[0:00] Well, good morning. Still got a few folk arriving as well. If you're visitors here amongst us, we particularly want to welcome you and particularly want to welcome the CY weekend with Dave Plant and Claudine and other leaders as well. First of all, apologies. I know some of you young ladies had a bit of a cold night last night. The heating was set up to come on, but I'm afraid it broke down on you. So I'm sorry about that. But hopefully you managed to get some sleep, even though I understand that you were talking and playing on your phones till half past one in the morning. So that's probably, so that's, okay. So now, now things have changed.
[0:52] Okay, so now we're here to be in the presence of God and to remember that we are here to worship him, who is the God of all things and the God who deserves to be worshipped and praised and adored.
[1:09] And just from one of the songs in the Psalms, we're told this, let the name of the Lord be praised both now and forevermore. From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets, the name of the Lord is to be praised. God deserves our worship, our awe, our praise. He's a good, faithful, holy God. And our first hymn, and all of our hymns are going to be on the screen behind me, reminds us that God is to be blessed. To be blessed means to praise him, to give him thanks. Blessed be the Lord. So we're going to stand and sing, bless the Lord, oh my soul. We'll stand as the music begins to play.
[1:54] Though God is holy, which means he's perfect and good, he's also made a way for us to know him and to come to him. And prayer is when we communicate and talk with God. And we're going to ask God to be with us this morning and pray. So let's just close our eyes and concentrate on what we're doing.
[2:13] Lord our God, you are holy and good and perfect. Everything about you is so unlike us. You are the God who created us and made us. You're the God who amazingly loves us and cares for us. The one who provides all our needs. The God who supplies and gives to us life and health and strength. You're the one who provides for us homes and families and food and clothes. And Lord, we thank you again that we can stop in the busyness of our lives and think about you. Thank you that you've given us a Sunday that we can come and remember what a good God you are and give you the praise of our hearts. We do want to bless you. We do want to say that you are wonderful and good because you're the God who has sent your son into this world. We could never know you. We would never know anything about you except that you have made yourself known to us. We thank you that in Jesus we have God walking and living in this world, our world, experiencing the things that we experience. The good things, the joy, the laughter, the fun, the friendship. But Lord, thank you that in Jesus you, God, have experienced the harsh realities of life. You know what it is to suffer, to cry, to be broken hearted. You know what it is to have been rejected and despised and called names. You know what it is to suffer and die. But we thank you that your death was not pointless, but it had meaning and it accomplished for us something wonderful. Thank you that you died for us to demonstrate the enormity of your love. We thank you too that you died to take our sin, to take the blame for all the wrong things that we have done, the wrong things that we continue to think about you and one another, the wrong words we speak. And oh Lord, we ask that even now you would help us to just see how much we need your forgiveness, how much we need your love and your care. We pray that you'll be with us in this time together and that you would help us to worship you just as we've sung.
[4:22] Help us to understand more of your greatness and love. Help us, we pray, day by day, to live in the way that you want us to, the best way, the most wonderful way, the most fulfilling way, the way that is following Jesus, your son and our saviour. So help us now and bless us and make this time a really meaningful time, for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.
[4:46] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you. How did you first hear about the Lord Jesus and where? Through a holiday Bible.
[4:57] Was that at? Yeah. Cannon Park. And how old were you then? How old were you then? Year three. So year three, so about? Seven.
[5:08] Eight. Yeah. And what led you to believe in the Lord Jesus and when did this happen?
[5:19] I don't know. It was just when Margaret was talking about it. When it was during the holiday Bible club. So when Margaret was teaching in the holiday Bible club.
[5:34] Is there a point when this happened, when you chose to believe in Jesus and could you tell us what happened at that point when you thought? I think it was someone was teaching and they said something really important.
[5:49] And what did you do? I just stopped for a minute. Yeah. I don't know. Like, yeah. Okay. And what, is there anything that's changed in your life since you trusted in Jesus?
