Seed Community Church, 38 Swan Hill Road, Murray Downs (2026)

08/06/2025

And here is today's message.

Ephesians 3:9-10

Entirely dependent on God's Holy Spirit.

Identity, ministry and humility.

Bringing things to light. It is the mission of the bible teacher.

It is a remarkable thing that God has given Paul the responsibility to impart to the gentiles the mystery of God's plan.

GOD HAS A PLAN
God's plan goes back to before the foundation of the world.

Paul's mission was to shed light on these mysteries.

God's plan and purpose from all eternity is to be through His people. At the heart of God's plan is His Church. All churches who meet are doing so as a part of the plan He established before time began.

So that people ultimate plan for the world is seen in an embryonic way in the Church. We are all connected in Christ. Whether we are believers in Russia or the US or even in Israel.

Churches that are under attack are ones who take the Word of God seriously. Not much attack on Churches that don't believe the Bible.

THAT PLAN HAS BEEN HIDDEN.
It is the bible that gives us the great revelation of God's purposes.

The bible gives us the great scheme of humanity. The bible tells us about darkness of the world and the fact that the Light of God came into. That darkness lead many a musician had a dream that war and conflict would disappear. But look at history. It hasn't happened. War and darkness is still with us.

Without the wisdom of God man in his wisdom cannot know God. The responsibility of the church in every generation is to shine light into a dark world.

Is global warming the real issue with the world. It is the only area that there seems to be total agreement. But global warming isn't the biggest issue facing the world. Darkness is. Jesus is the answer. Nothing else matters. Whether global warming is an issue or not, the world needs a Church prepared to proclaim that Jesus is the answer.

Jesus created everything. Here's a staggering thought, this is God's world. He made it.

There is a sense of abject hopelessness in the world. They don't understand how they started, how the continue or how they will end. Without God nothing makes any sense.

The world God made and it was good. Man has spoilt the world and so all the bad things man does makes the world bad.

GOOD - BAD - NEW
Good world, made bad by sin, is made new through the work of Jesus. The gospel is not about what we have to do but about what God has done for us

When God's plan is complete Jesus will return.

All injustice will be dealt with when the King comes back. Evil doers may look like they get away with it. But they won't. There is no hope for peace on earth except through the Prince of Peace.

Christian make sure that as you view our world, do so in light of these truths.

08/06/2025

Forgot to post last week's message. Here it is.

Ephesians 3:7-13

We need to be grateful of the pastors in our lives.

We start of with three words Identity, Humility and Responsibility.

The message of the Gospel is not a story about what you do to make yourself a Christian.

So what is the Gospel? We need to be sure that we understand what we're saying when we say the gospel.

It is the message of salvation through the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ conveying divine power to save all those who believe. The story of the Gospel is that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.

The appeal of the gospel is to men and women to receive the Reconciliation provided for them in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ and this is Paul's message and it was as a servant of this message that he was made a minister.

He was made a minister. No man may make himself a minister. Serving by divine initiative. It is by appointment. God gives it all. It's not something that we can make, happen ourselves. It is but by the Grace of God.

Paul was a Pharisee of Pharisees and left to his own devices that's what he would have pursued. But God intervened. We don't have a predisposition to beliieve Jesus. It was by the gift of Grace of God that Paul was called to be a minister of the Gospel.

We don't want a Pastor who says that they could become a doctor, an engineer or lawyer. Then think "no I'll become a Pastor the church looks like a good job". No we need someone who is called by God, someone who can do nothing else really.

Humility

Humbled by the fact that God calls us. Never tire of saying how much God has done for us. All the.things Paul did and he counts them as nothing but considers the blessing of being forgiven as foremost.

Paul recognises that he isn't an obvious choice. He is least likely as he is at the bottom of the pile. Grace of God so showered upon him that he knows who God is, who Jesus is too. Paulus in Latin means "little". It is believed that Paul was short.

Spiritual pride is the worst. Everything we have is a gift and how can we pride ourselves in that.

Responsibility

Amazing that God would choose someone who hated gentiles the become an apostle to the gentiles.

