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The Holy Spirit (Heidelberg 20)

Posted on by Phill Sacre

What can we know about the Holy Spirit, and why does it matter to us as Christians? The Apostle’s Creed doesn’t have much detail about the Spirit but in this session we look at a few Bible verses which help introduce us to the work of the Spirit.

There is just one Q&A in this session, as the Apostles’ Creed only has the line: “I believe in the Holy Spirit”! But we look into it in a bit more detail, as it’s vital to understand the Holy Spirit in the Christian life.

We focus in on these points:

  • The Spirit is eternal God, along with the Father and the Son;
  • He has been given to us personally;
  • He makes us share in Christ and his blessings;
  • He comforts us;
  • He is with us forever.

If you enjoy this, you can do the whole series right here on the website, or on the app (see links on the right hand side of the page). Alternatively, I am uploading them regularly to YouTube and Facebook. All sessions on YouTube are available on this playlist.

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Mark 3:7-12 – Learn to read the Bible #11

Posted on by Phill Sacre

I’ve just published the eleventh part of the Learn to read the Bible series on Mark’s Gospel. This week we are looking at Mark 3:7-12, when Jesus is surrounded by crowds.

For those who are coming to this new, the idea behind this series is not for me to simply explain everything to you, but rather to give you things to think about yourself. This is about training you to read the Bible for yourself, rather than just giving you all the answers!

See this page if you’d like a few pointers for how to use these videos. Don’t forget to pray!

You can read the passage online here (although I’d suggest it’s better in a physical Bible). You may also want to have a pen and paper handy to jot down notes and things you want to look into more.

Key points from Mark 3:7-12

  • Jesus withdrew to the lake but the crowds followed him. Why do you think Jesus tried to withdrawn from the crowd?
  • People came to him from a very long way away – it seems like his fame was spreading. Imagine what it would be like today if someone appeared who could actually heal people!
  • He kept a boat ready to stop people from crowding him. What do you think this says about Jesus’ priorities? Does this mean that Jesus thought it was more important to teach people than to heal them? Why do you think that is?
  • The impure spirits knew who Jesus was – but Jesus forbade them from telling people about him. Why? Do you think that people might have got the wrong idea about Jesus? – maybe people would have thought that Jesus was there just to heal them or do things they wanted.
  • How do you see Jesus? Do you see him as someone to submit to and listen to, or as someone who is simply there to heal us and do occasional miracles?

Looking for more?

You can see the rest of the videos in this series on the this page. If you’d like a more focussed series teaching the Christian faith, check out the teaching programme.

You might also want to see the previous episode in the series on Mark 3:1-6.

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When trouble seems to go on forever – Psalm 13

Posted on by Phill Sacre

Have you ever been in a situation where trouble seemed never-ending? This is exactly the situation David was in when he wrote this Psalm. This Psalm teaches us how to deal with these times.

This is part of the weekly Thought for the Week series. This series is designed to give a short, 10-15 minute ‘thought’, including a Bible reading and a prayer. At the moment I am working my way through the Psalms but I may take a break from them after a while and look at another part of the Bible.

Do subscribe to the mailing list if you want to get these delivered by email, or subscribe directly on YouTube if you want to see them there.

You can see the previous week’s thought on Psalm 12 “When truth is political” here.

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Advent Reflection “Keep Watch” – Matthew 24:36-51

Posted on by Phill Sacre

Advent is a season where we look back to Christ’s first coming, and look ahead to his second coming. It’s a good opportunity to remind ourselves that we are waiting, and consider whether we are making the most of our time. In this passage, Matthew 24:36-51, Jesus asks us to consider whether we are keeping watch, whether we are waiting well.

Read the passage online here.

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Jesus, Son of God – Hebrews 1:1-4 Sermon

Posted on by Phill Sacre

Yesterday in our church we began a new sermon series for Advent. I was preaching, the passage was Hebrews 1:1-4. The idea behind this series is to try to understand that Jesus is more than a ‘baby in a manger’: people often like to see the manger at Christmas time, but then leave Jesus there.

In this sermon we think about three reasons we shouldn’t leave Jesus in the manger!

Read the passage online via Bible Gateway.

During the sermon I mention our church’s Ask a Pastor videos – you can see these on this playlist.

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How can I hear from God? Children’s Talk – Hebrews 1:1-2

Posted on by Phill Sacre

For our online service today, I recorded a short children’s spot. The passage is the first two verses of Hebrews chapter 1. I’m trying to find out how we can hear a message from God, to find out about him.