[6:04] Well, I found that my anger's gone down, so that's a plus. And I can really attest to that because I used to struggle with anger issues and it's just been wonderful to see how the Lord has helped you with that, as you say.
[6:22] Has it been easy being a Christian? No. Yeah. It's not easy for any of us, but we have the comfort that God is with us and is at work.
[6:34] And I just wanted to share with you something else about you as well. It's been such a blessing to see how God is working in your life, even over the past year.
[6:47] And as you have been involved in the children's club that she used to attend, she's now volunteering and helping and teaching at the club.
[7:00] And also last summer, I was involved in an open air children's club that we did in Middlesbrough. And she was teaching the Bible verse and helping to lead some of the things.
[7:13] So it's been wonderful to see you growing in your faith. And thank you. Well done, Jess.
[7:28] That was really very brave of you, I think. We're going to read now from our Bibles. And hopefully you've got a Bible nearby or one that you can share with somebody. And we're going to read from the Gospel of Matthew and chapter 19.
[7:43] I say, if you can turn there yourself or if you can find one to read along with, Matthew 19. And if you've got one of the church Bibles, one of the Red Church Bibles, that's page 986.
[7:59] Page 986. And it's about an event in the life of Jesus when somebody comes and asks him a question, an important question.
[8:12] So we're going to read from verse 16 of Matthew 19. Verse 16. Just then a man came up to Jesus and asked, Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?
[8:28] Why do you ask me about what is good? Jesus replied, there is only one who is good. If you want to enter life, keep the commandments.
[8:39] Which ones? he inquired. Jesus replied, you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honour your father and mother, and love your neighbour as yourself.
[8:56] All these I've kept, the young man said. What do I still lack? Jesus answered, if you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give them to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, then come follow me.
[9:12] When the young man heard this, he went away sad because he had great wealth. Then Jesus said to his disciples, truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven.
[9:26] Again, I tell you, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God. When his disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, who then can be saved?
[9:41] Jesus looked at them and said, with man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. And we're going to think about that event and that meeting between that man and Jesus in a moment or two.
[9:53] So if you have got a Bible, then you can turn it to Luke in chapter 19, that would be great.
[10:04] If not, then just listen as best you can. This is our thinking time, okay? This is the thinking time and the quieter time, as it were, of our service. We've heard from lots of people about different things, but now we're going to hear from God and his word.
[10:18] And particularly about this, about Jesus and what he does and what he means and what he came to do. But I want you to think, I want you to think in your head for a moment, all of us.
[10:29] I want you to think, what is the one thing that you really, really, really want? I don't want anybody to shout out, but just think, what is the one thing that you really want? The one thing that if you had that one thing, it would just make life brilliant.
[10:42] It would make life complete. It would make you feel that everything else doesn't matter. If I could just have this one thing. It doesn't have to be an object. It doesn't have to be money or a car or a house, necessarily.
[10:53] It can be, perhaps, a broken relationship that's fixed. Or it can be just feeling that I'm loved and accepted or being happy with myself or something like that.
[11:04] If I could have that one thing, it would make me complete. Happy. Perhaps, as you're thinking, you can't think of just one thing.
[11:15] Perhaps there's two or three things in your head. Well, I'd like to have that, but I'd also like this and that. So, maybe you're somebody who says, I can't think of anything that I'd really need or want. I think, pretty much, I've got everything that I could possibly need.
[11:28] I've got all the things that I want. Well, here's a man, a young man, and he had everything, really, going for him. He really had the lot.
[11:39] He had everything that possibly we would want and much more besides, but he still missed something else. There was something lacking. There's something that he really wanted, or he thought he wanted, anyway.
[11:51] He thought if he had it, it would make him happy, but he didn't know how to get it. He didn't know where to get it. He didn't know what it meant. So, this person, we don't know his name.
