This service will also
include communion.
Praise to the God of All Comfort
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.
Our Father God is;
God
We all have different experiences of our earthly fathers. Some of them were playful, some were loving and kind, some were busy and others emotionally distant. Some were cruel and unkind and others were absent. Our experiences with our earthly fathers will affect how we see God as Father. This is understandable, but God should be the lens through which we see our earthly fathers.
He is God and so is perfect. Our earthly fathers can only ever be a dim reflection of the perfect Father we have in heaven. We must never allow their failings to obscure our view of our heavenly Father.
The Father from all Eternity
We are not born parents. Some of us become a biological mother or father at the moment we first have children, others become parents through caring for children. Before the creation of the Universe, God was Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He was Father before we became His children. God has always been Father, it is who He is.
We may only dimly understand, but this is with our own understanding of ‘becoming’ parents, but our lack of understanding in no way changes the truth of His eternal Fatherhood.
The Father of Compassion and all Comfort
It is God’s compassionate nature that makes Him Father, not a biological relationship. Just as we have to learn how to be parents, so we have to learn to become like Him. We can learn how to be better Christians through gaining understanding of what the Bible means when it calls God Father.
He comforts us not only for our own sake, but so that we can learn how to comfort others. So that we can pass on the comfort we have ourselves received. We are called to become like Him.
Challenge:
God intends that our sufferings are a means to an end. This does not mean that he causes them, but he uses those things that happen to us for our ultimate good. Are we willing to work with God and allow our trials to mould us into the type of person God always intended us to be; Loving and compassionate, able to comfort those who are suffering, daily becoming more like Jesus?
Service Details
Theme: ‘Our Father God’
Readings: 2 Corinthians 1 v 3 – 11
Preacher: Robin Brenchley
Led by: Marion Brenchley
