Daily Reading for Tuesday 22nd August 2023

Prayer
-Give thanks to God for those who have recently recovered from sickness.
-Pray for those who are sick or receiving treatment in our congregation.
-Pray that we each would walk close to God, putting off sins that easily beset us and that we would daily give thanks for our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. (1 John 1.3; Hebrews 12.1; 1 Thes 5.16.)

Church Services
Sermons
Sunday morning at 11:00am in church (also available online via Facebook)
Sunday evening at 6:30pm in church (also available online via Facebook)
Bible study and prayer
Wednesday evening at 7:00pm - This week ( Wednesday 23rd) will be online via Zoom
Lunch hour service
Thursday between 1:00pm and 1:30pm in church (also online via Facebook)
Outreach/witnessing
Saturday morning at Victoria Street (outside the big Boots store) for 10:30am (across the road from Town Hall - No. 64). Afterwards we go back to church for prayer.

Daily Reading
Preface - Jonathan, without the knowledge of his father or any of the people, attended by his armourbearer only, smiteth the Philistine garrison. The Philistines seized with a panic beat down one another. Saul perceiving the tumult enquireth of God, but without waiting for teh priest's answer setteth upon the enemy, and is joined by the Hebrews, and by the Israelites out of their hiding places. His ill-advised adjuring of the people is a hindrance of the victory. The people, faint for want of food, fly upon the spoil, and are hardly restrained from eating the blood. Saul buildeth an altar; he asketh counsel of God, but receiveth no answer. Jonathan taken by lot, and sentenced to die, is rescued by the people. Saul's victories. His family.
1 Samuel 14
Preface - Paul exhorteth to holiness and conformity to God's will: and to think soberly of the gifts allotted every man respectively. We are all members of one body in Christ, and should diligently exercise our several gifts for the common benefit. Various practical duties recommended. Revenge is specially forbidden, and to do good for evil injoined.
Romans 12

A Puritans Catechism
Q55 - Which is the sixth commandment?
A - The sixth commandment is, Thou shalt not kill.

Robert Murray M'Cheyne - God Makes A Path - Daily Devotional Readings
When a believer falls
But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.
1 Corinthians 9 v 27
As long as a believer walks humbly with his God, his soul is at peace. The candle of the Lord shines on his head. He walks in the light as God walks in the light, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth him from all sin. But the moment that unbelief creeps in, he is led away into sin - like David, he falls very low. A believer generally falls lower than the world; and now he falls into darkness. 
When Adam fell, he was afraid; and he hid himself from God among the trees of the garden, and made a covering of leaves. Alas! when a believer falls, he is also afraid - he hides from God. Now he has lost a good conscience, he fears to meet with God; he does not love the house of prayer; his heart is filled with suspicions. He says to himself: 'If I had been a child of God, would God have given me up to my own heart's lusts?' He refuses to return. 'There is no hope: no; for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go.' Though God has never been a wilderness or a land of darkness to the soul, yet he says: 'W are lords; we will come no more unto thee.' The Lord hath forsaken me, and my God hath forgotten me.' Ah! This is the bitterest of all kinds of desertion. If you put away faith and a good conscience, you will make shipwreck.