[12:03] We know a few things about him, but we don't know his name. We don't know all that much, but we know that he came up to Jesus, and he said to Jesus, Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?
[12:17] What was it we know about this man? We know he was young, because we're told later on that he's a young man. That means he's probably around about 20, which, for some of you, would seem like really old, but for some of us, would seem like really, really young.
[12:31] But he was young. He had his whole life ahead of him. He had everything to look forward to. He didn't have any responsibilities of paying a mortgage like older people have to have. He didn't have all the responsibilities of having to get to work every single day.
[12:44] He just enjoyed life being young. The trouble is, when you're young, though, you want to be older. You want to be grown up. You want to be respected. You want to be able to earn money.
[12:56] You want to be able to do the things that you want to do. Being young means having to be told what to do by your teachers or your parents. We all want to be older when we're young. Somebody once said that youth is wasted on the young.
[13:10] When we're young, we just want to get out of being young. We want to be grown up. To be able to drive. Be able to do all the things older people can do. When you get older, you want to be young.
[13:23] You miss those days. When you're older, you think, oh, it was great when I was young. When I didn't have all those problems. I could do what I want. Go where I liked. When we're young, we feel invincible.
[13:35] We can take on the world. When we're young, we know everything. Our parents, they don't know anything, really. They don't know even how to use their mobile phone or a tablet.
[13:46] We have to teach them and show them. When we're young, we can accomplish anything we want to do. Our lives are all before us. And here's this young guy. He's like that.
[13:57] He thinks he knows everything in one sense. That's why he's going to Jesus. Not to Jesus because he really needs Jesus to tell him what to do. He wants to tell Jesus in one sense that he's done all the things. That he's okay.
[14:08] There's something that he's missing. Something that he lacks. What about you? Young or old? You may feel that you lack something.
[14:22] Yes, being young is good, but it's hard as well. It's difficult. Being old is difficult because your body's not doing the things it used to do when it was young. You've got lots of responsibilities and struggles.
[14:35] There's so much to fill our lives when we're young or old. So much to make us think about that perhaps we don't think about that one thing that we really need. That one thing that is most important of all.
[14:47] The other thing we know about him, which perhaps we might be a bit envious of, is that he had great wealth. Not just young, he's rich. Later on we're told he had great wealth.
[14:59] That means he had loads and loads of money. He could buy whatever he wanted to buy. He could get whatever he wanted to get. He didn't have to save up in his piggy bank or in his bank account.
[15:10] He could have gone out and bought what he wanted. Isn't that what people dream about? Isn't that what most of the people we talk to think is the answer to life? If only I could have more money.
[15:22] Isn't that why so many people buy lottery tickets? Or they go online, gambling or bingo sites. Isn't that the reason why we choose perhaps the career that we want to do? A job that's going to pay us well and give us money.
[15:36] Perhaps the thing that you want most of all in life is something that you think can only be got with money. Perhaps you're wanting and hoping to have lots of money.
[15:49] But there's lots of things money can buy. Yes, it can buy us cars and houses. Perhaps it can even buy us friends. It can buy us the things that we enjoy, the latest technology.
[16:00] But you can't buy everything that we want. Many years ago there was a group called The Beatles. And they sang a song which is called Money Can't Buy Me Love.
[16:11] Yes, people might like us because we've got money and we'll buy them sweets or we'll buy cans of pub or whatever it may be for them. But actually they're probably not really our friends. They don't really care about us once the money's gone.
[16:24] We have lots of things that we enjoy that are free. Just being able to do what we want to do. There's lots of things that money can't give us. And it can't give us the one thing that we need most of all.
[16:35] It can't buy for us the thing that is most essential. And this young man, this rich young man, he wanted this thing but he couldn't buy it. All the money in the world couldn't buy it. The richest billionaire in the world can't have this thing with money.
[16:49] So he's young and he's rich. There's something else perhaps. He's religious as well. When he comes to Jesus and asks him, what must I do to get eternal life?
