We continue our series in Isaiah 61 looking at the second part of verse 3 where Isaiah makes the astonishing promises that God can take the situations in our lives where we are in mourning or dispair and turn them around to give us beauty, joy and praise. Chris challenges us to bring our pain and grief to God and allow him to transform our lives. Stephanie also brings us her testimony of how God has worked this verse through her life over the last few years.

Susan leads the rest of the service and Pete and Nick lead our sung worship.

We continue our new series in Isaiah 61 with Chris this time focussing on verses 2 and 3. Isaiah is very clear in his writing that alongside the year of the Lord’s favour also comes the day of his vengeance and judgement. There will be tough times for everyone and in the end we need to make sure that our names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Thankfully through Jesus there is an easy route to have our names in the Book – keep our faith in him! Isaiah also prophecies that the spirit of the Lord can bring comfort to those who mourn and grieve. Sometimes we are not even aware of our need to grieve until it is pointed out to us, but come to God and he will give you comfort and rest.

Andy leads the rest of the service with prayers for the ongoing situation in the Middle East, whilst Lynne and Dave lead our sung worship.

Today we begin our new series looking at Isaiah 61. Isaiah prophecies to Israel in verse 1 that one will come who can say: “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me” and Chris uses that as the overarching title of the new series. This week he looks in depth at the promises made in verse 1 that the Spirit will allow the promised servant to proclaim good news, bind the brokenhearted, proclaim freedom to the captives and release prisoners from their darkness. Jesus is the ultimate fulfilment of this prophecy, and he delegates his power to us so that we also may be able to fulfil the prophecy. What a gift!

Karen leads the rest of the service as we share communion together and pray for the various situations around the world that badly need God’s intervention. Pete and Nick lead our sung worship.