver is.
Do not get drunk on wine, but be filled with the Holy Spirit. You will not regret if you make the right choice. And it goes on to say then, we need to really start wrapping this up because time’s going. He encourages them and they can do this as they’re filled with the Holy Spirit, as they do not grieve the Holy Spirit, walk in unity. Ephesians 4:1-6, walk in unity. It might say in your Bible, live in unity. The original word is walk. Walk. Who walked with God and then was no more? Enoch. Do you remember that? Beautiful. He walked with God. Are we walking with God? Can two walk together unless they be agreed? Ask Proverbs. Or are we walking like this? God’s right over there and we’re right over here. There’s a big gap. No, let’s walk closely with God. Intimate relationship with him. Walk in unity. That’s where every one of us are in unity.
We’ve got an important AGM coming up on the 13th of May. Wednesday the 13th of May, 7 o’clock in the lounge. We need everyone there because we’re going to discuss what’s next with that hall. We want everyone there. Don’t complain if we decide something in that meeting that you don’t like, but you weren’t there to vote. Because we’re going to go with whatever God leads us to do on that day. We’re going to go with it. So be there, 7 o’clock Monday. Walk in unity. Let’s all be in unity. Amen.
How lovely it is. This is God speaking by his through David. How beautiful it is, how lovely it is. What is it again? When God’s people dwell in unity. What does God do when his people are in unity? What does he do? He commands. He commands the blessing. He commands the blessing. Right? Walk in unity.
Walk in holiness. Oh, hallelujah. Ephesians 4:17-32. Walk in holiness. 4:22-24 says, you were taught with regard to your former way of life. We can we’ve all got a former way of life. Some of which we’re not we’re really embarrassed about, ashamed about. Sometimes I have flashback of what I used did once say in a party and I go, oh my dear Lord God, thank you. Thank you that you’ve changed me, forgiven me. Thank you for the blood of Jesus that cleanses us from all that and it’s gone. You were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self. Put off the old self, which has been corrupted by its deceitful desires, to be made new in the attitude of your minds and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. How awesome is that? Walk in holiness.
See, walk in love. Oh, these are beautiful verses. Ephesians 5:1-6. It says here, listen to this now, folks. Listen to this standard. This is to the church, this is to each one of us. Listen to this. Be imitators of God. Be imitators of God. It didn’t say one of the prophets, didn’t say John the Baptist, didn’t say Isaiah. No, be imitators of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. As dearly loved children. You are dearly loved child of God. You’re a dearly loved child of God. Do you believe that? You’re dearly loved because the cross that will prove it. You are dearly loved. Be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live a life of love. Just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. This is love. There’s no greater definition of love than this. God so loved the world that he gave his only son and his only son died because of his love for you and me. There’s no greater love. And we’ve got to live that love. We have to live it out. Let’s move on. Walk in the light. Ephesians 5:7-14. For you were once darkness, but now you’re light in the Lord. Hallelujah. How many testimonies have I heard where people say, I see the light. I see the light. Hallelujah. See that that transformation like that. I’ve seen the light. Wow. Anitas is looking a bit tired now. I need to wrap this up. I’ve seen the light. I’ll never forget that guy and he used to mock Christianity terrible. Mike his name was. He won’t mind me telling his name. He’s put his testimony in magazines and all that. And he used to really try and wind Christians up and mock them and belittle Christianity, all that stuff.
Cut a long story short. He came to church with me one day. So I can have a laugh, he said. That type of attitude, you know. Well, he came and I’ll tell you what, at the end of the service, I was trying to get him out of this place because it was too much for him. We sang that sing hallelujah to the Lord and all the women going, sing hallelujah to the Lord. Sing hallelujah to the Lord. Hallelujah. It was just too much for a person who’s never been to church and and everyone’s putting their hands up, you know, and and they’re clapping and you know, they do all the things you don’t want them to do because you’ve got this guy who’s never been to church in his life and he’s a real cynic.
Do you know at the end of the service, I said, Mike, I’m trying to get him out of the place. Come for a coffee, come to the coffee bar. He said, I think I’m going to have a chat with this preacher guy. That’s how he said it. Do you know what? Half an hour later, he came and dragged me out of the coffee shop. I want you to come to the back of church and pray with me. Hallelujah. And he was going like this in his prayer, I’ve seen the light. I’ve seen the light. I still wasn’t sure if he was taking the mic, but he wasn’t. He was not. And he went on. He went on. He he kept the way, he kept the path. He kept on and on with the Lord. Walk in the light.
Walk in wisdom. Ephesians 5:15 to 6:9. Be very careful how you live. Be wise. Need to move on. No, I’m going to share this one as well. Make the most of every opportunity. Do you know the word for opportunity there is Kairos. That’s a God opportunity. A God opportunity.
Do you know Johnny phones us up. He’s got this he’s he’s got his job with Boohoo, the fashion agency, but he does a part-time job delivering in the early hours of the morning and he’s got a delivery van and all that. And he phones us up. He’s been given 8 to 8 o’clock that night to get his van back. He’s had a massive big puncture. And do you know on the way to pick him up and try and we bought this foam that we’re going to pump into the tire. Don’t buy it, it’s rubbish. It started leaking out of the hole whether we should we should have taken the nail out. I don’t know. We kept the nail in. It might have kept the foam in the tire, but anyway, on the way there, right in front of me, tire service, a van with tire services on. And so I’ll take his I’ll put his phone number down. Then, after we decided to abort it because all this stuff was leaking out of the tire and the tire had gone flat again. We’d only got a mile down the road. Guess what I see right in front of me in traffic lights, a van with tire services on. And later on I just thought, I really missed an opportunity there. I could have got this guy to go and repair that tire, we could have got the van back. It was a missed opportunity. It says here, make the most of every opportunity. Sometimes we’ve got to step outside the box. Sometimes we’ve got to do things that we’ve never done before, that type of thing. Make the most of every opportunity.
And then finally the passage on spiritual warfare that we spent some time. Put on the full armor of God. Believers, put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. We’re already in the days of evil, but they’re going to get even worse. The scriptures warn us.
Let’s pray. Father God, we just thank you, Lord, for your amazing provision. You’ve blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. And Lord, you’ve given us so much. And we just want to get this right, Lord. We want to respond in the right way. We don’t want to grieve your spirit. We don’t want to quench your Holy Spirit. But we want to go with whatever you want. And we pray this prayer, Lord, your will be done here at Bethel as it is in heaven. For your glory, Lord, the building of your church and the blessing of multitudes in Jesus Christ. Amen.