[17:01] Jesus basically says, keep God's commandments. Keep the religion that you've been brought up in. Don't steal, don't murder, don't lie, honour your father and mother.
[17:12] And he says, I've always done that. Ever since I was even younger, I've always been good. I've always been religious. I've always had a belief. But religion didn't give him the thing that he wants.
[17:26] Perhaps some of you have been brought up to go to church. Many of you haven't maybe. Perhaps some of us have been following and going to church all our lives. And something that we do every Sunday and from time to time we pray and so on.
[17:43] We think, well, if I've got some religion, if I'm a good person, then of course, then everything's okay. Everything is alright. We know there's some people who do just live for their religion.
[17:56] We see it on the TV where people will give their lives and die for what they believe in. But being religious can't give us the thing that we need. Coming to church can't give us the thing that we need most of all.
[18:09] Even reading our Bible or going to a CY camp can't give us those things. Having Christian parents can't give us those things that we need. That one thing that we need more than anything else.
[18:20] And this man knew that too. So he was young, he was rich and he was religious. He had everything going for him, but there's something missing. What about you? You might still be young or you might be old.
[18:32] You might be rich, you might be poor. You might be very religious, you might have never thought about religion. But there's still something that you lack, but it's so important. And so because he lacked this thing, he went to the one person he knew who could give him the answer to what he wanted.
[18:49] He went to Jesus. What good thing must I do to get eternal life? That was the one thing that he was missing. Eternal life.
[19:01] Now I wonder how many of you, when you thought about the one thing you really, really need. And how many of you thought, I really need eternal life? Perhaps not many of us.
[19:12] Perhaps none of us. But it is the one thing that we need. It's the one thing we need to recognize that we need more than anything else is eternal life. It doesn't matter if you're young or old.
[19:25] It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. It doesn't matter if you're religious or an atheist. It doesn't matter where you live or what your background is. We all need eternal life.
[19:36] Why do I say that? Oh, pardon me. Thank you. Because we're all going to die. That's why.
[19:47] We're all going to die. That's why we need eternal life. And no matter how much money we've got, it's not going to stop us from dying. No matter how young we are, it's not going to stop us from dying.
[19:59] We're all going to die. Religion can't stop us from dying. Perhaps we don't think about death at all. In fact, when we're young, we don't think about death at all.
[20:10] And really, we don't like to talk about death. It's such a depressing subject, isn't it? It's something that you just don't talk about unless somebody has died. Then you talk about it for a little bit and you go to the funeral. But otherwise, you just don't touch that subject.
[20:23] There was a comedian and a film director by the name of Woody Allen. And he's quoted as saying, I'm not afraid of death. It's just I don't want to be there when it happens.
[20:36] Death is a reality for all of us. Perhaps even now, no matter how young we are, we meet people who we find out later they've died. Perhaps people even at school.
[20:47] Perhaps grandparents or other members of our families. And we know that death is real. It's there. But we don't think it's ever going to happen to us. Or certainly if it's going to happen to us, it's such a long way in the future we don't need to worry about it.
[21:01] You see, death isn't the greatest problem that we face. When Jesus speaks about eternal life, he's not talking about just living in this body forever and ever. And never getting ill and never dying.
[21:12] He's talking about something very different. It's something much worse than dying. And that's dying without forgiveness from God. Dying and not being right with God.
[21:24] The God who created us. The God who made us. The God who we must ultimately stand before to judge us as to how we've lived. When this young man asks the question, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?
[21:37] He's asking the question, how can I be right with God? Because I know, my religion has taught me that I know that I must meet with God one day. And unless I'm right with God, unless my sins are forgiven, then I'm going to face an eternal punishment.
[21:51] Eternal separation from God. You see, there is life after death for every single person. We've been created with a soul, a spirit. We sang that at the very beginning of the first song.
