Several new year messages have hit the headlines.
Whether you reckon this is a year to reform public attitudes to the young (a “national habit of being suspicious…”) and tackle the unhappiness and anxiety it breeds, or that, despite economic gloominess, 2012 is a year of great opportunity with Her Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee and the London Olympics (and that we should “go for it”)… it certainly is a year of even greater opportunity in Jesus.
We hope to make the most of 2012. We shall be stepping forward, together, as we take hold of the grace offered us in Jesus.
It is our custom to use the formal setting of the annual Covenant Service and the demanding words of utter self-abandonment, as expressed in the Covenant Prayer.
At both morning services on Sunday 8th, we shall follow the (1975 version) of that prayer, as a means of corporate commitment, or recommitment, to God in Christ Jesus.
I am no longer my own but yours,
Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will;
Put me to doing; put me to suffering;
Let me be employed for you or laid aside for you,
Exalted for you, or brought low for you;
Let me be full, let me be empty;
Let me have all things, let me have nothing;
I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things to your pleasure and disposal.
And now, glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
You are mine and I am yours. So be it.
And the covenant made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.
[Not everyone will feel comfortable with these words, but in praying “put me to suffering”, we are NOT asking the Lord to make us suffer! Instead, should the troubles of this world bring us into suffering, then we ask that God’s good purposes might shine through us even in that]
All our members are urged to attend, but all may join in… and you are welcome to be with us. Perhaps you’ll want to make this new year of 2012 a special one, yourself.
