St. Paul's Pilgrim Today

Who is Who?

Who is who?
Mary, the Mother of John Mark

Story:–
There lived a man named Silivano. His nickname was “Úꞌbóko” (Cucumber). He was known for drinking. I was born when he was drinking, and grew and saw him drinking. He was known to have own nothing in his whole life in his own house that earned him an insulting description “No gecko poop can be found on his compound.” However, this man told one of his sons that “Everyone you see walking around here including your auntie who thinks she is the holiest, are all sinners.” He died as a 6 year child in the faith and a happy man. And this man is my late Dad.

“When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying.”
Acts 12:12

1. When someone calls you by your own name, it is a sign of inclusion, and a sign that you are known personally.
2. Luke, the writer of Acts, mentions a significant woman by name, he has to explain who she was because she was not well known during Jesus’ time of ministry. That woman was “Mary the mother of John, also called Mark.” Most people would have been familiar with Mark, the cousin of Barnabas and missionary assistant to Barnabas and Paul. But very few knew his mother’s name.
3. Mary was not an important person not even a leader in the early church. But she used what she had to serve the church in Jerusalem church. According to Acts 12:12, she apparently had a big house that might have had a courtyard, and may be two stories of living area or something like that for hosting a good number of believers and she had a servant.

Her house could have been a meeting place which is described in Acts 1:12-17. It is therefore very definite that Mary’s house was a meeting place in Acts 12:12-17. It was the place where the church gathered to pray for Peter when he was in prison in Jerusalem.

Who are you?

1. You may not have something like that big house of Mary for God’s people to gather,
2. You may not have servants who would help you serve God’s people who gather in your house.
3. You may not be a leader in your community or group.
4. You may not be an important person in your eyes.
5. But know that everyone has something to use for God’s ministry. It might be a small thing you don’t think about which others see as a potential in you to serve others.

It could be your ability in something which others are not able to do and sometimes, they look at it as a very insignificant job/work but without it, services are not complete.

It could be a spiritual gift God has given you to pray for others like this group in Acts 12 praying for Peter when he was in prison. You can imagine, these prayer warriors did not believe in the power of prayer. They did not believe in what Mary’s servant told them about Peter being outside the door.

a)    The servant so overjoyed that she did not open the door for Peter but ran to give this message to the church in their house “When [Rhoda] recognized Peter's voice, she was so overjoyed she ran back without opening it and exclaimed, ‘Peter is at the door!’”

b)    Hear the response from the praying believers: “‘You’re out of your mind,’” they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, ‘It must be his angel.’” I wonder whether this answer was from Thomas who believed in seeing and touching before accepting any rumour.

Conclusion

Let us ask God to show us how to use for Him what we have from Him. Remember it is the responsibility of everyone as an individual to use what he/she has for God and never to undermine your gift including whatever you have.

Developments in the Church

Beatrice reading Scriptures during 10:00 am Service
before the Floor was painted

"Laborers" working on the Floor

Open Air preaching after Pastors Conference held

The all non-denominational Pastors' conference was organized by Reach Africas Unreached (RAU) based in Moyo district (bordering Yumbe district from the East) and hosted by St. Paul's Pilgrim Church of Uganda - February 2014.

St. Paul's Pilgrim Church of Uganda Construction Progress - 2013/104

View from the Police Station

 View from the temporary Children Church

 View from the Main Road

View from BBL Compound

Doors and some Window glasses fixed

Andrew Angupale

It is a blessing to be Hungry and Thirsty

Text: Matthew 5:6

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”

Truth: The secret to a healthy spiritual life is a passion for God.

Aim: To incite desire for God more than anything else.

Introduction

The commercial break gives us insight into how Jesus taught spiritual lessons. Advertisers pay millions to put their slogans and images before us. They believe it is worth it. Why? Because it works. They know if they can get their slogan and image into our head it will influence our choices. They don’t have to present a persuasive case for why we need to buy their product.  

Advertisers have learned what Jesus knew 2,000 years ago: an image connected with an idea is a powerful means of influencing our view of the world.

i)                    Some advertisers suggest our world is incomplete without their product.

ii)                  they give us that image over and over.

