WELCOME
Communion Worship Service
Good morning First Baptist. We welcome you to worship this morning. Be sure to remember your brothers and sisters in Christ throughout the week as you pray for them, and as the Holy Spirit brings their faces to your mind. Be sure to also connect with them in the ways that are possible. And if you have any questions or would like to talk to someone, please don’t hesitate to contact the church through the church telephone and leave a message. (519-733-4144)
Songs
Call to Worship
Give thanks to the Lord, for God is good!
Pastor: Come, let us worship God, the Creator of life.
All: Thank you, God, for our first nations people who lived in harmony with You and creation and opened their arms in welcome to us.
Pastor: Come, let us give thanks to God, the foundation on whom this country was built.
All: We remember the first settlers came to Canada seeking freedom of religion and a place where God’s will would be done from sea to sea.
Responding to God
Pastor: Come, let us celebrate Canada’s birthday!
All: We cherish the gift of this nation and pray for the insight, faith and courage to live out God’s purpose for Canada.
Good morning FBK – and welcome to Worship!
Songs
Prayer
Prayer of Confession & Assurance
Heavenly Father,
Today we are going to talk about David…. And we know he is always noted as being a man after God’s own heart.
But he was also a man who failed so many times, he was a man who sinned and made really mad choices.
But he was also a man who knew when he had done wrong that he needed to admit his failures to you and ask for forgiveness.
Father, this morning we do the same. We know where we’ve messed up this week, where we’ve spoken badly, where we have not treated others the way we should or passed judgement on them for who they are or how they look.
None of these things are good in your sight.
But we do this because we long to knows as people after Your Heart.
So we ask for forgiveness and that we would learn from our shortcomings and become more focused on the Strength & guidance you provide.
Amen.
Words of Assurance
God gave us Jesus…
So we can be assured of His Love,
His Guidance and most especially His Forgiveness!
Summer Stories
King David: Wholehearted Devotion
Today's Message: Pastor Dave Page
Today continues our sermon series called: Summer Stories and we look at the story of one of the Old Testament’s most famous characters: King David. We know him as a man who pursues God above all else and a man who fails in his pursuit of God regularly.
This morning we look at the end of David’s life and a true witness to why he was called a man after God’s own heart.
Scripture Reading: 1 Chronicles 29:1-15
Then King David said to the whole assembly: “My son Solomon, the one whom God has chosen, is young and inexperienced. The task is great, because this palatial structure is not for man but for the Lord God. 2 With all my resources I have provided for the temple of my God—gold for the gold work, silver for the silver, bronze for the bronze, iron for the iron and wood for the wood, as well as onyx for the settings, turquoise, stones of various colors, and all kinds of fine stone and marble—all of these in large quantities. 3 Besides, in my devotion to the temple of my God I now give my personal treasures of gold and silver for the temple of my God, over and above everything I have provided for this holy temple: 4 three thousand talents of gold (gold of Ophir) and seven thousand talents of refined silver, for the overlaying of the walls of the buildings, 5 for the gold work and the silver work, and for all the work to be done by the craftsmen. Now, who is willing to consecrate themselves to the Lord today?”
6 Then the leaders of families, the officers of the tribes of Israel, the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, and the officials in charge of the king’s work gave willingly. 7 They gave toward the work on the temple of God five thousand talents and ten thousand darics of gold, ten thousand talents of silver, eighteen thousand talents of bronze and a hundred thousand talents of iron. 8 Anyone who had precious stones gave them to the treasury of the temple of the Lord in the custody of Jehiel the Gershonite. 9 The people rejoiced at the willing response of their leaders, for they had given freely and wholeheartedly to the Lord. David the king also rejoiced greatly.
David’s Prayer
10 David praised the Lord in the presence of the whole assembly, saying,
“Praise be to you, Lord,
the God of our father Israel,
from everlasting to everlasting.
11 Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power
and the glory and the majesty and the splendor,
for everything in heaven and earth is yours.
Yours, Lord, is the kingdom;
you are exalted as head over all.
12 Wealth and honor come from you;
you are the ruler of all things.
In your hands are strength and power
to exalt and give strength to all.
