This week in our physical venues and across our Online Venue, we have been celebrating New Ground Sunday. Here at Everyday Church, we are part of a family of churches called Newfrontiers and within that Newfrontiers family we are part of New Ground. A number of years ago, because of growth and a desire to be more missional, Newfrontiers moved from being one family across the world to a wider famil...

There came a moment in history when God fulfilled one of His many promises. The promise had been that His presence would one day move from a temple, accessible by a small number of priestly, anointed individuals, to being poured out upon men and women from all nations and backgrounds. That which filled a holy sanctuary, hidden away from most, would fill and reside in the hearts of everyone who cal...

Hopefully, you will remember our Vision & Values series from January and February of this year. We spent six weeks unpacking the statement: “Who we are and why we are here”. We unpacked those eight words, with seven key words: Son – Father – Spirit – Grace – Community – Kingdom – Love We reminded ourselves that our purpose flows out of our identity – we are Kingdom bringers because we are imag...

Death separates us from one another, that is why funerals are so painful as we are forced to face up to that reality. But the Easter truth that I love to proclaim at the funerals is that death can never separate a child of God from the love of God. In 1 Corinthians 15:20-22 Paul goes on to say, “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For ...

The Lord's Prayer is like a diamond with many different facets - Jesus is teaching us to pray this prayer containing so many different forms of prayer; adoration, submission, spiritual warfare, confession, petition - it's all in there. But the form of prayer I want to say a bit more about here, is intercession. Or more concretely the part of intercession where we seek God for him to reveal what h...

So we come to the end of this Vision and Values series. Reminding ourselves that who we are will always shape what we do. Our purpose as Kingdom bringers flows out of our identity as image bearers. Discipleship leads us to the Kingdom. This week in our sermon we recognised that our vision of following Jesus together as a covenant community is not always matched by our reality. Our individual and ...

About a year after I became a Christian and was baptised I felt God call me to leadership – a call that he has confirmed many times since. That first time back in 1984 the call came through scripture – specifically Isaiah 61 – why don’t you take a moment now to read it through. Three things happened in my heart on that first occasion – what I realise now will have been the first time I would have...

Christians should love the church. Jesus loves his church, community is God’s idea and the church is his plan A for impacting the world with his kingdom. However, the reality is we can often struggle with church. The latest census reveals that in the UK 46% of people would still describe themselves as Christian – that is actually quite encouraging – but less than 5% are part of a church community....

Ephesians 2 verses 1-10 is one of the great levellers of the New Testament. You do not need to be a biblical scholar to understand it – though a bit of study will help you with some of the beautiful nuances. But at first reading it leaves you in no doubt as to its meaning. We were dead in our sin – unresponsive to the majesty of God. Lost in our own selfishness. There was no hope! But God – who ...

Jesus points us to the Father and promises us the Holy Spirit. Jesus also models for us a relationship with the Father and a life lived full of the Holy Spirit. Although Jesus is fully God, he is also fully man, and as such he displays in his life how we can live our lives in relationship with the Father and dependent on the Holy Spirit. Jesus uses the spiritual disciplines of prayer, worship and...

This week we have begun a 6 week journey together. A journey in which we will be aiming to remind ourselves of who we are and why we are here! As part of this journey, our Devotions – both our video and written versions – will take on a slightly different format. They will work closely with the sermons being preached in our venues each week. Their aim will be to ground some of the concepts that w...

Some Christians continue to take Jesus’ instruction literally, including Eastern Orthodox and Mennonite traditions. While I think Jesus’ foot washing example gives us principles rather than rituals, it might still be a useful exercise in Life Group one day. I must admit, though, I find feet quite ugly, especially mine. They tend to take a bit of a battering from daily life. Then there’s athlete’s...

As he spoke these words Jesus surely had in mind an event that had taken place some fifteen hundred years earlier and is recorded in Numbers 21:4-9. The people of Israel had recently been delivered from slavery in Egypt but now they started to grumble against God and stopped trusting him. In judgement God sent swarms of snakes amongst them and many people died....

This week we get back into John’s gospel after our summer break. We remind ourselves that John is writing his gospel to help his first readers, and us, see who Jesus was and is. John structures his gospel around 7 signs and 7 “I am” statements. The purpose of these two groups of 7 is the same. Look at what Jesus did (the signs) and listen to what Jesus said about himself (The “I am’s”) and make a ...

Vision is vital. We live in a changing world. Some of that change is God ordained. Seasons in the natural world, stages of life, day and night. These are all part of the rhythm that God placed in the world for our good and wellbeing. However, we are also surrounded by unstructured change. From pandemics to drought, from the war in Ukraine to economic challenges. These seemingly random changes can ...

Today we’re going to focus in on Jesus’ interaction with two sisters. Jesus is returning to Bethany to see Lazarus, who he has been told is sick. On his approach he is met by Martha and Mary. By this stage Lazarus has died, and they happen to approach him one at a time. You can read this story of Jesus comforting Martha and Mary in v17-37. Remember, these two sisters are grieving the same person ...

If you have noticed anything over the last few weeks you will have noticed the numerous references to sheep. Sheep and Shepherds are a key motif and illustration throughout scripture. Israel was a nation of shepherds. Shepherding and pastoral care – literally looking after your flock – were hard wired into the minds of the people that Jesus was speaking to. Yes he was a carpenter and his disciples...

Jesus chooses to call himself the true shepherd, and that sums up so much: a close and personal relationship between himself and his followers, the certain security that we can have in him, the dependency in his guidance, his companion, his profound care for us and most of all his sacrificial love....

This week our passage revolves around a healing miracle. One of the seven signs in John’s gospel that is meant to cause us to stop and look at Jesus and ask the question, “who is this man?” It is also a passage that gives us opportunity to ask some questions about healing itself. Later in the gospel (John 14) Jesus will say to his first disciples, and to us, that we will see even greater miracles ...

In this devotional we are going to look at just a few verses and one particular aspect of Jesus’ teaching, the devil! In our passage Jesus makes reference to the devil in his challenge to religious leaders who have allowed there dependence on religious tradition to become a stronghold of deception in their lives. He is exposing the fact that when we are deceived to the point of missing the truth a...