Living a life without Villains

Well Good Afternoon! Hey Sal, how are we doing? I'm doing good, thank you. Hi, everyone! It's lovely to have you with us this afternoon. Welcome to CROWD church. Yeah it's great that you are here. Happy Sunday afternoon! The reason for my slight hesitancy was I was just putting it out on Instagram that we were doing it! We'll let you off! We are CROWD church, we are based in Liverpool, and we're part of frontline church happily through the medium of the digital, wherever, we're able to meet you, wherever you are in the world! As you can see, I'm not the technical one on the team, so anything that goes wrong today, we know who to blame. The digital, whatever? That's the technical term! Whatever! You know, the digital ,magic , digital stuff! Look at that! We can be beamed across the world. Fabulous. We can and we are currently beaming across the world through digital stuff on Facebook and on YouTube. So wherever you are, wherever you're watching, this is great that you're here. Great that you could join us. If you're watching live, then please do say hi in the comments. It would be great to meet you. Great to get to know you. Join in the conversation. If you're watching on Catch Up, you can still get involved! You can still comment, we do check them. And also before Sal tells me to do it. I'm gonna put on....there we go. Well done Matt. Good Job. The WhatsApp number brilliant! So if you don't want to comment on via Facebook or YouTube, or wherever you're watching us, then feel free to send us a message via WhatsApp. We would love to hear from you. As well, if there's anything that you'd like prayer for we believe in prayer. So we would be happy to pray for you. So if you've got anything that you need, and you'd like prayer for that, then just send us a message for our WhatsApp number. We'd love to hear from you. Yeah, definitely, definitely. So let me tell you what is coming up in today's live stream! We have the enormously talented, the exceptionally handsome and, debonair John Harding! Hang on there Matt, is this about you? Oh John! I though you were talking about yourself for a second. I was actually describing myself to describe John. I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, we do have John. I'm really excited to hear his talk today. What's the title of his talk, Matt? "Living a life without villains!" Yeah. Which is great. It's a great talk. I've heard it as a fantastic talk. We'll be able to have a really good discussion about that afterwards. John is going to come and join us after the worship to be able to have a little discussion about that. So any questions you want to ask John or anything you want us to discuss, again, put those in the comments. We would love to have your input this afternoon! Yeah, definitely don't feel shy, do put it in there. I'm looking forward to the q&a with John. It's always good fun, it's gonna be a good laugh, and good banter. And that's going to be after the worship, which Sal is going to explain about in just a little bit after the talk. We've also got the usual catch up stuff. We've got a quick video from James Sloan in the Catch Up stuff. So that is what's going on today! All told, it should take about 45 minutes to 50 minutes, somewhere around there. If you stay around for the worship at the end. It's normally about an hour. Just to give you a clue. If this is your first time with us, a big, big, warm welcome. It's great that you've joined us! Yeah, absolutely. We love to have new people here. But we love it if you've been coming every week as well. It's brilliant. We really want this to feel like a family place. A place where you feel connected, and part of this group. If you're just asking questions, or you want to know more about Jesus, or the things that we're talking about, then this is the place for you. Absolutely! I couldn't have said it better myself Sal. I definitely wouldn't have tried anyway. So John Hardings put here in the comments, he says, "We've been caught off guard!" So obviously referring to me with the Instagram pallava. Matt says, "Please, no tech issues today." Just so you know, occasionally we do get tech issues. It's not unheard of. So if they happen, do bear with us. We do try and fix them as quickly and as humanly possible. But this is a danger of live streaming. It does go wrong on occasion. That's what makes it real, and that proves to you that we're not pre recorded. We're coming to you live. And yeah, that's very, very real and live, isn't it, Matt? Absolutely. It doesn't get any more real, and any more live, than you and me on a Sunday afternoon. Let's just be fair. Absolutely! That's the beauty of it we hope! So just bear with us. Obviously, as Matt said, we'll try and fix things as quickly as we possibly can. So stay with us if we do have any issues, but hopefully we won't today. So hopefully it will be smooth running. That's very good. I've seen Nicolas put in the comments already. She's got her question ready. And Matt has already said it, "Don't forget to allow for Nicola Morris questioon!" Matt, it's Nicola's turn this week. If you are new to the live stream, and you have not really got a clue what we're talking about, you'll find out later. Let's just leave it at that! You're gonna find out. Just keep watching, and you'll find out. Now if this is your first time, or if you're a regular visitor, if you haven't done so yet, make sure you hit that like button or subscribe button. Depending on what platform you're on, do get in touch and connect with us. We do live stream out every Sunday at 4pm. You can get all those fancy reminders through the digital tech stuff that Sal talks about. I'm not going to live that one down now, am I? This is just what it's gonna be called from now on, the tech stuff! So yeah, so make sure you do like and subscribe, and stay connected to what's going on. If you want to, share it out, tell the