South East Anglican

Does fasting have any influence on our spiritual relationship with God? Isn't it just an old-fashioned pratice that we've progressed away from? Dave preached on why fasting was historically important for Israel in the Old Testament, and took at look what role Jesus saw fasting taking in the life of his followers.

Is your prayer life all that it can be? For many of us, our prayer is limited to particular times or seasons. But prayer is always available! God has given us this incredible gift of round the clock access to his attentive ear, so as disciples of Christ, people saved by him, we don't want to take that for granted.

Being a follower of Jesus who wants to grow in Christlikeness starts with confession and repentance. Not just acknowleding sin, but actually stopping sinning. But God meets our repentance with forgiveness and our darkness with light.

What do we do with our sin? How do we handle it? Well, it depends who you ask. God and our culture are at odds with what to do with our sins, wrongdoings, and faults. Unfortunately, even within the Church we can disagree about how to respond to our own sin. Dave outlines why lament has been, and still is, a pivotal practice in the life of a Christian.

We had the privilege of having our Bishop, Richard Condie, visting our parish and preaching for us. As part of this recording, you'll hear a short interview between Richard and Dave, followed by the sermon at Southern Beaches from 1 Peter 3:8-22.

You may not have ever wondered about the future of hospitality, but perhaps you should've! Towards the end of his life, Jesus speaks to his disciples in two key moments about the future of his hospitality towards them. And if you're a Christian, this is your future too!

Hospitality has been a key identifier of God's people since God made a people for himself thousands of years ago. And yet, many of us today find hosting people a particularly stressful thing. Where have we gone wrong? Why do we find following God in this area so challenging, still?

Hospitality is great, but it comes with a cost. Some people are more aware of that cost than others, and consistently try to have the goodness of the kingdom without the minimum cost. But how does the gospel impact the costs we are willing to incur for the sake of hospitality?

Hospitality can often feel like a nice thing that Christians should do. But on Sunday, Dave showed from Luke 10 and Hebrews 12 that joy-inducing hospitality is central to the heart of God, and therefore not an optional extra for Christians, but a key identifier of who we are and who God is.

Last Sunday Stephen preached about some of the roles of Jesus in his life and ministry and what that means for us today as people who follow him.

Every Christian has been given a hope to cling to as we await Christ. The hope is not presents under the Christmas tree, nor is it a spouse, it's not even the church! The hope of the Israelites was, and the hope of Christians today is, no one else and no thing else other than God himself. Christ our Saviour, our Hope, and Restorer of everything.

Advent is the season of preparation for the return of Christ. But, do we really need to prepare? Won't we have time to get that sorted once he arrives? Jesus tells a parable in Matthew 25 that answers that exact question. It serves as a warning to the complacent, and an encouragement to the wise. Which one are you?

The season of Advent has begun, as Stephen preaches from Isaiah 64:1-9 pointing us forward to the return of Christ.

Kings and queens come and go, but not King Jesus. King Jesus reigns eternally! So the question is, does his kingship govern your life?

Is the church a place of staunch resistance to change, or a driving force of innovation? Regardless of what our various churches may be today, the Bible describes men and women who boldly pursued Spirit-powered, gospel-based innovation. And for the last 2000 years, men and women have transformed the cultures around them by taking the Great Commission as a floor for ministry, not a ceiling.

Sometimes we need to be reminded of the character of the God we love and who loves us. This week, Stephen reminded us of the faithfulness of God to us, even when we are faithless.

What is a saint? Should we celebrate saints? The word has gathered some baggage over the years since it was used in the Bible, and it has gone out of fashion in many evangelical circles. But as we celebrated All Saints day on November 1, Stephen makes the case that it's a word worth redeeming.

Guest Speaker Adrian Lane taught about the incredible gift that it is to have our lives turned around by the gracious love of Jesus, and how we can share that wonderful news with those around us. Jesus never intended us to just be 'caught', but to also go and 'fish for others' with the gospel that saved us.

John is single-minded in how he deals with the theme of 'love' in this pastoral letter. For John, it's quite simple: love one another. Christians ought to prioritise loving each other first and foremost because of the love that we have received from God. If God is love, then his children should inherit that character trait, too, especially, John says, towards other Christians.

What do you mean when you talk about 'life'? Is life a pulse? Is it the ability to survive and thrive? Perhaps it's the ability to contribute to your society? John (and Jesus) think it's more than that... much more! In this four letter word, John and Jesus invite the Christian to rethink everything, and to consider what it might mean to take hold of 'life to to the full' today.

It was God's plan to fill the world with light in Genesis 1. It was God's plan to send Jesus as the light of the world in John 8. And in 1 John 1, John reminds Christians that it is God's plan for Christians to live and walk in that light through the death and resurrection of Jesus. The good news isn't that we should be in the light, but that we can be, that Jesus gives us a way of escaping sin an...

Jesus saves his harshest rebuke for the last church, the church in Laodicea. There is much to learn from this church but perhaps the most striking is that they were oblivious to the critiques of the Jesus they claimed to worship and represent. And yet, even to the Laodiceans, Jesus graciously gave them time to repent and return to him, to still claim the victory.

There is a problem in Philadelphia - but not with the church. The problem in the city of brotherly love was an argument about who the real children of God were, who were legitimate, who was in line for an inheritance, and who wasn't. The family drama was messy, but Jesus speaks truth into that messy situation with decisive clarity.