[22:04] Bless the Lord, O my soul. There's something within us that makes us, which is not flesh and blood, a soul. A personality. A part of what God has placed within every one of us that makes us different to all the animals around about us.
[22:18] And that soul, that part of us which is spirit, lives forever. When this body dies, we don't cease to exist. But neither do we automatically go to heaven.
[22:29] A lot of people think that. Perhaps you've even been to a funeral or watched it on telly. And they'll talk about, oh, they've gone to a better place when they've died. Or they've gone to be with the angels when they've died.
[22:41] Or something else like that. It's almost taken for granted that everybody who dies goes to some sort of paradise, some sort of heaven, some wonderful place. And many of us hope that we might go there.
[22:54] Even if we don't really have time for God. Even if we don't really have time for church or Jesus. We hope, should we die, that, yeah, we'll be okay. But the young man's question shows us that there's something that has to be done.
[23:07] That we don't automatically go to heaven. That when we die, that isn't straight there. But it does show that there is life after death. And the Bible makes it very, very plain and very, very clear.
[23:20] Jesus makes it plain and clear. He says there are just two destinations when we die. It is either eternal life with God in heaven, which is wonderful and the most marvelous thing we've ever could possibly think about.
[23:33] Or it is eternal punishment and separation from God in hell. There's no in-between places, no floating around as a ghost. It's heaven or hell. It's life or eternal death.
[23:46] So that's why it's so important that he came and asked the question. And he asked the question of Jesus, the one person who's able to give us the true answer. I know at the moment there's a lot of talk about fake news.
[24:00] How do we discern what is fake news and what is truth? Well, we know that what Jesus says is truth because he is God who speaks to us. He never lied. He never did anything wrong.
[24:11] He never deceived. He never pulled the wool over people's eyes. He always said it as it was. And he made it clear that there is death and there is life.
[24:22] There is heaven. There is hell. And the big question that the man brings, the young man brings, is what good thing must I do to get eternal life? And the big question is faulty.
[24:33] Because he says, what good thing must I do? That's the problem with us, isn't it? We always think about I and me. And about doing. That's what we think about possessions and money and those sort of things.
[24:47] It's all about me. But what he should have asked is, what good thing can you do to give me eternal life? He went to Jesus, the right person, but he asked the wrong question.
[24:59] And sometimes in life we ask the wrong questions. We ask questions like, will this make me happy? Will this give me pleasure? Will this make me popular? Will this give me friends?
[25:11] Will this satisfy? We don't ask the questions, the important questions. How can I have eternal life? Is there a God and can I know him?
[25:24] Who is Jesus and what has he done in coming into this world and living and dying? Jesus came on a rescue mission. We celebrated his birth just a couple of months ago at Christmas.
[25:35] We'll be thinking about his death and resurrection in just a couple of weeks time. What was the whole purpose of Jesus' life? It was to rescue and to save us.
[25:46] It was to bring us eternal life. It was to bring us into a right relationship with God. It was to earn us forgiveness for our sins. When he died on that cross, the Lord Jesus died in our place.
[25:59] We deserve the blame. We're the ones that have done the wrong. When he rose again to life, he accomplished for us something that we could never have.
[26:10] Life beyond death. But why can't we buy eternal life? Why can't we be good enough to have eternal life? Well, sin is the problem.
[26:21] Sin, your sin and my sin. It's not just bad things we do, that's sin. But it's especially those fits of selfishness.
[26:33] When I'm the most important thing in the universe. Our pride and our greed. Our hatred and our bitterness. Our resentment and our unforgiveness. Sin is in our spiritual DNA.
[26:45] It's not something that can be cut out by a surgeon. It's not something that we can have medicine to make us good. You just try being good for one day. Try not to be selfish or jealous or greedy or proud or thoughtless or insensitive.
[27:01] Just try that for one day and you'll find that you'll fail. Just as I do. No matter how much we want to try and be good, we can't. Because within us is this sin. It's part of our nature.
