Talks And Sermons From St Matthew's

Modern life tends to shun dependency and celebrates independence, but the Bible tells us that God created us to be dependent people. Join us as Pads Dolphin explores how the early church was a dependent community - dependent on God, dependent on each other and dependent on grace.

After Jesus' ascension, his followers lived in a new community, that would go on to become the Church. But what was this community like? Over the coming weeks we will be looking at different aspects of this community, starting this week by foussing on the witness of this community.

When some of Jesus' followers went to see his tomb after he died they found it empty. Join us for this special Easter baptism service where Pads Dolphin leads us through Peter's question, 'What has happened?'

When Jesus entered Jersualem on a donkey's colt, he was making a bold claim to be God's Messiah - the one all Israel had been waiting for. But what kind of Messiah was he going to be and how would he save us? Join us as Pads Dolphin takes us back to that first Palm Sunday.

God is in the business of restoring his creation. Consequently, he is always doing something new. But doing something new inevitably means leaving things behind. Join us as Pads leads us to consider what things we might need to leave behind, or areas of our lives where we need restoring so that we can join in with the new things God has planned for us.

In this final part of our Bible Overview series, Anthony Wisdom shows us that the story of the Bible doesn't end at the cross and leads us to think about how we can take what we've learnt and apply it to our daily lives as followers of Jesus.

Jesus' parable of the prodigal son paints a picture of a wayward younger brother, who squandors the family wealth but is accepted back into the family by HIs father. Most of us are familiar with that part, but what about the elder brother, who is less happy to see his brother's return? What challenge or message is there for us from the elder sibling's reaction? Join as as Pads Dolphin takes us through the hope and challenges that this passage presents.

John the Baptist recognised Jesus and showed him to his disciples. Those disciples went on to follow Jesus and lead others to follow Him too. How did John recognise Jesus? And what can we learn from this response of the first discples?

God calls us to seek Him while He can be found. Time is limited and our complacency poses a threat. Join us as Pads Dolphin shows us how God has opened himself up to us and invites us to come and find Him while we still have the time to do so.

Continuing our overview of the Bible, we reach the Gospels and the arrival of Jesus into the world. But who was this Jesus? The Jews were expecting a Messiah, longing for a Christ - was Jesus the Christ they were looking for? Who did he say he was and who do people think he was today?

This week we are looking at the cost of being a disciple. Jesus made it clear that to be His disciple would entail personal cost, but what sort of cost? Time, money, effort? Possibly, but probably more also. Join us as Pads Dolphin explores what Jesus says about the cost of being his follower, and encourages us to be prepared to take the risk of inviting others to come to know Him.

Jesus spoke a hard-hitting parable to a crowd of proud pharisees which essentially said that no amount of religious observence or faithful box-ticking was going to secure the favour of God and their eternal life. Join us as Pads Dolphin explores what the Bible tells us is actually the key to our savlation - humble faith in Jesus.

After being freed from slavery in israel, the Israelites were appointed judges to keep rule, with God as their King. But everyone else had human kings and, naturally, the Israelites wanted their own human king. God relented, but warned what a human king would mean for them. What followed were centuries of evil kings and a people turning away from God until the kingdoms of Israel and Judah disappeared altogether.

Jesus tells us not to worry, but how can we actually do that in practice? After all, life is filled with many things to worry about. Paul Fulton talks us through some practical help to lay our worries down and reminds us of the promises of God that will help us through our struggles.

It's week two of our Bible overview course and Anthony Wisdom takes us through the pledge that God made to Abraham, through the enslavement of Israel in Egypt and their liberation by God. Following that, we look at the rebellion of the people of Israel whilst in the desert and the giving of the law - the Ten Commandments - and consider how focussing too much on the law (legalism) can be a form of rebellion in itself.

Right at the outset of Jesus' public ministry, he returned to his home town to preach and set out his manifesto - to open eyes, change lives and bring good news. Join us to hear David Horne tell us more about what this could mean for us at one of our wonderful family baptism services.

Immediately following his baptism, Jesus was led by the Hoy Spirit not into a big crowd to perform amazing miracles, but to the wilderness, to be by himself, to overcome temptation by the devil. Why would the Spirit do that? How did that time prepare Jesus for what was to come and what can we learn about times in the wilderness in our own lives?

In the first of our fortnightly Bible Overview course, Anthony Wisdom introduces us to the first of the major themes that we'll be considering - the legitimate authority of God over his creation.

An introduction to our new Bible Overview course, hosted by Anthony Wisdom and taking place fortnightly at St. Matthew's Church.

The Bible reveals four things as essential for a fulfilled Christian life - repentance, faith, baptism and also the Holy Spirit. As a church, we tend to be fairly familiar with the first three of these, but the Holy Spirit can remain somewhat elusive. Join us as Pads Dolphin tells us more about the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives and we hear about what real impact He can have in us today.