It’s a bit funny / silly, I hope you might enjoy it!

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Reflections on 1 year of UTB

Posted on by Phill Sacre

Understand the Bible has now been going for one year! (Well, more or less – understandthebible.uk was registered on 26th November 2019). It’s been a funny year in all sorts of ways. One year ago, when God gave me the opportunity to begin this ministry, I never dreamed where we would be one year later. Coronavirus, lockdowns, BLM, how much has happened! It seems like the world has changed completely.

In a funny kind of way, I think the lockdowns have actually been good for UTB. It gave me some extra time to be able to develop the App and to work on a few new courses. I think more people have been considering Christian things as well.

Let me run through what I’ve been able to do in the last 12 months of UTB.

What happened in 12 months of UTB

  • I produced about 120 videos which have been uploaded to the YouTube channel.
  • I developed the teaching programme. This was something I created entirely from scratch. At least it meant I was able to put my software development skills from a previous life to good use!
  • I also developed the mobile app – first time I’d ever developed an app. I think it’s not bad for a first app, but when I get the time I will go back and revisit it.
  • I’ve completed several new courses: What is Christianity, the Heidelberg Catechism, and the How to Live as a Christian series have all been completed in the last year.
  • I’ve completed one or two blog series, most recently Get to know God.
  • I also started several regular features – Thought for the Week, Learn to read the Bible, and Your questions answered.
  • Finally, I think the website is looking much better than it did at the start of the year. I think it could stand to be improved, but it’s much better than it was.

It’s been a busy old year! But let me move on to talk about some of the lessons I’ve learned.

Reflections on the year

Getting something started from scratch is really hard

I don’t think I quite appreciate how hard it is to start something from scratch. I suppose that’s the only reason anyone ever does it, or at least, does it for the first time! In some respects it’s been a long, hard slog. I don’t want to make it out to be like it’s been a really difficult year – there have been lots of blessings.

2 corinthians 5:7, "for we walk by faith and not by sight"

But it takes strength to keep putting out content – videos, blog posts, etc – when there doesn’t seem to be much interest in watching them. It’s helped me to really focus on the reason I started UTB in the first place: there aren’t really any other places on the internet which teach the Christian faith in the same way. Understand the Bible is unique. For me, it’s been an exercise in walking by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). You have to focus not so much on the present, but on the future.

Over the last few months, my mind has often gone to Noah. God asked him to build a boat in the middle of the desert. How ridiculous! And yet, he started building – and his faithfulness was rewarded. I have sometimes felt like Noah – creating videos and courses which teach the Christian faith, which not many people are watching right now. And yet, I have faith and trust that God will use them in due course.

Publishing regularly really helps

Over the summer, I did some reading up about how to get websites going. One thing they suggested was publishing regularly. So, since September, I made the decision to start publishing much more regularly than I was doing. Initially this was three times a week, but I’ve now extended this so I publish something every weekday on this blog. I publish videos three or four times a week.

It seems to have begun to work: the algorithms which run the internet now seem to have noticed and the website traffic has begun to increase. The number of people who subscribe to UTB on YouTube has slowly increased.

In some ways it feels a bit like being a slave to the algorithm: if you publish regularly, the algorithm will reward you with more visitors. At the same time, I think publishing regularly isn’t a bad thing, so long as you’re producing useful things. It’s the reason I started the Thought for the Week and the Learn to read the Bible series, and I think both of those have been appreciated. Writing regularly can actually be a good discipline – perhaps it’s no bad thing to be forced into doing it!

God is faithful

The biggest lesson I’ve learned over the last year is that God is faithful. This has been shown in many ways. Let me just give you one example. At the end of 2019, I was thinking that I needed to get a new computer: I had been producing videos on my old laptop, which was getting very slow. I needed something faster, but the problem was computers are expensive. Or at least, the kind of computers you edit video on are expensive. I had a figure in my mind of about £1000, which I didn’t have.

Anyway, before Christmas, we were at our church cafe’s Christmas meal. I was chatting to someone who wasn’t from our church. She just happened to be there that year, and she said that someone else had told us about our situation and UTB. A day or two later, she rang up and said her son had been saving up some money and wanted to give it to us. It turned out to be exactly £1000. That money went on a new computer, which I’ve been using to produce the UTB videos for the last year.

That’s not the only time coincidences like that have happened. Every time I or the family have needed something, God has provided. We have not gone without this year. God is faithful.