We want a Gospel for nice people. But God comes to save sinners and when God shines His light of Grace upon you, what a joy, what a blessing.

The wisdom of God is actually foolishness to those who are perishing. Does the pastor preach Christ. If yes then he is on the right track.

Pastors aren't there to give ethical talks or be political. The Pastors role is to preach Christ. That's his job. Don't give people what they want you give them what they need. And they need Christ.

Paul loved to tell us all about Jesus.

If you are in need of salvation, turn to Jesus. He is to us Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification and Redemption. He is all of these to us. Without Him we have nothing. He redeems us from the pit.

25/05/2025

Today's message 25 May 2025

Starts off with Acts 22 and Paul's testimony regarding his salvation. Then moved Ephesians 3:1-6.

No one was more amazed at the grace of God than Saul of Tarsus. His works to destroy the way was clearly obvious and the transformation made even more amazing. What was also amazing was that the Lord could choose a more unlikely person to go the the gentiles.

Talk about mystery novels and how we try to figure out the ending. The word mystery in Ephesian is a word that cannot be deduced from human wisdom. We need the Spirit of God to fully understand.

Paul was comvinced that he needed to oppose Jesus of Nazareth until he encountered Jesus on the road to Damascus. And then he tells us how he preached the gospel and that only true understanding came from the Holy Spirit.

In 1 Corinthians he wrote that you can't argue someone into salvation but it is the work of the Spirit.

Entrance of God's word brings life but men and women can't grasp it unless God sheds His light on it.

We possess no intuitive radar. The barrier is impenetrable and only God can tear it down. We can't.

Do you think that Paul would be surprised that we are reading his letter that he wrote 2000 years ago. Some would say yes which is wrong. Paul would not have been surprised. He had seen the risen Christ and so he understood that his letters actually carried the Authority of God.

2 Peter 3 speaks about Paul writing scripture. Their unique foundational role in the Church. We don't need other revelation as we have the scriptures.

Verse 6 and the mystery. Thinking about Jesus and it is a great mystery. The mystery of the incarnation. The mystery of Jesus being fully God and fully man. Only by the Holy Spirit does a person bow down. Jesus is the substance and the source of this mystery.

This truth is clear and understandable. It is a mystery only to those who haven't the Spirit of God.

3 chapters in Acts 10, 11 and 12. It's the story of Peter who needed to be converted of his faulty view of the Gentiles. He was hanging out with Simon the tanner who deals with dead animals. A big no no to Jews. Same with the vision of all the animals. He needed to realise that what God makes clean, is clean indeed.

God doesn't show favouritism. No special nation status anymore. Cornelius needed to be dissuaded from worshipping Peter as a god and Peter needed to be dissuaded from treating Cornelius as a dog.

And how blessed are we because of this.

14/05/2025

There will be no Church service for the 18th May. Apologies for any inconvenience.

11/05/2025

Ephesians 3:1-13

Paul is writing to the saints in Ephesus who are faithful in Christ Jesus. In Ephesus and in Christ.

Are you in Christ. Former life absolutely opposed to Christ and now he was in Christ.

We are placed into a community. This thread has been with us in our journey through Ephesians. Unity despite our nationality and ethnicity. Even if you are an only child you have brothers and sisters here and all over the world.

Community in the Christian life is not an idea but a reality. When we were placed in Christ we are organically related to anyone else who has been placed in Christ. We are sharing citizenship and members of one family.

Don Carson has a wonderful quote regarding this, this is what he writes. The church is not made of natural friends, it is made up of natural enemies. What binds us together is not common education, common race, common income levels, common politics, common nationality, common accents, common jobs or anything of the sort, Christians come together not because they form a natural collocation, but because they have been saved by Jesus Christ. In this light he says, they are a band of natural enemies who love one another for Jesus sake.

On our own we can't convey the wonder of what it means to be in Christ, we do it best together. Some of us are tempted to view the gospel as an individual, we will look at Church stuff as an optional extra. But it isn't. We would need to wonder if you understood what it means to be in Christ.

