25 May 2025 St. Paul's Church

ABSA BANK, WELKOM

4052 0411 25

Cheque account

Welcome

Scripture Readings

Chorus All hail the Lamb

Chorus All heaven declares

Chorus All over the world

Hymn All people that on earth do dwell

General Confession said together.

 Almighty and most merciful Father, we have strayed from Your ways like lost sheep, we have left undone what we ought to have done,  and we have done what we ought not to have done. We have followed our own ways and our own desires and we have neglected and broken Your holy laws.

Have mercy on us Lord.

Restore those who repent and confess their sins  according to Your promises declare in Jesus Christ our Lord. Grant, merciful Father, for His sake, that hereafter  we may live a righteous and obedient life,  to the glory of Your Holy Name. Amen. 

 Assurance of forgiveness said by the minister standing.

 Almighty God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, does not desire the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live.  He has given authority and commandment to His ministers to declare to His people that He pardons and forgives the sins of all who truly repent and believe His holy gospel. 

 Therefore, let us ask Him to grant us true repentance and His Holy Spirit, that we may please Him now, and that the rest of our life may be pure and holy so that at the last we may come to His eternal joy through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

The Lord’s Prayer said together. 

Our Father, which art in heaven,

Hallowed by thy Name,

Thy kingdom come,

Thy will be done,

In earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;

And forgive us our trespasses, 

As we forgive them that trespass against us; And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil.

For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, For ever and ever.  Amen. 

The Ten Commandments

Minister:

Our Lord Jesus Christ said : “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it : Love your neighbour as yourself.  All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments”. 

Congregation :

Lord have mercy on us, and write these commandments in our hearts and minds to keep them. 

John will now read the Old Testament reading to us from the NIV pew bible.

He begins with “Hear the Word of God as it is written in Psalm 67”

He ends with “This is the word of God”.

Congregation: “Thanks be to God”

Carol

will now read the New Testament reading to us from the NIV pew bible.

She begins with “Hear the Word of God as it is written in Acts 14:8-18”

She ends with “This is the word of God”.

Congregation: “Thanks be to God”.

Hymn All things bright and beautiful

Sermon

52 sermons from the book of acts

9. THE APPEAL TO GOD Acts 4:23–31 ILLUSTRATION: In his talk entitled “The Sense of an Ending,” Jeremy Begbie tells a story about attending a worship service in a poor South African township. Immediately before the service, a house around the corner had just been burned to the ground because the man who lived there was a suspected thief. A week before that, a tornado had cut through the township, ripping apart fifty homes; five people had been killed. And then I was told that the very night before, a gang hounded down a fourteen-year-old, a member of the church’s Sunday school, and stabbed him to death. The pastor began his opening prayer: “Lord, you are the Creator and the Sovereign, but why did the wind come like a snake and tear our roofs off? Why did a mob cut short the life of one of our own children, when he had everything to live for? Over and over again, Lord, we are in the midst of death.” As he spoke, the congregation responded with a dreadful sighing and groaning. And then, once he finished his prayer, very slowly, the whole congregation began to sing, at first very quietly, then louder. They sang and they sang, song after song of praise—praise to a God who in Jesus had plunged into the very worst to give us a promise of an ending beyond all imagining. The singing gave the congregation a foretaste of the end. Christian hope isn’t about looking around at the state of things now and trying to imagine where it’s all going. It’s not about trying to calculate the future from the present. It’s about breathing now the fresh air of the ending, tasting the spices and sipping the wine of the feast to come. 1. IT WAS UNITED And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is.—Acts 4:24 Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.—Matthew 18:19 2. IT WAS BELIEVING And being let go, they went to their own company, and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them. And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is.—Acts 4:23–24 3. IT WAS SCRIPTURAL Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ. For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together, For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.—Acts 4:25–28 4. IT WAS DEFINITE And now, Lord, behold their threatenings: and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak thy word.—Acts 4:29 Long time therefore abode they speaking boldly in the Lord, which gave testimony unto the word of his grace, and granted signs and wonders to be done by their hands.—Acts 14:3 5. IT WAS CHRIST-HONORING By stretching forth thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus.—Acts 4:30 6. IT WAS ANSWERED And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with boldness.—Acts 4:31 The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the LORD.—Jeremiah 23:28

Notices Mr John Oberholzer - Session Clerk

Please remember to tithe

Collection Janet

Praise God from whom all blessing flow

Prayer

Hymn All to Jesus I surrender

Benediction

Doxology Now unto Him