13 Now, our God, we give you thanks,
and praise your glorious name.14 “But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand. 15 We are foreigners and strangers in your sight, as were all our ancestors. Our days on earth are like a shadow, without hope.
When studying a persons life and the legacy they leave, It can be helpful to look at the end of a life. That’s because it gives us a chance to consider the lasting impact they leave. We all have opportunities to leave a legacy, because life is filled with endings – moving away, death, changes in job or church.
Have you thought about how will you be remembered?
- How will your children remember you?
- Your co-workers?
- Your family?
- Your community?
I want to begin our look at the end of David’s life with a brief summary of the timeline of David’s life.
- 1040 – Saul becomes king
- 1038 – David is born
- 1025 – David is anointed by Samuel as the next king; Saul takes him to his court to play the harp for him
- 1020 – David defeats Goliath; becomes friends with Jonathan, the king’s son, who protects him from Saul’s attempts to kill him
- 1010 – David becomes a commander in Saul’s army
- 1007 – David flees Saul’s house as Saul tries repeatedly to kill him. He spends time hiding and going from place to place, as some mighty men come to support and encourage him. Twice 1005 – David has opportunity to kill Saul but refuses
- 1000 – Saul & Jonathan die in battle; David becomes king over Judah, the southern kingdom, and Ish-Bosheth, Saul’s son, over Israel, the northern kingdom
- 993 – Ish-Bosheth is murdered; David becomes king over all Israel
- 992 – David returns the ark to Jerusalem; David wants to build a temple but God says no; Nathan promises him an everlasting kingdom
- 980 – David sleeps w/ Bathsheba and has Uriah killed
- 969 – Absalom revolts against David and steals the hearts of his people
- 962 – David’s health begins to fail
- 961 – David charges Solomon and the men with the construction of the temple and charges his son to walk with God after his death
- 961 – David dies
David’s life is an extraordinary life – David has been brought by God from the life of a simple shepherd boy to the life of a king, giant killer, poet, lover, warrior, leader of the people, and man after God’s own heart.
So, why share this last story of David’s life with you this morning?
It’s a true picture of a Jesus centered legacy King David leaves in 1 Chronicles 29?
He leaves this legacy in two ways.
(1) He points the people to God, not himself
King David is dying, and that is cause for concern for the nation of Israel. The nation has never been better – there is unity, prosperity, and God’s blessing – but now the king is dying. What is going to happen when King David leaves? David confronts this right away:
in v. 1 – My son Solomon, the one whom God has chosen, is young and inexperienced. How will the nation survive the transition?
This is a critical point that I don’t want you to miss. Think about how you came to faith in God. Think about how you grew. For most of us, we connected to God through someone else. Our parents, our pastor, a ministry leader, a small group leader, a friend, a mentor. Some of us connected to God best through a specific church. Most people don’t do it on their own. There is almost always someone who bridges the gap and helps us experience God. What happens when they move away? Or when we move away? Or when they die? This is what the nation of Israel and a young boy named Solomon face.
For many of us, times of transition are times of real anxiety. But look What David does, and see what that teaches us about dealing with these kind of transitions?
First, he begins by talking about all the resources he has put together for the temple, what will become the house of God. He continually points people to the temple as their focus, and not to himself or to Solomon. The temple is all about providing a home for the ark, a resting place for the presence of God. That is the central concern for David. David is doing something so important when it comes to legacy and times of transitions. He is not pointing the people to himself by building a monument to himself; he is pointing people to God – reinforcing to the nation that they need the presence of God for themselves. Remember that this is what the ark was – the place where the people would meet with God.
For those of you who are responsible for others, leaders in this church or relationships of faith, point those you are called to lead to God. The worst thing you can do is to communicate that they need you, that apart from you they will not survive in their faith.
If you’re a parent, you can parent in such a way that your children become dependent on you for their faith – that’s a trap. In the end, their faith has to be their own.
Point the people to God.
In the last recorded words of David’s life his message was that we all need the presence of God. As John the Baptist said, “He must become greater; I must become less.” You do not need me or Pastor Marlee, you do not need Andy Stanley, Rick Warren or JD Greene, you do not need a certain church or style or program or leader. You need the presence of God in your life. Period.