world to come watch church on a Sunday afternoon. Because it is great, great fun to do. We are a place for those that might not understand or might not care or might not see the relevance Church. Matt. I think we should get into the talk, don't you? Yeah, absolutely. Let's let's get into the talk before it goes even more wrong. We have got coming up, Pastor, Senior Pastor John Harding. CROWD church is part of Frontline Church. John is the senior pastor of Frontline, great guy. I've been friends with him for years really, really value him as a person. And as a friend. And actually, as a teacher. He's going to be talking about Judas today. He's got some really interesting stuff. We've been working our way through Mark's gospel, if you've been following along, for CROWD, you've been working your way very slowly through Mark's gospel. So John's going to carry us on through that. He's going to hit on this next topic. And then, Sal, we'll be back after the talk. But let me hit the right button on my pad here. And here is Pastor John. Hi there CROWD church. As has already been said, my name is John Harding. I'm the senior pastor of frontline church. And it is a great privilege to be able to share some thoughts with you, once again, from the Bible, from God's word. Now you guys are journeying through the book of Mark, one of four Gospels. And today we're looking at a really tricky section of scripture. Tricky character in the Bible that raises all sorts of big questions. We're in Mark, chapter 14, verse 10, and 11. And we're thinking about that iconic villain, Judas. And then synonymous with betrayal and treachery. I've called my talk today this, "Living a Life Without Villains." Because I think there's something in the essence of this story that can liberate us from seeing other people as villains, and empower us so that we no longer see ourselves as victims. But I am getting a little bit ahead of myself. So let me just grab my Bible and backtrack. And we're going to read that section of Scripture, Mark 14: 10-11. "Then Judas Iscariot, one of the 12, went to the chief priests to betray Jesus. They were delighted to hear this and promised to give him money. So he watched for an opportunity to hand Jesus over." Whether you are a Christian or not, whether you have read the Bible or not, there is a good chance that you would be familiar with this part of the story of Jesus and this character called Judas. Now we know that Jesus had gathered around him 12 men, 12 apostles, whom he lived with and worked with for three years. For three years, he invested everything he had into those 12 men, but only 11 of them went on to be leaders of the earliest church. One of them did not make it, Judas. Because as we know, Judas betrayed Jesus, in the Garden of Gethsemane, in the early hours of the morning, whilst it was still dark, Judas led a team of soldiers to Jesus. He identified Jesus to them with a kiss. He kissed Jesus on the cheek as was the cultural greeting for friends and family in this place at this time. That's how he betrayed him. And with that act of betrayal, Judas sealed Jesus's fate. Jesus was arrested, he was falsely accused, he was sentenced to death. He was crucified on a cross. The most horrific of all deaths. Why did Judas do such a thing? How could Judas do such a thing to his friend? Well, if we look at the beginning of chapter 14, Jesus is at this meal and this woman comes into the house, she interrupts the meal, she takes an expensive alabaster jar full of the most expensive perfume. Mark estimates it was worth more than a year's wage, hugely costly. And this woman, she breaks open the jar, and she pours the contents over Jesus. It's an extravagant event. Basically, she is aware that Jesus is about to die. Jesus has spoken quite openly about that. So she anoints Jesus, she prepares him for burial because she knew that if he's arrested and executed, he wouldn't get the burial that he deserved. But this is the point I want to make from that bit of the story. Judas is furious. He is outraged, and the reason he is so mad is because he is controlled by greed. For Judas, it was all about the money. We know from elsewhere in the Bible that Judas was the treasurer for the team, he kept the accounts, we know that he was dipping his hand into their fund into their pot, he was a thief. In fact, we know that he betrayed Jesus in exchange for 30 pieces of silver. So I think Judas was basically doing the math of this perfume incident, he was saying, "Don't waste it, sell it use the money on the poor" But! He was thinking about how he could have gained financially if he had access to that woman's resources. So I think on one level, there's this cautionary tale here about the power of money and wealth, to corrupt. How when we make money, the main aim of pursuit we often damage those around us those closest to us in its pursuit, whether that be through reckless risk of overexpansion, or simply through working every hour that God sends and neglecting our family and our friends. We all need to pay attention to the potential for money to corrupt us as it did for Judas. But that's not really what I want to focus in on today. As I've set up called this talk, living a life free from villains. A life free from villains, because I think there's something in this interaction between Jesus and Judas. Something in the bigger picture story here that can people as villains. And it can empower us so that we no longer see ourselves as victims. If you really read the Bible carefully, you will see that Judas was not blamed for Jesus's death. Jesus did not blame Judas. In fact, not only was Judas lots of blame, but neither were the Jewish priests of the Roman Centurions and Pontius Pilate. No one took Jesus's life from him. Jesus was quite clear about that no one had the power to take his life. Instead, Jesus was freely gladly willingly surrendering his life, to die on a