Paul was in prison when he wrote Ephesians. The first point in chapter 3 is that even though a prisoner of Nero in Rome, he says he is a prisoner for Christ Jesus. He has no agitation. No resignation. No stoicism. Here he is showing exultation. It is what has happened to him that advances the gospel. How do we react when things don't go as we plan?

Andrew Murray. His words. I am here by God's appointment, in His keeping, under His training, for His time.

This makes all the difference in the world. It doesn't actually change the circumstance, it is what it is, through the storm, you are not out of the storm, you are going through the storm, and Paul writes out of the storm tossed experience of his prison and he says I am a prisoner for Christ Jesus. Not only a prisoner but a prisoner for you gentiles.

The Jewish people had an issue with this. Read Acts 22 to see how they reacted when Paul pointed out that he was an Apostle to the gentiles.

There was a new temple, a new people. All through Christ Jesus. Jews couldn't stand the fact that Gentiles were being saved too.

The gospel of Jesus is a radical story. It is grounded in the fact that God from all eternity has planned the rescue of both Jew and Gentile. Where can a Jew and Gentile meet together in peace? The rich and the poor. In the church. We are the temple. We aren't going up to the temple, it is coming down to us.

What we have here on earthcin the Church is partial. In heaven it will be perfect.

04/05/2025

Ephesians 2:19-22

ART
Alienated
Reconciiled
Transformed

At one time. Refers to who we were. A description of humanity without God. Helpless. What can a dead person do to make themselves alive. And we were hopeless. Without hope.

But now. We are reconciled to God through the cross. The account has been settled by Jesus. No longer strangers and aliens.

A real observable difference between the Christian and the Non Christian.

Paul's conversion was dramatic. Not all of our conversions are dramatic. Transformation may occur over a long period of time. As we read God's word, as we pray, as we learn more, one day we look back and realise we have been transformed.

Faith in Jesus makes the greatest of distinction.

We are now fellow citizens with the saints. In Christ we have a new identity.

Members. All of God's people together in His household.

We belong to God and we belong to each other. We can choose our friends but not our family. Same with Church. Some people Church shop, never satisfied.

How long did it take Jesus to wait for you to get your act together. He didn't, He took you in as you were. We can't make ourselves clean, only He can do it.

Jesus is the cornerstone and everything else fits into Him.

We are stones in God's temple. He is building something. Being joined together in Christ, building a holy temple.

The dwelling place of God is in the Church.

We may be from different cultures, backgrounds, education, yet we are one. We worship the same God, share the same saviour.

We are all stones, not always fitting well together. We all require chiselling and hammering to get us to fit together.

Do we think that those who are stuck up snobs would need to have their trough edges knocked off, of course they do. Our culture is manifestly chaos. And it is a phenomenal opportunity for the Church.

The building isn't the Church. Jesus is present in us, not the building.

The character of a local church is molded by the self perception of those who are members.

Wise as serpents and harmless as dogs. We differ from each other on innumeral levels. But in Christ we are one.

27/04/2025

Passage for today. Ephesians 2:11-22

We long for peace and harmony. Lennon in his song Imagine stated that the only way for the world to move forward is to have an end to religion. Seems nowadays we can only achieve this not by the end of religion but by blending all religions.

Universal agreement that our world is broken. No agreement with the cause or cure. Yet Ephesians, written years ago, has the remedy.

Peace discovered in the context of hostility. Jesus is our peace. He is making peace and He preached peace.

Jesus is the prince of peace. Paul's life was marred by hostility, he had a hatred for people and pursued those people and imprisoned them even to death. Paul discovered how wrong he was.

The devil is the great fabricator. He has convinced everyone that the answer is the problem. The problem is you people who talk about Jesus.

It's a matter of truth.

Jesus stands and says I am the way, the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through me. The only way to meet the God who made us is through the Prince of Peace.

Separation was replaced by integration

Hostility swallowed up in community

Jesus is creating a completely new society with barriers broken down and the church is that society.