[27:12] We see it, of course, in the world. We see it when we turn on the news. Or we get a blog. We see it in Afghanistan. We see it, of course, in Syria. In the Ghouta area of Damascus.
[27:25] Where people are bombed and killed. And children and young people and families are destroyed. We see it, of course, in the schools in America. Like in Florida where a young man walks in with a gun and starts shooting 17 people.
[27:41] But we see it as well in our schools. Our schools. Not people being shot necessarily. But we see bullying. We see jealousy. We see abuse and fear.
[27:53] We see it in our homes, maybe. We see it in our offices, in our workplaces. We see it in all the relationships we have. We can't stop but hurting one another. And we can't stop living lives opposed to God.
[28:07] Have you thought about that day when you will stand before God? And all your life, everything that you've ever done, everything you've ever said, everything you've ever thought, will be made known to everybody else.
[28:24] All those shameful things. All those things that make you squirm inside. And God will judge you and me according to those things.
[28:36] He won't judge us because of what other people say about us or about what we say about ourselves. He'll judge us according to the truth of who we are and what we've done and how we've lived. And his judgment will be this.
[28:48] That we have sinned against him and that we deserve hell. His judgment. His justice. His justice. Many people don't like that, of course. We don't like to think of God in that way.
[29:00] And so we either do one of two things. We either make God a bit like Father Christmas. Somebody who's always nice and never would say anything against us, even when we're wrong and horrible ourselves.
[29:11] Or else we decide there is no God. Let's get rid of God altogether because we don't want anybody judging us or telling us how we should live. We'll just get rid of God. You see, either making God a Father Christmas or getting rid of God doesn't change God.
[29:26] It's like you with somebody at school you really dislike. You can only say, right, I'm going to ignore them and just going to not even consider them there. It doesn't make them go away.
[29:37] You can't make God go away because you don't believe in him anymore or because he doesn't do the things you want him to. You can't stop him being angry with what is wrong and wicked and evil in your heart and in the world.
[29:52] So you've got to do something about it. This young man knew there was something that had to be done about it. How can I have inherited eternal life? How can I actually get to be right with God?
[30:03] How can I actually be forgiven? How can I have that confidence that one day when I die, that when I stand before God, he will not punish me with eternal hell?
[30:14] Well, that's the reason Jesus came. That's why this young man went to the right person, to Jesus, the only one who never sinned, who lived a perfect life, who died the death that we deserve and rose again to prove that he's all that he claimed to be.
[30:32] You see, people make all sorts of boasts, don't they? They'll boast about, you know, I've got this fantastic new iPhone 10. I've got it. It's brilliant. Well, where is it?
[30:43] Well, it's at home. It's at home. But I've really got it and it's fantastic and it's amazing. Or I've got this really flash new coat, this new super dry coat. Well, where is it?
[30:54] It's at home. People make boasts about things or say they can do things, but they don't back it up. But Jesus didn't just say, I'm God and I've come to save and you must follow me.
[31:05] He backed it up by rising from the dead, doing what nobody else could ever do. And 500 people saw him, not just one or two. It wasn't just a ghostly image.
[31:16] People sat down and out with him. People who saw him over the course of 40 days, met with him, talked with him and ate meals with him. He proved what he said by what he did.
[31:29] So you can trust this Jesus to give eternal life. So back to the question. The question that we were thinking about at the beginning.
[31:40] Let me ask you again, what's the most important thing that you need and want in life? What is it really that you want? What is it that's going to make your life complete?
[31:52] What is it that's going to give you what you need more than anything else? It's eternal life. If you haven't said that, then you still haven't seen. You still haven't understood what Jesus is saying here.
[32:04] And Jesus said to this young man, okay, if you want eternal life, it's very simple. You can have it. You can't buy it. You can't work for it, but you can have it. Give up all the things that you own and follow me.