Jesus understood the power of an image connected with an idea.

i)                    The cross,

ii)                  The mustard seed,

iii)                The lamp on a stand,

iv)                The pearl,

v)                  The hunger and thirst

Are not only realities, but they are powerful images that reveal something even great about Christ and His purposes for our life. Like the advertisers, to get the full impact of the wealth of their meaning we need to bring them before us again and again. Of all the images Christ used to teach about himself the one that we experience every day is hunger and thirst. In fact, all of us will act on this image immediately after this service. We’re given this powerful image every day so that its truth will capture our choices each day. I suggest that the idea Jesus is teaching us through this image is that the secret to a healthy spiritual life is a passion for God.

I want us to notice two things from this verse: the condition to a healthy spiritual life and the consequences of a healthy spiritual life.

Why is hungering and thirsting such a good illustration? Because as water and food is to the body, so righteousness is to the spiritual life. We as humans hunger and thirst not only for food but for satisfaction in life. We search in all kinds of different areas to be filled, to be satisfied, but we always end up falling short.

The Condition to a Healthy Spiritual Life

Some translations use the word “happy.” We’ve seen that is a poor exchange. Those who are blessed are generally profoundly happy; but blessedness cannot be reduced to happiness. In the Scriptures man can bless God and God can bless man. In that duality we get a clue as to what does blessing mean. To be blessed fundamentally means to be approved, to find approval. When God blesses man, he is approving man.

• Since this is God’s universe there can be no higher “blessing” than to be approved by God. The beatitudes challenge us to consider whose blessing we are seeking. Is it more important to be approved by our family or colleagues, or is the most important desire to gain God’s approval? For those Christians that yearn to please God more than anyone else in their world, these beatitudes will be very encouraging to them.
• The disciple that pleases God hungers and thirsts for righteousness. It is not that he wants to be a little more righteous. The intensity with which Jesus states this pictures desperation. He can’t get along without righteousness; it is as important to him as food and water.
• The scholars say that the grammar of the original language expresses a hunger and thirst for the whole thing. In other words, this person doesn’t want a sandwich, he wants the whole loaf of bread. This describes the hunger we have when we say we are starving. Though few of us really know what that is like. Praise the Lord! This person is not asking for a sip of water; he wants the whole glass.

Do you have the hunger and thirst for Jesus you did when you were saved or maybe just a few years back? Paul said that it is possible; as our bodies grow weaker with age our spirit for Christ can grow stronger. Does that describe your Christian journey? Today, you are more desirous for God than you were in the past? That was true of Moses.

Moses’ first encounter with God was at a bush that was on fire, but it wasn’t consumed. He took off his shoes and got on his face before God. Later he sees God perform ten plagues on Egypt, and Moses leads Hebrews out of bondage without a shot being fired. Moses raised the rod of God into the air and saw the Red Sea split and a million plus people crossover on dry land. He saw the glory of God’s presence represented in a pillar of fire at night and a cloud during the day. He drank water that came from a flint rock and ate manna that came from heaven’s ovens. After all of that, do you know what Moses said to the Lord? “Lord, I know I’ve seen all those miracles but would you show me Your glory?” Now what a minute, Moses? I think you’ve seen enough, haven’t you? Not for Moses. His hunger and thirst for God were insatiable.

• hen the Prodigal son was hungry he sought to satisfy his hunger with the husks fed to the hogs. But when he began to starve is when he decided to go back to his father.
• The starting point in all achievement is desire. Weak desire brings weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat. The key to will power is want power. People who want something badly enough can usually find the will power to achieve it.
• We are filled with hunger and thirst that are greater than an empty stomach. There are many legitimate hungers: there is the hunger for truth, love, knowledge, belonging, expression, justice, imagination, significance and many more.

What is it that we can’t get along without? Righteousness. Isn’t that a little disappointing? What is this righteousness that we are starved to have?

The Bible speaks of righteousness in three ways. There is positional, public and pure righteousness.