We are to be an indication to a broken world what Jesus has done in us. We aren't perfect but we need to do our best.

Jesus has broken down the wall. This wall being broken means absolutely everything to both Jew and Gentile. There was a wall between us, but in Christ no longer.

The laws were written for an interim purpose. It all pointed to Jesus. The law isn't done away with, it's a mirror to show me that it is through Christ alone that I'm saved.

The only solution to the middle east crisis is to get the Arab and the Jew together. And the only way that can happen is if both accept Jesus. Then they become one in Christ. No more emnity.

He has made one in place of two. He has done this in order to create in Himself one new man in the place of two. He has taken those who were once separated from one another who were actually hostile to one another. And he has created one new man in the place of two. No distinction for those near nor far away. They both have access to the Father.

All the things we hold dear are irrelevant when we come to Christ. Think of Paul, the Pharisee of Pharisees, he now counts as nothing.

Jesus brings us near. The divisions and distinctions that once separated us can't be in us anymore. Sometimes they are, but Christ breaks down those barriers and we both have access.

Access to where? Not to a temple in Jerusalem but to the Father. The tearing of the curtain ended the temple. We have access to God the Father Himself through Jesus.

Message ends with John Lennon. Imagine there's no heaven, easy if you try, imagine all the people living for today. No thought for yesterday, no thought for tomorrow. And in to this steps Jesus. No need to imagine, we find purpose in Jesus Christ.

13/04/2025

Today's talk was very encouraging. Based on Ephesian 2:11-22

The main point being In Christ Jesus

Hopelessness and helpless. Not to drive us to dispair but drive us to the only solution, namely Jesus.

What we are by nature and is contrasted with we have become by grace.

Our identity is directly tied to community.

Once statelessness, but now have citizenship.

Once friendless, but now have a new family.

Once alienated, but now have joined together.

All this comes from one phrase "but now in Christ Jesus". This is the most common description of a follower of Jesus in the Bible, being in Christ Jesus.

Easier to explain who we are as being in Christ Jesus. It means to be united with Christ, the way a limb is part of the body or a branch is part of the vine.

When we feel the knife of his pruning

We are united with Christ. Not inside Christ.

Chosen in my maker, I was hidden in my saviour all this before all the mountains were formed.

God doesn't believe for us. In John 1 Jesus gave us the right to become a child of God. Like Nicodemus outside of Christ we are blind and helpless.

You must be born again, there is no other way.

Our faith is actually rooted in the activity of God.

All that Christ has done, it is not for those who don't believe. When we encounter Jesus we will let everyone know that we are under new management. We are buried with Jesus and raised with him to newness of life in baptism. Not that we are saved by baptism, but it portrays it. So if we think we can continue to sin, our lord and master Jesus says things differently. S*x is to be in the sanctity of marriage. We no longer live to satisfy our desires, but His. I am a new creation.

Dementia is awful. Loss of indentity. What is worse is those who have no clue who they are in Jesus and never have.

Raised or united with Christ. We are raised, yet live on earth. We are in Australia, yet we are in Christ. We are perfect, yet are horribly imperfect. We look to our identity in Christ. Seek the things that are above.

Easy to be discouraged but look to our identity in Christ. Our lives are hidden in Christ.

We are safe in the arms of Jesus.

I am His and He is mine.

Jesus is the gate and all who enter though Him will be saved. You who were far away He has brought near.

Jesus says, come near to me. How do you come near to Jesus, by taking Him at a his word, by believing His promises, by receiving him. By being placed in Christ Jesus.

06/04/2025

Today's message

Ephesians 2:11-22

Remember

All kinds of wars nowaday. No place to turn from strife, bloodshed and injustice. The world is in need of repair.

There is not a person anywhere in the world that doesn't acknowledge that with the world the way it is, someone has to come up with a fix.

We will never learn till we bow to God.

In Christ He was going to unite all things together. God's purpose was always in Jesus.

By grace through faith that we have been reconciled to God.

One of the evidences of God's eternal purpose is to be seen in the absence of hostility, in the presence of harmony, in the breaking down of barriers and the building of bridges over all kinds of troubled waters.

