FULL CIRCLE! Sjirk Bajema, 09-12-2

Sermon 2 on Heidelberg Catechism Lord’s Day 52 (Q & A 128-129)

Scripture Reading: Psalm 115

Church of the Lord Jesus Christ...

Before we consider the way we end our prayers, let’s reflect on what has made up our prayer so far. We note that we began praying by looking up to where the Lord is - “Our Father who art in heaven.”

Here is child-like faith. We know our place. To sum up, this is HIS POSITION.

And as we do that we know that we have to respect Him for who He is. So the first request is, “Hallowed be thy name.”

IT’S NOT THE OUTLOOK – IT’S THE UPLOOK! Sjirk Bajema, 09-11-2

Sermon 1 on Heidelberg Catechism Lord’s Day 52 (Q & A 127)

Scripture Reading: Ephesians 6:10-20

Church of our Lord Jesus Christ...

We ask that temptation won’t control us. It’s something so important that we need to ask it all the time. It’s in the Lord’s own model prayer, so it must be so! That’s why Answer 127 begins, “By ourselves we are too weak to hold our own even for a moment.”

Balance can be so hard to find, and yet it is so important in life. We need balance in order to walk, balance in what we eat and drink, balance in how we spend our time and balance in what we think.

It's that last area that I'm thinking of as I write – and one particular area of our thoughts, too. I'm thinking about the balance between God's reign over His creation and our responsibility to plan and act.

Reformed and Presbyterian people like ourselves often emphasise the fact that no matter what happens in life, God is in control. We're right to do so – the Scriptures clearly teach that a small bird can't even fall to the ground without God allowing it to do die (Matthew 10:29). We derive great comfort from the fact that nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God (Romans 8).