Friday Communication - 19th January 2024
It has been very encouraging for me to see the year start with a very good GSF. Not on the team myself it was wonderful to witness and have reported the clarity of the gospel message, the care for the children, the thoughtful love shown by all the team and the pit crew, and many families who had invited other children to come. We can give thanks to God for the peace, prosperity and freedom that allows us to run this and our other ministries where we seek to make disciples of the Lord Jesus, and we can thank God for the love, faith and hope which is evident in the team and their willing service.
It is a good way for us to start the year, together in the work of the gospel. And I hope that is how our year will continue. There is always a lot going on in our lives, individually and collectively, and this year will be no different. But what excites me about this year is our participation in the Meet Jesus mission. As I was reflecting on this I realized that the title itself really grabs me. Three reasons.
The Lord Jesus is there to meet
Firstly, That the Lord Jesus is there to meet, in His word as we hear His voice, but also as we call on Him, the living Saviour. He is not just an idea but a person, a person who hears us as we cry to Him, a person who always does for us what He promises. I was reminded of how good this is listening to Guillaume Bignon as he was being interviewed by John Dickson. He was recounting how he came to faith from atheism and how he needed to know not just that the gospel was intellectually true, but experientially true, and how the Lord answered his prayer in bringing both conviction of sin and of gracious forgiveness. I have included a link to this podcast in this Friday news, and here -
French Atheism (undeceptions.com)
Check it out for some encouragement. We can confidently encourage our friends and family to meet Jesus because he is there to meet.
The Lord Jesus is worth meeting
Secondly, the title grabs me because the Lord Jesus is worth meeting. He is so great, so good, and so loving. He is the one for whom and through whom all things were made, including us. Nothing is too hard for Him. He can raise the dead. And He is good – we see both His kindness and His truthfulness over and over again in the gospels. He is like no other in both what He says and does. And knowing us He still loves us, loves us to the extent of laying down His life for us to give us life. There are mockers and scoffers in our society who seek to ridicule our faith, and the Lord Jesus. Their words say everything about the emptiness of their own lives and nothing about Jesus. We should not be embarrassed or diffident about encouraging others to meet Jesus. He is worth meeting.
Jesus is interested in meeting us
And thirdly, we can encourage others to meet Jesus because, amazingly, He is interested in meeting us. He came for the sick, not the well, for sinners, not the righteous. He came to seek the lost. We have nothing to offer Him. He does not need us, our praise, our love, our devotion. The triune God has life and love in Himself in a richness we can scarcely imagine. Yet the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, is interested in meeting us, sinners, and calls us to Himself.
Equip yourself to help others meet Jesus
So I am excited about encouraging others to Meet Jesus, and I hope you are too because you know for yourself, as I do, that meeting Jesus is life changing, it is hope and peace and life and knowing an abiding love. Plan to come to the training Helen Bell will be running in first term on having conversations with others about Jesus. We can all do with a refresher on this as the kinds of questions people have change. We might have thought about how to have a conversation about the truthfulness of the gospel, but for many today that is not the first question. It is about whether the gospel is good, whether it promotes human flourishing. How can we move from their concerns to helping them meet Jesus? Come and benefit from Helen’s wisdom and experience in talking to others about Jesus.
And be praying now at home and in your groups for people you can read a gospel of John with. Pray for them by name, and if you are not confident to read through a gospel where they can meet Jesus in His own words, plan to come to the training Andy will be running in Term 2 on reading the gospel with another person.
And if your friends find church strange check out the calendar and look for the events like the Bushdance to which you can invite your friends so they can meet Christians and become more comfortable in their presence. Be deliberate.
We never know what the coming year will bring. But we do know that if it runs its course it will bring us one year closer to the return of the Lord Jesus and the great day when we will all stand before Him. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if it was also the year when your friends and family could start to look forward to that day because this year they met Jesus, met Him now as the Saviour of the world, the One whom all will meet then as the awesome Lord.
