Masterpiece / Family Service / Ps John Pearse

[Music] Kids life has been doing a series called Masterpiece. Everybody say Masterpiece. Masterpiece made by God. And what was so cool about that little game that we just played as Ben was saying is that every little thing was there on purpose. Now they only had a minute or so. God had a long time to prepare us. And so what we're going to talk about today is that we are God's Masterpiece. And so, adults, I need to let you know in the room. We're playing by kids life rules, okay? So you can't just sit there and kind of not often go to sleep. In fact, if you do, you'll probably end up on stage doing something because I've got some activities. I'm watching, okay? No, we just want a little bit of interaction, all right? So as we ask questions, get involved and it's going to have a lot of fun. We're going to have a lot of fun together. This is week five in the kids series and it is called Masterpiece. Masterpiece, sorry, not Masterpiece. Okay, so the first thing we're going to do everyone is a little thought experiment, okay? A little bit of imagination, adults. Do you remember what that is? A little bit of imagination. I'm going to give us a question here, okay? This is the task that we're going to have. We are all going to build a house, all right? Just have that in your head, we're building a house. And what I want you to do in this thought exercise now, this thought experiment is think about what your job would be in building that house. Are you going to be the designer, the architect? Are you going to be the person that's digging, doing all the earthworks to prepare the foundations? Are you going to be putting all the pipes in? Are you going to be, I don't know, plastering the walls? Are you going to be doing the tech and the wiring? Are you going to be coming in once all that hard work is done and decorating it and making it look nice? Are you the one that's turning up each day, telling everybody what to do, the site manager? Are you the person that's providing snacks and food and all that kind of stuff? Just think about it for a moment and we're going to ask you to yell out what you would do, okay? If I didn't say one of those things, you can have something else. So I'll give you guys a moment to think about it. Kids, I want you to yell out what you would do in terms of building a house. Are we already? All right, yell it out. What would you do if we were building a house? I've seen designer, her painter. What about over here? Admin, Lisa Admin, at the back. Come on, yell it out. You got to get involved. A lot of plants, I didn't say landscaping, yes, landscaping. Okay, what about this side over here? I'm going to make the camera guys work today. What would you guys do in the building house? What would your role be? You guys designing, what about over here? Foundation builders. Okay, I'm not going to keep pushing over there because they don't want to say anything. That's fine. We'll make it a bit easier. Hands up if you're a planned person. Hands up if you're the hands-on person. You want to be on the tools. Hands up if you are food and coffee, beverages, snacks, light refreshments. Hands up if you are landscaping. You guys are amazing. It's the Lord's work there. Hands up if you're just coming in at the end and handing the key to the person. That's the job you want to have. Hands up. What's interesting is that we're all in this same room together. But we didn't all pick the same thing. We all naturally went to something that we felt we would be able to either enjoy doing or have the skill to do. That's very interesting that we can all be in this same room and have different things. We did not pick all the same job. And I would say to the adults, I think the kids picked it very, very fast. They're used to this stuff. They picked it straight away. We had to maybe sit and think. And maybe as we get older, we need to remember that ability to be decisive quicker. To not let fear and all the other stuff that comes in through age and experience get in the way of that natural instinct of what's inside of us. And that's what we're looking at today. And so we're going to come back to this in a moment. Right now we are going to turn our eyes to the screen. And we're going to watch a Bible story. And this is what kids life watch when they're up in the hub. And it's got a guy in it whose name is Matt. Kids, I want you to look out for the guy whose name is Matt, okay? His one job in this video is just doing sound effects. Who would love to be like a sound effects guy walking through life. Imagine if you're at work, something happens, you had a little sound board and you could press it. And whatever sound you loaded in would happen in that moment. That'd be pretty cool, right? I would like to do that. But kids, I'm going to give you a job, are you listening? Everybody listening say yes? I want you to count how many people, how many jobs there are in this Bible story that we're going to hear, okay? Is that all right? I want you to count how many and adults want you to get involved in this as well. Okay, so let's turn our eyes to the screen and watch the Bible story for today. It's Bible story time! Hello everyone and welcome to our Bible story. My name is Charity and I will be telling you this story with the help of my friend Matt. Yes, all righty. Okay, here we go, perfect. I will be providing sound effects. All right, well today we are going to take a look at an incredible story from the book of Exodus about how God uses many different gifts to do something amazing. It actually works. Yes, I labeled that one important Bible moment because that's what it is. Great, well, every single person is created in the image of God. This truth shows up clearly in the book of Exodus. After God rescued his people from slavery in Egypt, they were free, but they were also in the middle of the wilderness. And even though the people grumbled and complained, God was gracious. He provided food, water, and protection, but God wanted to give them something even more important. Light savers, take that Egyptian something. No, not light savers, his presence. God called Moses up Mount Sinai to meet him in a cloud of glory. Mountains, always in that big setting. Yeah, and there God gave Moses laws and then special instructions. Yeah, God had covered, have them make a secret tent for me. I will live among them. So, hang on a second. God wanted it to live with them. That's crazy. Yeah, God Himself was going to