1. Positional righteousness refers to our relationship to God based on our relationship with Jesus Christ. When a sinner repents of his sin and surrenders to Jesus as his God he goes from being separated from God to being a child of God. Everything has been made right between him and God because of the saving work of Jesus Christ.
2. Public righteousness refers to the will and standards of God being practiced in society. God wants society to be just and merciful. God wants people to live at peace with one another. Christians work to see that laws and social standards reflect God’s will. That’s public righteousness.
3.  Pure righteousness refers to the individual Christian living a holy life, a life of purity. This is to live a life being set free from the power of sin. They want to be set free from selfishness and empowered to live selflessly like Jesus. They want to be free from revenge taking and be big-hearted people of forgiveness like Jesus. They want to stop disbelieving God and start growing in faith in God. Sin and its consequences are progressively being removed from their lives.

Once more, here is the distinction between Christianity and all other religions. At the heart of every religion there is a major figure. With Buddhism it is Buddha. With Islam there is Mohammed. With Hinduism it is Krishna. And with Christianity it is Jesus Christ. That’s where the comparison ends. If you ask adherents of these other faiths where do you find salvation, they point to a way of living. A Muslim will not point you to Mohammed. He will point you to the Koran. It is not Buddha who delivers you, it is his “Noble Truths” that instruct you.

By contrast, Jesus not only taught the truth, He said He was the Truth. He didn’t just point the way to salvation; He said He was the Way to salvation. That’s why for a Christian it is not a way of living, it is first relating to the person of Jesus Christ.

What will it take to bring us to this blessed condition of Hungry?

It will take the same thing that it takes in the natural.

• We have to cut out the junk food:

1. Junk food is the stuff that provides no true nourishment or strength to the body, it pacifies (appeases) the appetite till we have no desire for the true healthy food that the body needs.
2. In a spiritual sense this is true also, We can fill up our lives on TV and Sports, and Recreation, and Natural things till we have no desire or appetite for the things of God.
3. Many times people lose their hunger for spiritual things, and they think that if they wait long enough it will return. The truth is, it won’t

Feeding of the 5000

“Jesus answered, ‘I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.’”

The hunger and thirst for God is pictured in this story of Jill and the Lion. The lion represents Christ and Jill represents us.

When Jill stopped, she found she was dreadfully thirsty…She listened carefully and felt almost sure she heard the sound of running water.

Jill…looked around her very carefully. There was no sign of the Lion; so she plucked up her courage to …look for running water.

…she came to an open glade and saw the stream, bright as glass…[A]lthough the sight of the water made her feel ten times thirstier than before, she didn’t rush forward and drink. She stood still as if she had been turned to stone, with her mouth wide open. And she had a very good reason: just this side of the stream lay the Lion…

“Are you thirsty?” said the Lion.

“I’m dying of thirst,” said Jill.

“Then drink,” said the Lion.

“May I—could I—would you mind going away while I do?” said Jill.

The Lion answered this only by a look and a very low growl. And as Jill gazed at its motionless bulk, she realized that she might as well have asked the whole mountain to move aside for her convenience.

The delicious rippling noise of the stream was driving her nearly frantic.

“Will you promise not to—do anything to me, if I do come?” said Jill.

“I make no promise,” said the Lion.

Jill was so thirsty now that, without noticing it, she had come a step nearer.

“Do you eat girls?” she said.

“I have swallowed up girls and boys, women and men, kings and emperors, cities and realms,” said the Lion.

“I dare not come and drink,” said Jill.

“Then you will die of thirst,” said the Lion.

“Oh, dear!” said Jill, coming another step nearer. “I suppose I must go and look for another stream then.”

“There is no other stream,” said the Lion.

I am speaking to some who are thirsty for God. Maybe there are some here and you are not interested in just a sip. You want the whole glass. What grace He has bestowed on you this morning. This passage beckons you to come to Him and be filled. Don’t let fear turn you away. You will only go away thirsty.

The condition for a healthy spiritual life is a passion for God. When the condition is met then there are consequences.

The Consequences of Healthy Spiritual Life

Jesus says this person will be filled. It means fully satisfied. He doesn’t get just a taste of bread but the whole loaf. He doesn’t get just a sip of water He gets the whole bucket.

This is written in the passive tense, which means it is not something we do. It is something that God does. It is limited to those who hunger and thirst for Christ. Our responsibility is not to pursue satisfaction but the Savior. The by-product of a growing relationship with Christ is being content.

