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he complexity of our brains the unpredictability of our feelings the subtleties of our genetics the powerful influence of our upbringing the lusts of the flesh and the temptations that afflict us he understands the mystery of birth and the terror of death he knows temptations of satan there is nothing about a human being that god does not know when the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak he knows when i m fearful and overwhelmed that is not unknown to him there is of course an even more glorious truth to this verse and that is in the incarnation that the lord of heaven became the dust of the earth the lord jesus took on our humanity in its fullness he was fearfully and wonderfully made in mary s womb he assumed our nature to redeem it and as he steps out to accomplish it to begin his public ministry his father in heaven shouts down from heaven this is my son with whom i m well pleased he lives a dusty life like we do his father knows his frame and remembers he is dust he lives for us he goes to the cross for us he is risen for us and he ascends to heaven for us and is seated at the right hand of the throne on high for us it is why rabbi duncan can famously and gloriously say the dust of the earth is on the throne of the majesty on high our saviour has been given a resurrected body and one day we will share in that the first man was from the earth a man of dust the second man is from heaven as was the man of dust so also are those who are of the dust and as is the man of heaven so also are those who are of heaven just as we have borne the image of the man of dust we shall f also bear the image of the man of heaven 1 cor 15 47 49 i recently heard of an old welsh minister whose final words were thanks be to god for remembering the dust of the earth it is a beautiful thing that god knows our frame he remembers we are dust your minister and friend paul ps we used to sing this hymn in the church where i grew up it is a magnificent meditation on the dustiness of jesus by joseph hart to the tune beethoven a man there is a real man with wounds still gaping wide from which rich streams of blood once ran in hands and feet and side tis no wild fancy of our brains no metaphor we speak the same dear man in heaven now reigns that suffered for our sake this wondrous man of whom we tell is true almighty god he bought our souls from death and hell the price his own heart s blood that human heart he still retains though throned in highest bliss and feels each tempted member s pains for our affliction s his come then repenting sinner come approach with humble faith owe what thou wilt the total sum is canceled by his death his blood can cleanse the blackest soul and wash our guilt away he will present us sound and whole in that tremendous day ealinglevy ministers letters 4 comments november 29 2025 november 29 2025 6 minutes praying for church plants in the last 10 years the lord has grown our fragile little denomination in remarkable ways there are external factors which have contributed but in the kindness of god we are now 25 congregations with 13 of these being church plants in these past few months we have seen three ipc congregations begin in salford carlisle and lincoln there are times and seasons in church life as well as denominational life we are now in a period of needing to see church plants grow and become sustainable in many ways the crying need of the uk is strong churches and so i thought it would be good for us to think about how we can be praying for these church plants using 5 points starting with p people it is easy to be obsessed with numbers in church life but we do need to see that god s ordinary way of working is of adding to his church we are to be praying that our congregations would come to spiritual maturity and grow in depth of love and insight and that as churches we would become more and more conformed to christ it is also right to pray that the lord would bring people to our church plant that people would be converted and added to the church and that christians who move into the area would join these churches there is a strength in numbers as a congregation grows it is able to reach more people have different ministries support other congregations and see more churches planted there is a reason why in the book of acts numbers are recorded so that we can see and rejoice over how christ s church has grown it is true that many churches in the uk have stalled at the 40 50 people mark it means that the church is always on the borders of viability vulnerability and fragility can be good things in a church s life there is a sense in which it can cause us to cast ourselves on the lord but for the sake of the gospel for the establishment of new churches for the work of the kingdom churches that grow and have more people in them are able to often have a greater impact there is something in the british christian mentality that is very nervous about churches growing big i wonder how we might have felt on the day of pentecost pounds to plant a church takes considerable expense there is the church planter s salary and accommodation a decent website the hiring of premises the expenses go on and on our church planting committee estimates that it takes 100 000 for the first year this means that our church planters as well as being preachers and pastors have to become fund raisers our church planting fund at presbytery has been a brilliant thing in being able to give grants to enable plants to get going we normally give grants for 3 years of about a third of what the planter has to raise it would be wonderful to see this fund able to give more and see more churches planted and established presbyters elders are a precious gift of the ascended christ to his church to be able to share in the work and governance in our churches the church planter is not able to do all the work and is extremely vulnerable on his own the pattern we see in the new testament is of a plurality of leadership we well know the danger of power in the hands of one man corrupting that man the testimony of the whole of scripture bears this out two are better than one because they have a good reward for their toil for if they fall one will lift up his fellow but woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up ecclesiastes 4 9 10 without counsel plans fail but with many advisers they succeed proverbs 15 22 it is for the health and safety of christ s flock that we believe elders are needed please pray that our church planters would see elders raised up in their congregations to shepherd jesus church properties the church is not the building is of course true but it is also equally true that buildings serve churches our experience is that a building enables you to be more established in a community to have a base from which you can do ministry and mission it says to the transient community around us this church will outlive you our church plants which are renting find themselves very vulnerable to the whims of their landlord some of our church plants have found themselves under attack for holding to a biblically faithful position on sexuality and been told they are unable to rent the space any longer because of that others of our church plants in places where space is at a premium are paying thousands of pounds for two hours on a sunday morning enormous amounts of energy can be taken up in church plants with set up and take down with