So how do you get the presence of God, according to David?
(2) David calls for wholehearted devotion.
What brings the presence of God? It’s not just having the ark of the covenant or the temple. It is wholehearted devotion.
David calls on the people to consecrate themselves, to give themselves completely to God.
1 Chronicles 29:5
“Now, who is willing to consecrate himself today to the LORD?” 6 Then the leaders of families, the officers of the tribes of Israel, the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, and the officials in charge of the king’s work gave willingly.
Whole-hearted devotion. That is what God is after, that is what what brings His presence, regardless of person, program, denomination. Programs and personalities mean nothing apart from whole-hearted devotion; To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind.
Whole-hearted devotion; consecration is to want one thing above all else. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
You want the presence of God? It is not about the programs, its not about Pastors or churches, its not about music styles – God responds to whole-hearted devotion. There is no secret program, there is no shortcut.
The ark of the covenant was very important to David. But here’s the thing about the ark – it was not a magic box. It was where the presence of God was most powerful, but it was not like a genie in the bottle. Remember Hophni and Phineas – they brought the ark of the Lord into battle, thinking that it would give them victory, despite the fact that they were evil, and instead, the ark was captured. You can’t put God in a box.
Many of our nostalgic feelings of faith are based on the fact that you may have had a really great church experiences in the past. Now, this can either be a good thing or a bad thing. For some people, they take the good from their past and are open to God and take initiative wherever they go. For others, they measure everything by their former church experiences for example, and unless their new church experience becomes like their nostalgic view of the past, then the opportunity in front of us can be missed.
There is much in our past faith practice that is still very valuable – We need to do midweek Bible Studies, We need to do more topical sermons with practical applications. We need to do more one-to-one discipleship. We need to have a strong men’s and women’s ministry. We need to do those things, because those were the most powerful ones in our lives.
We must also recognize however that the working of God is not tied to a person, program, building or idol. Just because you leave something, or someone in the past, does not mean that the power of God has left. God will show up wherever there is wholehearted devotion, regardless of the method or person.
Church, to consecrate yourself is to declare that I will love you no matter what, that I will follow you wherever you lead, that everything I have belongs to you. I will love you with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind.
Notice what is one of the most prominent aspects of this passage? Its Money, the peoples wealth. Consecration involves our money. That is one of the most tangible ways to say to God “I trust you.” Tithing – it is always tough to do, always a sacrifice, but God shows up where there is wholehearted devotion.
So, right about now is the time where you might expect me to say “get out there and live a life of whole-hearted devotion!” Right?
Don’t kid yourself. Nobody lives a life of whole-hearted devotion. Solomon did not live a life of whole-hearted devotion. Neither did David, really. Yes, the temple gets built, and yes, God’s glory comes in.
2 Chronicles 7:1-3
When Solomon finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the LORD filled the temple. 2 The priests could not enter the temple of the LORD because the glory of the LORD filled it. 3 When all the Israelites saw the fire coming down and the glory of the LORD above the temple, they knelt on the pavement with their faces to the ground, and they worshiped and gave thanks to the LORD, saying, “He is good; his love endures forever.”
But the wholehearted devotion does not last; they again begin to treat God like magic, something that needs to be conjured up. And in Ezekiel, God gives Ezekiel a vision:
Ezekiel 10:18-19:
Then the glory of the LORD departed from over the threshold of the temple and stopped above the cherubim. 19 While I watched, the cherubim spread their wings and rose from the ground, and as they went, the wheels went with them. They stopped at the entrance to the east gate of the LORD’s house, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them.
God gives Ezekiel a vision of the presence of God leaving the temple for good. Is there any hope for the nation, for those of us who can not devote ourselves wholeheartedly to God?
We need God’s presence. David tells us that. In order to experience God’s presence, we need wholehearted devotion. But we can not give that.
So here is our question for you today – What do we do?