A time for thanksgiving

I just wanted to give thanks to God for his faithfulness in sustaining UTB over the last year. I’d also like to give thanks for all those who’ve participated in UTB – whether via YouTube, Facebook, or the website. It’s been a joy to see that people have been appreciating it (I’ve collected some comments on the Testimonials page).

My prayer for UTB is that God would use it to help many people come to faith and grow in their faith. That’s why I do what I do here. I thought I’d finish with Psalm 100, which seems appropriate:

1 Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
2     Worship the Lord with gladness;
    come before him with joyful songs.
3 Know that the Lord is God.
    It is he who made us, and we are his;
    we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving
    and his courts with praise;
    give thanks to him and praise his name.
5 For the Lord is good and his love endures for ever;
    his faithfulness continues through all generations.
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Mark 3:1-6 – Learn to read the Bible #10

Posted on by Phill Sacre

I’ve just published the tenth part of the Learn to read the Bible series on Mark’s Gospel. This week we are looking at Mark 3:1-6, when Jesus heals a man on the Sabbath.

For those who are coming to this new, the idea behind this series is not for me to simply explain everything to you, but rather to give you things to think about yourself. This is about training you to read the Bible for yourself, rather than just giving you all the answers!

See this page if you’d like a few pointers for how to use these videos. Don’t forget to pray!

You can read the passage online here (although I’d suggest it’s better in a physical Bible). You may also want to have a pen and paper handy to jot down notes and things you want to look into more.

Key points from Mark 3:1-6

  • It begins “Another time” – could Mark be suggesting this is related to the previous passage? They both seem to be about the Sabbath and Law.
  • “Some of them” (the Pharisees? – makes sense if it follows on from the previous passage) were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus. Why do you think they would do this? Do you think some of your friends or family accuse Jesus without giving him a fair hearing?
  • Jesus asked the man to stand in front of everyone – he didn’t heal the man in secret, but did it in public. Almost as if he was looking to confront the Pharisees.
  • Jesus asked “What is Lawful on the Sabbath – to do good or to do evil”. I think this is a really good principle when thinking about God’s laws: as we saw last time, it’s easy to think the Law is a bad thing, or for obeying the Law to become an end in itself. Maybe you could spend some time thinking about the way you think about the law and how we often get this principle wrong.
  • This doesn’t mean we can ignore God’s laws! – but it’s easy to see them in the wrong way.
  • The Pharisees and Herodians end up plotting to kill Jesus – what irony! Killing someone is unlawful, whereas healing on the Sabbath is not. Why do you think they reacted like this? What does this say about our own sinfulness?

Looking for more?

You can see the rest of the videos in this series on the this page. If you’d like a more focussed series teaching the Christian faith, check out the teaching programme.

You might also want to see the previous episode in the series on Mark 2:23-28.

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God is… three persons (Trinity)

Posted on by Phill Sacre

In this final part of our Get to know God series, we turn to thinking about how God is three persons – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is traditionally known as the doctrine of the Trinity. Sometimes people can have the idea that the Trinity is too difficult to think about, or it doesn’t really make much difference to everyday life. But, as theologian D.B. Knox said: “The doctrine of the Trinity is the foundation of the Christian religion”. It’s essential to our Christian lives: we experience God as Trinity. It matters that we don’t just think of ‘God’, but think in terms of the Father, Son and Spirit.

Obviously there are many books which have been written about this topic (and I’ll link to some of them below). We won’t be able to deal with the whole doctrine of the Trinity in one session! But I hope this will at least make a start so you want to continue learning yourself.

Let’s start by thinking about what the Bible says, before we go on to look at why it matters for us day-by-day.

What does the Bible say about the Trinity?

The doctrine of the Trinity is somewhat veiled in the Old Testament. That is, it’s there if you know what you’re looking for – there are some passages which don’t make sense any other way. And yet, we don’t really get the full picture until the New Testament. Because we don’t have much time here, we’ll concentrate on the New Testament for the moment.

Continue reading “God is… three persons (Trinity)”
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When truth is political – Psalm 12

Posted on by Phill Sacre

In 2016, the Oxford Dictionary chose “post-truth” as the word of the year. We are living in days when truth itself has become political. How should we respond?

This is part of the weekly Thought for the Week series. This series is designed to give a short, 10-15 minute ‘thought’, including a Bible reading and a prayer. At the moment I am working my way through the Psalms but I may take a break from them after a while and look at another part of the Bible.

Do subscribe to the mailing list if you want to get these delivered by email, or subscribe directly on YouTube if you want to see them there.

You can see the previous week’s thought on Psalm 11 “Will good triumph over evil” here.

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