I love Sundays, especially the first Sundays of the new year. Everyone is back from holiday, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and enthusiastic about the year ahead. Even those of us who remained in Jo’burg over the holiday period are feeling refreshed.

So, welcome back! Welcome home to RUC! I hope you’re eager to grow in your walk with Jesus in 2014.

A vital ingredient in our spiritual growth is corporate worship on the Lord’s Day. And a key indicator of our desire to grow, our devotion to Christ, and our love for his people is our faithful involvement in corporate worship. God’s word admonishes,

“Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another-and all the more as you see the Day approaching”Hebrews 10:25

Let me give you a ‘heads-up’ concerning the preaching plan for the next few months. Next Sunday (19 January) we will focus on our mission of moving ourselves and others to the right as we unpack Colossians 1:28-29–a couple of great verses on how spiritual growth happens.

Sunday 26 January will be a special day in the life of RUC as we get to know our new Next Generation Pastor, Ryan Wiesner, and his wife Kirstin. They will share their testimony at all services, and Ryan’s official ordination to Christian ministry and induction as a Pastor of RUC will take place in the evening service.

From the beginning of February until Easter we will be running different morning and evening sermon series. Our evening series, preached by Ryan and others, will focus on Paul’s letter to the Galatians which contrasts the futility of religion with the freedom of the gospel. On Sunday mornings I will return to the Gospel of John. We have covered the first twelve chapters where the focus is on Jesus’ public ministry to the Jews. As we enter chapter thirteen, we begin the second half of the book. This part begins in the Upper Room where Jesus gathers with his friends (disciples) to prepare them for the mission to the world on which he will send them. This section (chapters 13 to 16), known as the Upper Room Discourse, contains vital practical teaching and rich encouragement for all of us who would follow Jesus in the life of discipleship.

Please pray for those of us who have the great responsibility of the ministry of the Word of God and, as the KFC ad says, “COME HUNGRY!”