There is a promise in this story, that is given ahead of our passage, in chapter 28
1 Chronicles 28:2-7
King David rose to his feet and said: “Listen to me, my brothers and my people. I had it in my heart to build a house as a place of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD, for the footstool of our God, and I made plans to build it. 3 But God said to me, ‘You are not to build a house for my Name, because you are a warrior and have shed blood.’ 4 “Yet the LORD, the God of Israel, chose me from my whole family to be king over Israel forever. He chose Judah as leader, and from the house of Judah he chose my family, and from my father’s sons he was pleased to make me king over all Israel. 5 Of all my sons– and the LORD has given me many– he has chosen my son Solomon to sit on the throne of the kingdom of the LORD over Israel. 6 He said to me: ‘Solomon your son is the one who will build my house and my courts, for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father. 7 I will establish his kingdom forever if he is unswerving in carrying out my commands and laws, as is being done at this time.’
Solomon will build the temple and his kingdom will last forever. We need someone who will be that bridge, someone whose wholehearted devotion will bring us the presence of God. We need that person because on our own we can’t do it. That person is Jesus, David’s descendant – He is the bridge to God.
In John 2:18-21, he says
Then the Jews demanded of him, “What miraculous sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” 20 The Jews replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” 21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
Jesus is the temple; he is the bridge. Not any person, program, or building.
1 Timothy 2:5-6
For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men– the testimony given in its proper time. Jesus loved God perfectly, wholeheartedly devoted. Only Jesus earned the presence of God. When we believe in him, we get the presence he deserved. And then, out of gratitude, you can give yourself to Him, wholeheartedly.
Jesus is the only bridge to God; once you know Him, then you can truly live a life of wholehearted devotion to God.
Once upon a time, there was a man who in his last days went to great lengths to point people to God. His whole life, within the bounds of God’s sovereignty, he made bold choices that would forever alter the trajectory of History…He was King David! The man after Gods own heart.
This is no fairy tale . . . it is the Good News of the Gospel.
Let’s Pray.
Prayer
Holy God, we come before you in prayer,
Thank you O God, for examples, like David, from your word who were willing to lead with compassion beyond their own self so that people can find healing and hope. Thank you that the sure and lasting hope for us is found in your Son and our saviour Jesus Christ.
God of freedom, we give you thanks for this weekend in the celebration of our nation. We are so grateful to live in a country where we are blessed with so many resources and the freedom to worship as we choose.
We pray for people who do not enjoy such freedoms. We pray for those who are downtrodden and oppressed. We pray for political rulers who care more about power and wealth than about the welfare and the rights of the people they govern. O God, help us to use our freedom and our many resources to be a blessing not just for our own benefit, but to also help this world be a better place, a place where all people can enjoy the basic necessities of life including freedom.
O God, may our church be like the Kingdom David foresaw, may we be a people who were willing to offer hope and healing to a broken world. Thank you for the people in our lives who have shared your healing and liberating love with us.
Father, we pray for those in your families that are ill – heal them
we pray for those that are scared and anxious – comfort them
we pray for those in that don’t know You – may we point the way to You.Thank you for your offer of freedom to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is through him, that we have the greatest freedom of all; freedom from our sins and freedom to be the people you have called us to be. And it is in his name, that we join now in saying together:
“Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread;
and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us;
and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.”
Communion
Reading- John 6:32-39
32 Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34 “Sir,” they said, “always give us this bread.”
35 Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. 37 All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me,”
Bread
Paul tells us “On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread and gave thanks to
God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
Prayer for the bread.
God of Mercy, you are one bread and we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. Lord, I thank you for allowing Communion to unite us as your people. You are the Bread of life, and we have come to partake of You so that we may have eternal life and so That life can be brought to Your body. AMEN.
Cup
25 In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant between God and his people—an agreement confirmed with my blood. Do this in remembrance of me as often as you drink it.”
Prayer for the cup.
God of Love, the cup of blessing that we bless is a participation in the blood of Christ. Lord, we understand that this cup is a symbol of our Communion with you
… a symbol so that we may focus on our relationship with You, our Savior and Lord. Amen.
“Through the broken bread we participate in His body, given for you
“Through the cup of blessing we participate in the new covenant Jesus gives.”
Take these elements and be thankful….
Song
Benediction
Lord, as we go from this place, surround us with your peace and love, that we make take healing and hope to others in your holy name. AMEN.