Sovereign Grace Music has just released their latest Christmas Album, “Heaven Has Come” and it is awesome! You can find out more about here: https://sovereigngracemusic.org/music/albums/heaven-has-come/

I highly recommend watching these music videos, especially the track “O Come All You Unfaithful”. This song we will be singing over Christmas time!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-QHbpYjuIg&feature=emb_title

You can also watch an interview with Bob Kauflin and some of the other writers on how they wrote the album, it’s really encouraging, just be sure to skip about 15 minutes in!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz9cApV5xbQ

Some tracks i particularly appreciate:

• O Come All You Unfaithful

• Away In A Manger (All Glory to Jesus)

• Come For Us

• Glory In the Darkest Place

• Do Not Fear

Head here to listen to Maddie’s talk “Flourishing in our Boundaries” from Psalm 16:5-6. From what I have heard it was a great morning of fellowship, a challenging and encouraging talk, and a helpful panel!

On Sunday we spent the entirety of our service exploring the theme righteousness. We gloried in the reality that though we are unrighteous because of our sin, Jesus has made us completely righteous, and now we are called to live out a greater righteousness! We are to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect!

Jesus’ sermon outlined 6 antithesis that made us rethink the difference between just following the letter of the law versus obeying God to the depths of being with all our thoughts, words, and deeds! We need His grace to live like Him!

Check out the sermon here

This Sunday we are going to be making a video for Sovereign Grace Churches Mission Fund. Basically, they want us to tell our story of the church plant and how the Lord has been at work in us and through our partnership with SGC. So, parts of our service will be filmed and eventually be distributed across SGC’s around the world! :0 ! Just wanted to give you the heads up!

If you are unable to attend we will be hosting the event on Zoom, your LG leader will send you a link today :)

As you know we are heading back to Tara for the School Summer Break! This means we will be back at Tara for Sundays 6th Dec to Sunday 17th Jan (God-willing!). This also means we will be able to have a bigger space, more ventilation, and greater indoor/outdoor mingling room!

This could also be a good opportunity to invite new people to join us!

For those who are new, Tara is an Anglican Girls School in North Parramatta, it is the venue we launched our church in but we lost access to the site during the COVID lockdowns and never were allowed back in, until now! You can find the address here

Let’s be thanking God for this and let’s be preparing our hearts for change, yet again!

It’s finally here! Our first ‘Yeah the Ladies’ (name still TBD)!

Maddie will be speaking on “Flourishing in Your Boundaries”.

Please bring $5 (or transfer $5 to the church) to cover breakfast and coffee

and RSVP to Maddison Spring by Friday!

It is exciting that we get to find another way to put Titus 2 into practice!

“3 Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, 4 and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.”

We are on again for our final one of the year, Sat 28th, 7:30pm, at my place Chapters 11-13 of the Masculine Mandate.

$15 for a better dinner - probably a mixture of smoked meat, pizza, etc.

BYO drinks.

Growth Groups are back on for the guys! Speak to your LG leader for details as to where you’ll be meeting!

This text in Matthew 5:17-20 is arguably one of the hardest in the whole bible! Because it brings together the very complex problem of how do we relate the OT to the NT, the old covenant and the new covenant, the Law and the Gospel! You can listen to my meagre attempt at preaching it here!

I was going to finish by reading Romans 10:1-10, as it is a great summary of the whole message. Read it here:

Rom. 10:1   Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

Rom. 10:5   For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. 6 But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.