All Nations Presbyterian Church

God, who made everything, made people to be different from the rest of the world. People are made in the image of God (Gen 1:26-27).  People are declared to be “very good” while the rest of creation is declared to be “good”. People are special to God, and have a special role to play in the world.

The phrase “the image of God” is used three different ways in the Bible. Firstly, all people, male and female, are made in God’s image.  Secondly, Jesus is the image of God in a way that we are not (Col 1:15). Thirdly, when people come to trust in Jesus they should become more like Jesus and closer to a true reflection of God’s image.

What might this mean for Christians?  It means that human life is important to us, so we oppose abortion, euthanasia and care about how all people are treated.  It means that we must value humans above the rest of creation.  And it means that we need to seriously pray and strive to better reflect Jesus’ character so we can better reflect God’s image.

(Based on Bible Cafe teaching, 19 February 2010).

The Bible describes Christians as sheep.  This is not the most flattering description, for sheep are vulnerable to almost every predator, and tend to wander off if left alone.  Jesus is the Good Shepherd of the sheep (John 10), who cares for them and who leads them.  But as we wait for Jesus to return, God has given the church elders to lead and shepherd His sheep.

Acts 20:17-38 gives us a clear picture of what elders should do, as Paul instructs the elders in Ephesus.  They are to care for the church, share their lives with them, and protect them from threats.  They are to lead the church, both by example and by decisions which help them follow Jesus.  They are also to teach the church, showing in different ways how the good news about Jesus impacts their lives.

All Nations is a Presbyterian church, governed by elders. We need to recognize that elders have an important role, support them and pray for them, and consider who might be a suitable elder.  We also need to submit to those God has placed in this position (Heb 13:17) and serve each other.  How can you support your elders?  Is there a godly man you can encourage to consider this important role?

(Based on Sunday teaching at ANPC, February 14 2010 ).

In Genesis 1:1-3, at the very start of the Bible, we see God created the world out of nothing simply by speaking.  God is so powerful and has made everything in a good order.  We can appreciate God’s power when we think about the complexity of the world and the human body.

On top of making the world, God controls what happens in the world. He even controls things like which nation lives where and for how long (Acts 17:26), how the birds and flowers survive (Matt 6:25-34) and the amount of hairs on your head (Luke 12:6-7).  And he makes and controls all things for a purpose: that we might see what he has made and seek after him, to try to connect with God.  And the only way we can connect with the God who made everything is through Jesus, who died, rose again, and will return to judge all things (Acts 17:31).

So what might this mean for us?  Firstly, we should appreciate the world a little more.  All of us busy modern people move so quickly we rarely slow down to appreciate God’s world, which is so beautiful.  Secondly, we should appreciate God more.  We have a God who is powerful beyond imagining, who cares for the people he has made, and who has the power to respond to prayer.  Finally, thinking about the world should make us want to find out about the One who made it.  To do this, we need to look beyond the world to the Bible, where God tells us about Jesus and how we can connect with God.

(Based on Bible Cafe teaching, Friday Night the 12th of February 2010).

On Sunday, February 7 2010 , we looked at the topic of children together.  Parenting is a popular and controversial topic, with so many different opinions out there.  Instead of giving advice on feeding and discipline, we aimed to correct our thinking about children to how God sees them.

Children are a gift from God.  Every child born is a miracle, but we see it most clearly when God gave children when they were previously not possible (as with Sarah, Rachel, and Hannah).  Sometimes even parents don’t think of their children as a gift, and we need to be reminded, even when parenting is hard!  The Bible also calls those who trust in God ‘children of God’ (as in John 1:12-13).  Having belief in Jesus is described as a new spiritual life, with God as our parent.

So the key example we have of parenting is God himself. Throughout the Bible we see God not just giving people faith, but sustaining and guiding them.  Sometimes He spoke firmly with his children and corrected them.  But in Deuteronomy 6 we see what God’s main aim in all this is – that people grow to maturity in God.  The family is supposed to be a primary way in which children learn the things of God and grow to love Him.

So what does this mean if you are a Christian parent?  Your main aim for your children should be different from everyone else. It shouldn’t simply be to give them a good education and want them to be happy; we should do all we can to help them to grow to be more like Jesus, with a stable mature faith.  Are you prepared to do whatever it takes to encourage this?  And all of us need to regain the wonder of being a child of God if we trust in Jesus. We have been adopted, cared for, given an inheritance by God, none of which we deserved. Our God is the most gracious parent we could ever imagine.

On Friday February 5 we started our Friday Night ministry with the idea of a ‘worldview’.  Everyone sees the world differently with different assumptions, some of which we are aware of an some of which we are not.  No-one has a perfectly balanced view of how life really is; it is as if we are all wearing different sets of glasses which tint how we interpret things.

For example, if the news runs a story about rising interest rates, what does that mean for you? If you are a younger person with a large mortgage, it is bad news. If you are a self-funded retiree, it is good news. If you are a teenager at home, it doesn’t mean all that much at all.

Your ‘worldview’ is the collection of all the presuppositions we have about the world in which we live. It is influenced by your age, cultural background, the culture you live in now, your gender, your political views, your education, your family of origin, your past experiences, your religious views and many other things.

How does this fit in with being a Christian?  Christianity is not just about moral issues or what we do on a Sunday morning. It affects our whole life and how we see the world. The world as God describes it in the Bible is how it really is. The Bible gives us guidance on such varied things as anger, money, sex, ethics, work, food and much more.  We need to understand how God describes the world in the Bible so we can line up our assumptions with God’s assumptions.  We need to try to see the world as God does, so we can know how to act in a way that pleases God.