Hunger and thirst are written in the present tense, which describes a continuing, on-going activity. Just like physical hunger and thirst can be satisfied, if you are healthy it will break out anew.

• Nicholas worked in the food service industry. He was a short-order cook and bottle-washer. But he became deeply dissatisfied with his life; he worried chronically about himself, even whether or not he was saved.
• One day he was looking at a tree, and the same truth struck him that struck the psalmist so long ago: the secret of the life of a tree is that it remains rooted in something other and deeper than itself. He decided to make his life an experiment in what he called a “habitual, silent, secret conversation of the soul with God.”
• He is known today by the new name given to him by his friends: Brother Lawrence. He remained obscure throughout his life. He never got voted pope. He never got close to becoming the CEO of his organization. He stayed in the kitchen. But the people around him found that rivers of living water flowed out of him that made them want to know God the way he did. “The good brother found God everywhere,” one of them wrote, “as much while he was repairing shoes as while he was praying with the community.” After Lawrence died, his friends put together a book of his letters and conversations.

Sometimes a commercial will seek to get you to act immediately by saying, “This offer is good today.” It can happen to anyone, anywhere and at anytime.

This offer is good today. If you are hungry or thirsty that’s good. You can be filled. Come to Jesus.

Remember what Jesus said: Hunger is a blessing

Blessed are they that hunger.

Are you hungry for God?

• If not tell God, that you are sorry for letting things crowd your life until they have quenched your spiritual appetite.
• Go on a fast, and not just food.
  Start pushing away the things that do not feed and nurture your spirit,
• Set aside some time for nothing else but spending time in his presence, and spend some time worshipping him.

Remember also one of the first signs of a physical illness is the loss of apetite, It is also true of illness of the spirit.

It is the water in our body that determines the vitality, strength, and energy associated with daily living. Think about these facts associated with our body and water:

• The human body is ⅔ water.
• The body absorbs cold water faster than hot water.
• By the time you are 70-years-old, you will have required 1½ million gallons (about 5,678,115 liters) of water.
• Studies show that increasing water consumption can decrease fat deposits.
• If you loose 2% of your body’s water supply, your energy will decrease by 20%. A 10% decrease in water, you will be unable to walk, and a 20% decrease – you’re dead.

1. v  Because our text indicates, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.”
2. So the degree of our desire, indicates how much of Gods righteousness we have in the gas tank!
3. Are you one of those who can drive or ride on empty tank and not be bothered by it, or do you like it better when the gauge reads half full or more?
4. And then we get to the question, is the tank half full or half empty?

The woman at the well wanted to fill her water jar full to fill the family pot full so that people her family has water anytime one desires to drink more water - John 4:13-14

“Jesus answered, ‘Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’”

Invitation

This Book is not about the desire of people to be with God. The Bible is about God’s desire to be with His people (you and me). The most frequent promise in the Bible is not “I forgive you.” It is “I will be with you.”

God wanted to be with you that He left heaven to come to earth as a man (Jesus Christ). He so wanted you to be with Him He died on the cross for your sin and rose from the dead as proof that you can be forgiven. But you must desire and repent of sin. You must accept Him as your God. If you want to be with Him, He already wants to be with you.

Church, do you remember the story of the two sisters Martha and Mary? The Bible tells us that Mary was listening to Jesus’ teach and Martha was busy getting dinner fixed. Do you remember why Martha wasn’t listening to Jesus but instead was busy fixing potato salad? The Bible says she was “distracted.” Have any distracted saints shown up in the Church this morning? Has the Spirit used this message to remind you what is the “necessary thing?”

I invite you to the altar to bow at the feet of Jesus and ask Him to fill your real hunger and thirst.

Please let us sing this song together before we conclude our message this morning in prayer.

1.     Seek ye first the kingdom of God
And his righteousness
And all these things shall be added unto you
Allelu..alleluia

A-lle-l-u-a allelu allelu-i-a
A-lle-l-u-a allelu allelu-i-a

2.     Man shall not live by bread alone
but by every word
that proceeds from the mouth of God
Allelu..alleluia

3.     Ask and it shall be given unto you
Seek and ye shall find
Knock and it shall be opened unto you
Allelu, allleluia

 Concluding prayers were said by Charles Onduga and dozens of of Christians came to the Lord.