FIRST SUNDAY WORSHIP SERVICE FOR THE MONTH OF APRIL
7th APRIL, 2013
THEME FOR APRIL 2013: BUILDING RELATIONSHIP
God has blessed us again with a new day and another month to be able to worship and praise his holy name. The first Sunday worship for April 2013 began with the reading of a holy scripture Psalm 30 and a prayer by the Pastor. The Pastor gives thanks to the almighty father for sustaining our lives, giving us a new day and a new month. It was then followed by the songs of praise led by worship team. The songs were:- Lungdam lua ing Toupa, Sa in Jesu itna lamdang, Aw Jesu Tuihing lui na hi
Praise and worship was followed by a mass prayer and then singing of the song; Khovel a ka lensung in. Collection of offering was followed by singing the hymn; Jerusalem Zion Khopi. Upa. Thiankhanmuan delivered the offertory prayer. He also made announcement and some of the points highlighted were:
1. Baptist Children Department: We asked God for giving us Sunday school teachers and God answered our prayers by giving us 7 youth who voluntarily gave their names.
2. Worship Team: With the blessings of God 13 people voluntarily gave their names.
3. Media Team: For better communication and information, media team was needed and for this 18 people were given the task of content writers, photographers, videographers and admin/technicians.
4. Ministerial Camp: As per the Ministerial Committee Meeting held on 4/4/2013, a camp is to be organised on the coming September 26-28 at Emmanuel Theological Seminary, Chandan Holla in collaboration with EBCC Delhi and EBCC Central Delhi. The Speaker will be Rev. K. Kamchinkhup, Dircetor Ministries EBCC. Anyone interested can join the camp.
Pastor V. Nenglian presided upon the Pastorial prayer:-
The Pastor gave thanks to the almighty father for those who got blessings in terms of getting promotion in jobs, getting new jobs, those who achieved new things in the previous month, and those got cured from their sickness. He also prayed for those celebrating their anniversaries- birthday, wedding and so on for the month of April. He prayed for those who lost their loved ones. He thanked God for those who completed their class X and XII board exams and prayed for those who still have exams. And above all he thanked God for his blessings, he prayed to God to continue to guide and lead us throughout our lives. He prayed for the entire church members as well, so that we all could fulfill our assignments, appointments. This pastoral prayer was followed with mass recitation of the Bible verse Psalm 23.
Sermon from the Pastor:-
Pastor V.Nenglian began his sermon on the theme: ‘Building Relationship’ ( 1Kor.12:12- 31; 1Jn 4:20- 21). The four types of relationship highlighted were- Relationship between God and Men, Relationship within the family, Relationship between the believers and, Relationship between leaders and the non-leaders. The Pastor delivered his sermon based on the relationship between God and Men. He put a question to ask ourselves, “Where do I need to rebuild myself.” We do need to rebuild ourselves through the relationship with God. He gives an example of Nehemiah, how Nehemiah tries to rebuild Jerusalem’s Walls. The Bible of John 15, “The vine and the branches” shows the importance of building relationship with God.
According to Nicky Gumbel, ‘Christianity is the first and foremost about relationships rather than rules.’ And according to John Piper, ‘Relationships are always in process, they are not static.’ Then, what is the most important relationship as believers? What is the relationship between you and the other believers? Or what is the relationship between the believers and non- believers? These are the important questions we need to ask ourselves. From Mark 12: 29 – 31, the Pastor was giving examples of how the teachers of the law including the Pharisees and shadusees lay emphasis as believers. They emphasise on the Ten Commandments, Teaching of Moses, and the different types of laws and rules. In the Old Testament, the relationship between God and Men is measured by how they followed the Ten Commandments or how often did they perform the sacrificial rites. They even asked Jesus Of all the commandments, which is the most important? Jesus replied, (v.29) “The most important one,” answered Jesus “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. (v.30). Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with, all your mind and with all your strength’ (v.31). The second is this: Love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these (v.30). How is your relationship between God and you? Is it with all your heart, soul, mind or strength? Thus, this Bible verse shows that our relationship is not measured by how often do we go to church or how much offering do we contribute or how much we practice the law, order and rules. Our relationship is measured by how much we love our God- with all our heart, soul, mind and with all our strength. When we love God and consider him as the most important in our lives then only we can have a good relationship with the other believers as well as the non- believers. As is written in Mark 12: 31, the next important commandment is to ‘Love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than this.’ Being a believer, where do we need to rebuild our relationships? The Pastor then concluded his sermon by highlighting the Mission field trip to be held on the 19- 21 April in Punjab (Batiala).
After the sermon, the Mission Committee distributed the pledge card for those who wanted to be part of the Mission Ministry. It was then followed by the congregation singing of the hymn; Toupa’n hong zang nuam and the service was concluded with a benedictory by Upa. Kamsuanthang.
P.S. - With the hope of God’s Blessings and Guidance, our next Sunday worship for 14th April 2013 will be held at the usual time (11 am), at the same place. A special number will be presented by the Prayer Cell and we will be fortunate to hear the living words from the Local Pastor V. Nenglian.
By- Manthianching
Media Team