live among His people, building a dwelling place for God was a huge project. Too big for Moses to do alone. So, God chose skilled leaders to help. God said, I have chosen Bezileu. I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, understanding, knowledge, and all kinds of skill. Spirit filled creativity upgrade. Yeah, God filled Bezileu with His Spirit to help him be a skilled artist. And He appointed a holy app to help him. God even gave them the ability to teach others. But the tabernacle needed more than just artists and builders. God also chose priests to serve inside it. Bring Aaron his sons, make sacred cloths. I have given the workers skill to do this work. Okay, yes. But before they could begin, they needed supplies. Tell the people to bring the offer from everyone whose heart moves them to give. Everyone was invited to be part of the work and the people were incredibly generous. Lots more. Yeah, they brought gold, yarn, linen, leather, wood, so much that Moses actually had to tell them to stop. Yep, back it up. Man, that is too much generosity. That's a rare problem. Yeah, after many months, the tabernacle was finished. Moses saw that the work had been done just as the Lord commanded. So, Moses blessed them. God used artists, builders, priests, teachers, and givers. Each person using what God had given them. They all worked together and God's presence lived among them. Very nice. God has given each of us unique gifts too. When we use them together, we shine God's light and help grow His kingdom. Oh, that's so cute. And that's our true story from the Bible. See you next time. See ya. There we have it. What an amazing story. Kids, did you notice at the end there how many different people were involved? How many, we got ten. You want to yell some out? They have people that. Giving, yes. And architects. Yes. I don't know if there was preachers there. There was priests. Yes. That's cool, that's cool. What we had was artists, builders, priests, teachers, and givers. All coming together to help build the temple, the tabernacle, which was going to be where God's presence was going to reside. Now, I want to show us a little illustration. I'm gonna ask Ben because he's such a good artist to come up and help me with this. Come on, Ben. Now I've got a ribbon here. Everyone can see this ribbon? Who reckons this is pretty strong or it's easily going to break? Kids' Reckon is going to break or it's going to be really strong. It's going to break. Let's see how strong Ben is. Let's see if you can break that. Let's give it a. Oh, that was too easy. That was too easy to break. Let's hold on to that for a second. Now I want to teach us something here because God gives us all gifts, right? And what He wants to do with those gifts that He gives us is connect them together with other people's gifts. And that helps to build His kingdom. You notice in the story that the that the the artists were given the spirit of God to to anoint them, the resources and the material and the skills not to just do the work themselves, but to teach others. And as everybody worked together, the temple, the tabernacle was built and God's presence came and resided. So I want to show us something, right? We all come and we all bring one strand, right? One strand. But if we all connect them together, I've got this one. Just imagine this was wrote, but it's different colored wrote because it represents all of us. I'm going to get Ben to help me here. Okay, I'm going to put this down for a second. Try and tie a knot in here. Okay. All right. Okay, we tied it up. Now what we're going to do is this is what God does is we're going to twist this, right? And this is like making a rope. You get all individual strands that normally together aren't quite strong enough to carry the weight of what the rope is going to to hold. But when they're twisted together, it creates something that's very strong. Who's a kid here? Whose parents are happy for them to come on stage because this is on YouTube. Get permission from your parents who wants to come and try and break this cord. Who we got over there? I think we can get we can get let's get Lincoln and Dan. Let's get both of them to come up here. We're going to give one end to Dan. Got to hold that. Whether not is and then give the other hand to Lincoln. All right, now come and see some of this side. Make sure we've got a shot over here. Let's see if you guys can break that cord. Okay, pull it really hard. We want to try and break it. Go for it. But wait, hang on a second. The one cord by itself broke so easily. And this is the same thing, just all connected together. But look how strong it is. All right, these guys are pretty strong Ben. All right, let's see if you can do it, buddy. Yep, let's see. He's going to put a bit in there. I hope he doesn't actually break it because I would ruin my analogy. But let's just see. Come on, Ben. Put some muscles in there. Who reckons they're stronger than Ben? Lee put his hand up. Let's get Lee out here. Come on, Lee. Let's see. Reckons he's stronger. He's going to get a coffee and he's come back. He's got the strength of coffee. Get up here quickly, Lee. You never put your hand up a church because you'll get called out just so you know. All right, Lee, here we go. Come on, you reckon you can do it. Let's see if you can break it. Okay, he looks like he's getting close. Now, see, you can't do it. See, that God cannot be broken. And when they made the tabernacle, when they made the tent where God's presence was going to reside, they got all the different fibers and all the different things and they twisted it together in the way that God told them and it built something that one person wouldn't be able to do by themselves. They had to come together and they created something. And what was so amazing about what they created was at the end of it, God came and lived in it. God came and lived in it. But the difference is if we were to go and try and visit that tent that they made, it's not there anymore. So where does God live now? Well, actually God lives inside of us. We are now the tabernacle. We are now the temple of the presence of God and by the Holy Spirit God lives within us. And so when we have our one gift that God gives us, we can do quite a lot of things with that one gift. But when we build that together, or in fact, if we allow God to build that together with other people's gifts, we can do so much more than we ever thought would be possible. And the point of it is not just