St Jude's Mapperley Archive Blog

Yesterday morning, we continued our series looking at who we are, and what we're here for. In particular, we were looking at 1 Peter 2:4-12 . What really struck me in the passage was that all of the wonderful descriptions of things we are as Christians – a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, God's house – are things that we can only be together . They are all singular, just like in Romans 12:1, we offer our bodies as one living sacrifice, or in Ephesians 4 we grow up from being many infants to being one mature body. How does this happen? It happens as God builds us together by his Spirit, as we get the rough edges and knobbly bits knocked off and sanded down. It happens as we speak the truth to one another in love, as we move from seeing other people as there to make us feel better to seeing ourselves as there to serve others and help them know, love and serve God better. This coming weekend is the church weekend away, and for...

Yesterday, we started a new series at St Jude's. Recently, the leadership team have been thinking through the question "Who are we?" and we came to the conclusion that the answer can be summed up as follows: We are a church on a hill: Worshipping God and listening to his Word Growing together as the family of God Shining with God's love in our community. With that in mind, we're doing a short series of three sermons in the mornings looking at different aspects of this. We started yesterday looking at Micah 4:1-7 . In the passage, God gives his people a picture of the way things will be in the end. Sometimes if a story is going badly, people flick ahead to the end to see how it all turns out – that's what God does here for his people. As we look at it, we can find confidence for the future, but also see something of God's purposes for us as a church. The picture is that the mountain of God's temple – the hill where God...

Good Morning All! For the Monday Mail this week, I'd like to send a link to Glen Scrivener's new Easter Poem (animation on Youtube). Here's the poem in full: The Israelites in thirsty lands, trod burning sands with desperate craving, no longer slaving for Egyptian masters, now by grace they're free to face this fresh disaster -- starving in a barren place. Until the Bread of Heaven fell like morning dew each day anew, and to these folks complaining, every day the Bread sustaining, to lead them all their journey through. Fast forward 1500 years: a Man appears, stands tall among His peers, And feeds the desert crowds without ado, A supernatural déjà vu. And having won the mob's attention then He makes His bold contention: He IS the Bread of old, the One foretold to feed us and through our wilderness to lead us. Could His claim be true? It's Thursday Night, an upper room, a supper strewn with broken bread, Then Jesus stands, a loaf in hand and says: THIS...

Good Morning! Yesterday morning, we looked at John 12:1-11, which is the story of Mary anointing Jesus' feet with perfume that cost a year's wages. We saw that Mary's grateful, responsive, loving, extravagant, disgraceful love was exactly the right response to Jesus, even though it left her with no money, no provision for the future and her reputation in tatters. In contrast, Judas was shown to be hiding his real sin behind trying to look pious. One of the ways we applied it was by thinking about whether we hold back from worshipping God for fear of what other people think, whether that's when singing at church or when speaking to our friends at work or at the pub, or even whether we're sometimes, like Judas, people who sit on the sidelines and snipe at those who are putting their hearts into worshipping God. We also saw how Mary's action predicts what Jesus is about to do – that she becomes the servant who wash...

Greetings! Yesterday morning, we were looking at one of my favourite prayers in the Bible - Ephesians 3:14-21 . For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. One of the things that Paul asks for is that God wou...

Loving God | Loving Each Other | Loving our Community Good Morning! We tend to think of commandments as being the opposite of freedom, don't we? But yesterday morning, we were thinking about the Fourth Commandment, and we saw that it is precisely about freedom. For generations, the Israelites had been slaves in Egypt. Their Exodus started when Moses, prompted by God, asked Pharaoh for the people to be able to take time off so that they could worship him in the desert. 10 plagues later, Pharaoh let the people go for good (helped by God, the Red Sea, etc). Now they are at Mt Sinai, finally worshipping God together rather than labouring as slaves in Egypt. And God gives them a commandment that they are to take a day off every week! It's the first law of its kind anywhere in the world; it's also the first law I'm aware of that protects working animals from exploitation by their owners. The two editions of the 10 Commandments...

Dear all, Yesterday in the morning services, we asked what people were grateful for about St Jude's, and we had loads of responses, which should appear on a notice board soon... In the meantime, Joyce has kindly collated the responses and here's a summary of them! Gratitude is a wonderful thing, and as we heard at the evening service last night, it's also an antidote to worry. Paul wrote " Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. " So let's thank God for all that is past, and trust him for all that is to come! In his love and service, John God’s Fruitfulness at St Jude’s Things we’re thankful for at St. Jude’s 2014 God’s love and grace Love for God and enthusiasm Brilliant leadership (x 2) Our vic...