The local Church contains within itself the seeds or the DNA of a remade world. The world is supposed to be able to come in and say "oh so this an indication of what God has planned from all of eternity to do." Despite our diverse ethnic backgrounds, we are all in Christ together. All part of the community of faith.

Division Paul was addressing the division between Jew and Gentiles. We need to understand the gulf between first century Jews and Gentiles and this shows to the world how amazing it is that we get along in Christ.

Circumcision was used by the Jew as a mark of superiority and yet in the Church both Jew and Gentile called each other brother and sister. To those outside this was amazing.

He has made a new creation.

Addressing a real division.

Secondly the condition of the unconverted gentile. They were separated from Christ. Alienated from the commonwealth of Israel. No badge of the covenant.

Thirdly strangers to the Covenants of promise. No knowledge of, nor right to the promises of God.

Fourthly no hope. The Jew had a destination, gentiles had none of that.

Fifthly without God in the world. Things that God had made clear to them by creation and conscience they had suppressed. They had created their own gods. Same remains true today. If we reject God's revelation of himself in scripture we find we are quickly taken up with superstition. The heart of man is an idol factory.

Final point. Before we became believers we were dead and in Christ we have been made alive and Paul wants to remind us.

Hendrickson summarises it best befreonwe came to Jesus. Christless, stateless, friendless, Godless, hopeless.

This is why we need to be reminded of the grace of God. That's why verse 11 follows verse 10. Has nothing at all to do with our background. He is making one new man in place of the two. A whole new community that God is making that comprises converted Jews and Gentiles.

His grace has made it possible. How helpless and hopeless we sinners have been, if He had never loved us till cleansed from our sin. Such a vital distinction. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us.

We are reminded to not raise up barriers of division. Church is really good at doing this.

Remember what we were. It's not what defines us now. Not our sexuality, our stint in prison. We are now defined by Jesus Christ.

When a Church starts to think that they are respectable, they lie to themselves.

We may think "why can't we just get on together, when will ever learn." Heed the call of Jesus.

Our original tombstone would have said, "Separated, alienated, helpless, hopeless. In Christ it now says reconciled, united and seated.

30/03/2025

Ephesians 2:1-10

By grace you been saved

An apt summary is found in Colossians 1:21-22

To walk

Walk in good deeds

Walking is a reference to our lives. e.g. the company we keep. The way and place in which we walk. We were in a different environment and we were condemned.

Some old novelists used the term "Walking out together". Who are you waking with?

Once we walked out with another, the prince of the power of the air, and now it has all changed.

Man as man is not simply lost and in need of direction, instruction, medicine but rather he is dead and in need of life. Raising the dead is the province of God.

The story of the bible is that we have been built for a relationship with God, but we are alienated because of our sin and because of God's wrath. But God Himself has provided the way, the truth and the life in Christ Jesus.

Start with the immensity of God's love. The fountain of God's love that the streams of mercy flow. John 3:16

Mercy means nothing unless we understand our predicament.

What we require is mercy and not justice.

He not only raised us to life, but He also seats us with Himself in the heavenlies.

Prodigal son headed home for mercy.

Why has God acted in this way in salvation?
On account of His mercy, His love, His grace, His kindness in Christ Jesus.

Today if you hear God's voice, do not harden your hearts.

One day every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord.

In the coming ages the whole universe will see what He has done.

In Jesus, God has reconciled sinners to Himself.

Faith is a gift from God. Faith is our response and not our contribution.

We are entirely reliant on God to respond to the Gospel. Salvation isn't an achievement of our own works. It's the work of God. Our ongoing Christian living is also dependent on God's grace.

Am I amazed by the grace of God?

Seed Community Church

08/06/2025

08/06/2025

25/05/2025

14/05/2025

11/05/2025

04/05/2025

27/04/2025

13/04/2025

06/04/2025

30/03/2025

Address

Opening Hours

Telephone

Website

Alerts

Contact The Place Of Worship

Shortcuts

Share

Category

Our Story