only a very small number of volunteers i realise it is naive to think that having one s own building will lead to growth and yet we need to realise that seeing churches established for the next 100 years necessarily means having your own building we need to have a long term mindset in planting we are going to have to be creative in seeing how churches can get established in their own buildings please pray that those church plants which are struggling to buy properties would be able to purchase a building is there a way that you could financially support one of our church plants in obtaining a building planters we have been blessed in the last 15 years with men who have come forward with their families willing to sacrifice and give themselves to church planting with the ipc we realise that the needs are enormous and that church planting does take a certain type of personality it isn t for everyone and so it is right that men s gifts are tested to see whether it is a good fit pray that the lord would sustain these church planters and their families who are often in isolated situations the pressures in a church plant where one is beginning from scratch are significant pray that we would care well for those men and their families there are also more opportunities than we can currently meet we are in need of more church planters jesus tells us the harvest is plentiful but the labourers are few therefore pray earnestly to the lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest matthew 9 38 39 pray that the lord would raise up church planters pray for those considering planting with ipc as a denomination we have so much to be thankful for we recognise that unless the lord builds the house we labour in vain pray that the lord would continue to build his church through us i think i got at least 3 of these p s from jonty rhodes in a presbytery report he gave ealinglevy uncategorized leave a comment november 6 2025 november 6 2025 5 minutes give us today our daily bread minister s letter oct 25 dear all at ipc every sunday we say together what is commonly called the lord s prayer which is of course wrongly named jesus never had to pray this prayer it s the prayer he gave to his disciples he didn t pray forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us it s both a model and a form of prayer and we are to use this to base our prayers upon but also jesus tells us to pray it when you pray pray this our father who is in heaven matthew 6 9 the lord s prayer is in many ways systematic theology in miniature it gives us the equipment to live out the christian life this prayer controls our christian attitudes it enables us to face life with all its ups and downs and uncertainties i ve been thinking on the petition give us today our daily bread and each word is worth meditating on what is immediately striking is that this request doesn t come until halfway through the prayer the lord s prayer is first of all about god s name god s kingdom and god s will those things are the utter priority the lord s prayer forces us to speak of his concerns before our own before we come to forgiveness and our needs how often my prayer life is the opposite the concerns of my daily life crowd in my priorities are tragically the other way round this petition includes everything we need our health our food our wants our cares our need to be sustained it reminds us that the lord provides and reminds us of his overruling providence in everything every word is loaded with meaning give what do you have that you did not receive 1 cor 4 7 as we pray give us our daily bread we are to recognise god is the generous giver all good gifts around us are us are sent from heaven above what we have is not earned the home that we live in the food on our table the money in our bank account the clothes on our back all is given to us and to be received as gift we need to recognise the source of what we have i often think of nebuchadnezzar looking out is not this great babylon which i have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty daniel 4 30 while the words are on his lips the lord humbles him and after seven years he recognises there is a god in heaven who is to be praised and blessed forever he sees himself as he is a creature who is dependent and god has given him all that he has our daily necessities are given to us by god give us i don t think i had realised here that it is a corporate prayer give us it does not say me or my so often i am keen to pray for me myself and i what patience god must have with me constantly being focussed in on myself this petition puts me in my place it shows me my concern should be with others we re even told to pray for our enemies by the lord jesus this prayer is a disciples prayer and jesus is encouraging us here to be thinking of his disciples it is right and fitting to pray this as a church sunday by sunday our own needs are prayed for in the context of others give us today jesus famously said therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow for tomorrow will be anxious for itself sufficient for the day is its own trouble matthew 6 34 proverbs reminds us do not boast about tomorrow for you do not know what a day may bring proverbs 27 1 to pray give us today our daily bread recognises that we are not in control we are mortal limited finite creatures we live by god s daily sustaining grace it is a great reminder that we live reliant on the daily care of god and when it comes to tomorrow we can rely on god s daily grace then for the israelites in the wilderness they were given manna daily they had to rely on god s fresh daily provision each day they weren t able to gather tomorrow s manna today they had to trust god would provide it in the morning our daily bread speaks to us of daily necessity in our culture we know exactly what this means bread is a slang term for money dough is used in the same way it is the stuff of life it s not the fleshpots that the children of israel longed for in egypt nor the extravagant food we see in restaurants jesus is speaking of daily bread as the basic food which keeps us alive the bare necessities the whole petition tells us that the christian life is one of reliance and dependence we entrust ourselves to the lord i think this is one of our basic struggles am i willing to live reliantly on the lord when i am forced to do that by my circumstances do i kick against it as i ve written before dependence and reliance are coming to all of us whether we like it or not it is just a case of whether we will learn to embrace them or be forced to the writer of proverbs tells us give me neither poverty nor riches feed me with the food that is needful for me lest i be full and deny you and say who is the lord or lest i be poor and steal and profane the name of my god proverbs 30 8 9 this is counter cultural living and it always has been where discontentment and envy of others can so easily creep in jesus is teaching us god gives us what we need and that is all ok he is teaching that we humans are like the rest of creation we are as dependent as the birds who neither sew nor reap and so we are not to be overly concerned about what we wear and what we eat what we look like matthew 6 32 god knows what we need before we ask it matthew 6 8 you can look at these physical provisions of the lord and the prayer is certainly referring to them but we realise that man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of god matthew 4 4 it woul...