to do so much more for us, it's to do so much more to build God's kingdom and to help share his love with the world around us, with the family around us, with the workplace around us, with our school friends around us. And so, as the scripture says, if we want to put the memory verse up, who can remember the memory verse, I guess it's up there now. Let's read it together. Well, here it is. How you made me is amazing and wonderful. I praise you for that. What you have done is wonderful. I know that very well. That's for the whole series. And now we've got the bottom line. This is the bottom line of this message that God grows his gifts in me to build his kingdom. God grows his gifts in me to build his kingdom. We've got to make sure, though, as we understand this, that we get the order of how this all works, because God is always interested in who we are before we do anything for him. And in fact, God wants to tell us who we are before we do anything for him, because it's in knowing who we are and our identity being in God in Jesus, that we actually can then do so much more for him. So, if we go back to that verse that was read in that video, it starts with God saying, I have chosen him. This is Bezile, the artist. I have chosen him. I have filled him and he is skilled. So before this guy had done anything, picked up a tool or done anything, God was saying that he's chosen, that he's his, that he's skilled and he's going to be able to do what he said that he did. God said who he was before he had ever done the job. And we can go to Jesus when Jesus gets baptized before he even starts his ministry. The first recorded thing in the Bible that God says to Jesus is this is my son. And I love him and I'm very pleased with him. That's before Jesus had done any earthly ministry. And so in the midst of this, as we look at the screen behind me, that says Masterpiece, we've got to know that you are God's masterpiece. And that is before you've done anything for him. Sometimes we think we've got to do things that make us good enough for God. Maybe that's come from our family background. Maybe that's because we've got a teacher at school that has an expectation or we've had a bad experience in some way that we've got to feel like we've got to earn our way towards God. But no, we don't because he created us. And he loves us. And he actually wants to tell us who we really are. And then in that knowledge of who we are in him, in that love and that connection that we have with him, we then have a task, a gift that he gives to us and a purpose here to out work on earth. And this I think is so important because as we get older, it's harder sometimes and we can feel like maybe we haven't done enough with our lives. Maybe we don't know what that purpose is. We can go through different experiences and situations that seem to strip that purpose out of our lives. And we can get lost in that place. And God wants to remind us that he created us, that he knows us. And no matter what stage of life we're in, he has a plan and he has a purpose for our lives. Let's have a look at this. Pastor Beck prayed this over the children, but Ephesians 2.10 says, "For we are God's masterpiece created a new in Christ Jesus where God's masterpiece created a new so we can do the good things that he planned for us long ago." No matter how you find yourself in this room watching online, God has planned good works for you to do in advance. And you are his masterpiece and we're created a new in Jesus. So kids, are you listening? I'm going to ask you a couple of questions. Who made us? That's right. And what are we? What did he make us? It's on the screen behind me, the big word. Masterpiece, that's right. We are his masterpiece. And what did he make us for? Or what does he want us to do with the gifts that he's given us? Build his kingdom. We go back to the bottom line. Bottom line slide. Now very quickly, if we go back a bit further on, in that same passage in Ephesians 2, verses 22, as we look at this chord, it says, "And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his spirit." Where His Masterpiece created in Christ Jesus for the good works He's prepared and advanced for us to do and in Him We are being Create we are being built together to become a dwelling place where God lives By His Spirit So as we come to to the end of this part before we move on in the service What do we take away from Today everybody listen up. Okay, this is the summary if you've been asleep through the whole thing wake up now for this moment And you can say oh, yeah, I remember exactly what that what that message that really cool guy was talking about That's what I think everybody was thinking as us Okay, first is you are His Masterpiece God says that over you before you've done anything for him the second thing is that God grows Gifts in His people for a purpose Not so that we could look impressive But so that we can point people to him and to build his kingdom and What he put inside of us the gift that he gave us he did that on purpose and when our gift Connects with other people's gifts God does something in that that we could that's bigger than we could ever do by ourselves And that God never wants wanted to live away from us He wants to live with us. He came close initially in the tent in the tabernacle and then in the temple so that he could live among the people And then he came even closer still by his Holy Spirit and what was once a physical location that God resided is now built within us We are the temple of the Holy Spirit and when we accept Jesus into our heart He comes alive within us and he lives within us and this is the truth God knows you better than you know yourself We need to listen to him To follow him and he will do more with our lives than we would have ever even known to ask for So great is the things that God wants to do within your life no matter what stage of life you are in And you will find I promise you if you if you if you lean into this and make this your life You will find there is nothing more fulfilling than living a life that is following God and Living in Everything that he has for you Nothing is more fulfilling than that And so I want to encourage us today That God has a plan and a purpose for every person But before that he has such a heart of love for you no matter what happens in your life no matter what has happened in your life God loves you so much and It's because he made you the Bible says that he needed us together in our mother's womb