[32:18] And what does the young man say? Yeah, I've got to have eternal life. I will give up all my wealth and everything else and follow you. No, what happened? The young man heard this. He went away sad because he had great wealth.
[32:30] What is Jesus saying? Is Jesus saying if you want to follow me, you've got to have no money? No, he's not saying that. He's saying if you've got to follow me, you've got to give all your money to charity. No, he's not saying that. No, he's not saying that. What he's saying is this. What do you love most?
[32:42] What's most important in your life? Because if it isn't having eternal life, then you've got it wrong. If you're living for money, if that's the most important thing in your life, then you can't have eternal life.
[32:56] If you're living for your friendship with your friends and your mates and the gang that you're in, you can't have eternal life. If you're living to be popular so that everybody likes you and looks at you and you make them feel good, if you're living for that, you can't have eternal life.
[33:13] This young man was unwilling to give up the thing that he loved most to have the thing that he needed most. And so many of us are going to do the same. So many of us are living like that, even today.
[33:25] I'm living for tomorrow. I'm living for my career. I'm living for my family. I'm living for my job. I'm living for my friends. I'm living for popularity.
[33:36] I'm living for the latest tech. I'm living for the sport that I play on a Sunday or that I watch my team. If anything is more important to you than having eternal life, then you can't have it.
[33:52] So Jesus, it's got to be number one because he's got to be number one. Following Jesus is giving ourselves to him, saying, you are number one, and whatever else I have, it's not worth having compared to what you want to give me.
[34:08] And let me assure you and say to you that whoever has followed Jesus and given to him their trust and faith has never been disappointed, has never been turned away, has never felt unsatisfied.
[34:21] Trusting Jesus to do what we could never do. Trusting Jesus to do what we could never do. Following him each day. The disciples, when they heard this, they said, it's impossible. Nobody can possibly be a Christian.
[34:33] Nobody can possibly follow God. But Jesus said this, what you can't do, God can do. If you are willing to follow Jesus, willing for him to forgive you and to make you a possessor of eternal life, then he'll do that.
[34:52] What you can't do, he'll do. You just need to ask him, Lord Jesus, will you save me? Will you give me eternal life? Please, thank you for what you've done for me.
[35:05] Thank you for your amazing love. I'm going to pray a little prayer now. And if you want to pray that prayer, you can. It's a prayer asking Jesus to be part of your life in a real way.
[35:20] If you do, or you've got more questions, obviously Dave and the others are around this afternoon, please speak to them. Don't let this opportunity pass by. Go back to life as normal tomorrow at school, at work or whatever.
[35:33] Get it sorted. Get right with God. So I'm going to pray. And if you want to pray this prayer too, then pray it quietly in your own heart to God, sincerely meaning it.
[35:44] Oh Lord, my God. Lord, my God. I thank you for Jesus.
[35:55] And I thank you that he came to save people like me. I thank you that he came to give me eternal life, which is what I need.
[36:09] The thing that I am searching for. I know my sin has got in the way. And I ask you to forgive me.
[36:20] Help me to make you number one. And to follow you. Give me that eternal life. Give me your Holy Spirit to live in my heart that I might follow you day by day.
[36:38] And that I can look forward to that wonderful day of being with you forever. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
[36:49] Amen. Amen. I'm going to close with prayer now. And ask for God's safekeeping through the day. Lord, we thank you that we've been able to be here with you.
[37:00] And you've been here speaking to us and meeting with us. And we pray that you'd go with us into the rest of our day. Continue to bless the camp here and Barry as he speaks this afternoon.
[37:12] Keep everyone safe as they travel home over the snow and the moors. And again, we pray, Lord Jesus, that very soon, if not today, that we might know that eternal life that you give.
[37:24] And for those who know it already, help us and encourage us as day by day we follow you. And as we rejoice in the wonderful gift of your love. Depart then, Lord, and leave with your blessing.
[37:36] In Jesus' name. Amen.