Mars Hill Blog | 06th March 2016 | Exodus

God wants to be seen though His people. When God wants to be seen through His people, there is nothing that can stop Him. The word Exodus literally means exit or way out and, as we have journeyed through Exodus we have seen a great escape of God’s people from slavery. We have seen God’s redemptive plan unfold. A Holy God among unholy , sinful people, trapped in their own slavery in Egypt. So God takes the initiative: God steps down and sets them free and takes them from death into a life, the picture of Jesus, a forerunner of what Jesus would do for us all. Bringing us out of the slavery of sin. All the while He wants to be our God and for us to be His people: He wants to be seen by others through His people. Jesus wants to be seen in you and me.   ...

Mars Hill Blog | 21st February 2016 | Exodus

God wants us to pursue an intimate love relationship with His people. He will not end that pursuit until He has accomplished His eternal purpose in our lives. From Genesis to Revelation, we can see God progressively moving closer and closer to the heart of humanity. We hear God walking with Adam in the late afternoon in Genesis. He also walked with Enoch, talked to Abraham, communed with Moses and the prophets. GOD’S PLAN IS AND ALWAYS WAS TO BE AMONG HIS PEOPLE.   Key Verse: ‘…..do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20  ...

Mars Hill Blog | 14th February 2016 | Exodus

We often use the term, ‘the honeymoon period is well and truly over’ as a negative term. But it shouldn't be: it should be something we see as positive. Something full of expectations, memories to be made, destinies to discover… We can use the same negative expression with our Christian faith walk. Well, the honeymoon period is over: now the work begins. I want us to see that our faith walk should go from one degree of Glory to another, that which lies in front outstrips what we have already been through. The best is still to come. Any early experience of God, any supernatural encounters, any miracles of healing, provision and salvation are just the beginning. God has so much for us, and it is as we grow in maturity that more of God’s Kingdom becomes available for us to walk in.   ...

Mars Hill Blog | 29th November 2015 | Exodus

Those people who have gardens will know that we have to keep things well pruned. Some plants are more delicate than others and have to be treated carefully: others are stronger and need to be pruned more vigorously. But, even when we leave just a little stump showing above the soil, the plants flourish the next year. If we don’t prune them, they grow gangly and will break in the wind. Pastor Dave, in his sermon today, likened this to the work that God is wanting to do in His church. His pruning makes us strong. In Exodus, we’ve been looking at how God’s people were trying to understand what it meant to love God and to trust Him in everything. And then He told them it was time to go out to the conflict and, so long as they kept looking to Him, He would keep their enemies from overtaking them. (Ex 23: 20). Just like us! God wants us to live in a place of rest, trusting fully in Him. When we walk in obedience to Him, He will strengthen us and enable us to be victorious in Him. If we want the world to change, they need to see Jesus. In this place pre-cross, the Israelites knew there was a place in the presence of God when their enemies were destroyed and their sicknesses were healed.  And as we now find ourselves in God we will see most incredible things happening as God will bless us also. We can become so caught up in life, we find a meaning in life and all we do or have, but we compartmentalise God into little bits of it. But He wants to be in every part of our lives. He can work in a split second, but also He works in our lives bit by bit and we see ourselves set free. We have a choice: serve God or serve this world. We can’t do both. The All-Powerful, Uncontainable God chooses to give us choices: but do we choose to let Him? He is Sovereign and will have His sovereign will. He has put His Spirit within us to empower us to become His glory in this world. God’s people had to wander round the desert for many years because they didn’t trust Him, and the world around them then ensnared them. And the same happens to us. But God came to bring us true freedom, to set us free - to serve Him and to show Jesus to others. We can only find rest and peace when we truly believe that He is the Healer, the One who provides for us. We need to walk by faith not by sight, not limited or confined by resources, intellect or ideas: set free to rise up in Him and do what He wants us to do. If we walk in obedience to Him, to what He has called us to, we can trust Him for everything. He is faithful. Pastor Dave led us into John 15, entreating us not to resist Gods’ pruning, which we need so we can become more like Jesus. The key to our faith is love, one of the fruits of the Spirit. When we submit to God’s pruning, He deals with our insecurities, fears and problems and what remains is love - for Him and for each other. ...

Mars Hill Blog | 29th September 2020 | Religion & Spirituality

Being a Christian isn’t always easy… If we truly want to live for Christ - it costs, we need perseverance, we need to be willing to let go of our life, and as Jesus said - we need to loose our life, if we want to truly find his. I have been asking myself - What Kind of Christians is the church producing today? Are we anything like the picture God had in mind? We want to portray the true gospel, and see real authentic Christians being disciples and looking to make other disciples, who are willing to come and be a living sacrifice and whose delight is Jesus....

Mars Hill Blog | 15th September 2020 | Religion & Spirituality

Have you ever gone though life wondering where God is? It might not be that is was particularly a bad time of life, but you just couldn’t really see what God was doing? This can often be the case both in the good, bad, but also normal parts of life. Have you ever then looked back over that time and as you have looked Suddenly God reveals to you what he was doing, and where he was? All of a sudden you see how God was fully in it?...

Mars Hill Blog | 23rd June 2020 | Religion & Spirituality

What it is to be free. Over the centuries people have fought for freedom - freedom of speech, freedom to vote, freedom to be. I think of the great Christian William Wilberforce - who fought to ban slavery, so that men and woman could be free. But there is something greater at stake here, something bigger than the earthly struggles we face, and that is eternal salvation, eternal freedom - this is the reason Jesus came - to give us life, Jesus came to cut us off from the power of sin, so we could stand right before God forever free....

Mars Hill Blog | 17th June 2020 | Religion & Spirituality

Weakness is not often seen as a positive thing. If you call someone weak it would be seen as an insult, a slight on someones character, as not very nice. Yet the bible encourages us to be weak, because it is in our weakness that God can be strong (2 Cor 12v10)....