A few people have said that they haven't been receiving my emails. Below is a copy of the email that was sent on Thursday 19th March 2020...
Dear all,
I read Psalm 121 again today. I'm trying to learn it (I just have such a bad memory!) Psalm 121 has four pairs of verses. The second pair is verses 3 and 4. The third pair is verses 5 and 6. And the fourth pair is verses 7 and 8. In each pair the second verse intensifies the first verse. So for example in verse 3 the Psalmist says: [The LORD] will not let your foot slip - he who watches over you will not slumber...' And verse 4 intensifies this: ...indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. It's not just that God watches over the author of Psalm 121. He watches over Israel too. The LORD watches over all of his people, including us. And it's not just that he won't slumber but he won't sleep either. And this is reassuring. Our God watches over us day and night. There's never a minute - there's never a moment - when the LORD isn't watching over us, whether we're awake or asleep. And the phrase 'watches over' doesn't just mean that he's peering down at us. It means that he's protecting us. In a similar way that an earthly father watches over his children, our heavenly Father watches over us. When there are reasons to be anxious and afraid this truth reassures us.
We're getting ready for the Live Stream on Sunday morning at 10:30am on the Village Church YouTube Channel. We've added a short Playlist of songs that we'll listen to together including a couple that are new (at least to us). Because of copyright I won't be able to play the songs from my end and so you'll have to play them from your end. It would therefore be helpful to have either a computer with two tabs open on your internet browser or two different devices ready with YouTube on. It would be great to have children connecting with us on Sunday morning and I'm attaching a colouring sheet for them to do during the sermon (if needed).
In light of the upcoming school closures and the number of parents who will have primary school children at home let me recommend Michael J Tinker. He's a professional Christian kids musician and every weekday you can join him on YouTube at 11am for songs, Bible and fun. It's only 15 minutes but when you've potentially got weeks and weeks with children at home every 15 minutes is a help! His YouTube Channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/user/michaeltinker/
For any of us who are at home let me recommend a couple of other things. Firstly, Olly Knight - a Christian singer / songwriter - is live streaming on Facebook every weekday morning between 8:30am and 9am for some singing. That might take your fancy. You can find him here: https://www.facebook.com/ollyknightmusic/. Secondly, www.everypsalm.com is source of songs based on the Psalms. Jesse and Leah Roberts, the musicians, are writing and releasing a new song each week based on the next Psalm. They're simple, meditative songs. They're really moving.
I've heard from a lot of people about the WhatsApp broadcast - thank you. I haven't set it up yet in case there are other people who want to be added. Do let me know in the next day or two and I'll get that going at some point soon. We're not going to mention people by name on the YouTube Live Stream and so the WhatsApp broadcast will be a place to do that - I'll try and send out a list of people to be praying for each week.
Warmly in Christ,
Jonny
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