cross as a sacrifice for humanity's sin. That's a big idea, isn't it? And it's the essence of Christianity as Christians, we believe on that first Easter that Jesus died as a sacrifice for our sins, so that we can receive forgiveness and salvation. And so rather than seeing Judas as a villain, we start to see him a bit more like a character playing a necessary part in God's big story. Now, we probably all know people, we may even be the sort of people, who spend all our time thinking and all our energy thinking and complaining about the villians in our lives. I was chatting to someone just the other day and they were going on and on about their boss at work and how bad their boss was and how their boss was trying to ruin their life. And then they went on to talk about a family member or a sibling who had been saying all these bad things about them, how evil they were, and they were stirring up trouble for that person. You see, as humans, we love to create villains for our stories. People who we can blame for all the bad stuff in the world. But the story of the death of Jesus impacts our lives in a way that frees us from all of that. What Judas and the priests and the soldiers meant for harm. God turned it into good, God works through it, because that is what God is like. He always wants to help to turn bad situations into good as we draw close to him. That means that we don't have to go through life needlessly wasting energy and blaming others for what they did to us. Instead, we can allow God to heal us, and to grow us and to transform us. We call that idea in Christianity, redemption. And that has certainly been my consistent experience in life. You know, my dad died when I was 18 weeks old. Before that, before I was born, he left my mum. So I never once have met my biological fathe. We grew up really poor as a result, at times, we didn't have food for the table. All of my stuff, all my clothes growing up were secondhand. And at times, growing up, if I'm honest, I found myself turning my father into some sort of villain, some Judas, someone who tried to derail my life and ruin my life. But you know, as I've grown as a Christian, a follower of Jesus, as I've invited more mature Christians to help me to follow Jesus, I've realised that all those things have actually helped to make me into the person I am today. They've shaped me and made me stronger, and more compassionate and more determined, I've, I've realised that actually, my father had no power over me to derail my life. He wasn't some Judas some villain, he was simply a broken human, as we all are, to a certain extent. And God has been at work in all of that in all of my life, turning evil into good just as he did on that first Easter. Jesus' betrayal and cruel death was flipped around, turn around, redeemed into the greatest of all histories. And I found that a relationship with Jesus empowers me to live life without making people into villains. It's such a joyful, liberating way to live. As a pastor, leading a large group of people, spending time with people, loving people, serving people, supporting them in the mess of their lives. It has really helped me to see the brokenness and pain, the hurts and disappointments that we all carry through life. How actually, we all have the potential to act and react like Judas. And this has given me a great deal of sympathy for Judas, the character. A man who simply could not get his appetite under control. A man who couldn't get his greed under control a man who wanted to fight back to fight the war, rather than seeking peace. A man who probably felt let down by his hero, Jesus. Judas was a man who made a hugely bad decision out of that place of pain, and brokenness. And what I found happens from time to time when you are in any form of leadership, when you're dealing with broken people is that people can project all of their hurt, all of their pain, all of their brokenness onto you. It's like you're the hook and they want to hang all of their baggage on you and blame you for all of that stuff. These people will usually end up leaving your organisation or church because the issue they have with you isn't the real issue. And in those moments, I think it's so tempting to make that person into a Judas character. To see them as the enemy to see them as someone showing disloyalty to or someone trying to hurt us, to betray us. And so we can respond to them as an enemy and we fight back and we try to defend ourselves. That is not how Jesus responded to Judas. Jesus does not do that. Why? Because Jesus knew that no one and nothing could derail God's plan for his life. Jesus knew he had to go through the cross through the grave to win the victory and to save mankind. He knew that evil would be turned into good. And that truth that that bigger story, that bigger perspective, it liberates us, it frees us. When we feel someone being a Judas to us, it empowers us to see their brokenness and pain, to remember that ultimately, they do not have power over us. So hold on to that truth, that God, that our God is always ready and waiting and longing to help to turn all of that bad, into something good. He wants to redeem it. He wants to transform how we see it. He wants to bring a healing into it and a freedom from it, as we journey with him and in relationship with one another. Amen. Wow, thanks, John loads to think about there. And we will be discussing that talk with John after the song. So the song that we're going to listen to today is reckless love. And we've played this one before. But if you haven't heard it before, this talks of God's incredible love for you. And in the song It talks about how he leaves the 99 to go and find the one and that's about a parable that Jesus told about a shepherd who leaves his 99 sheep to go and find the one that is lost. That's how much he loved that one that was lost. This is talking about God's love. So thank you so much to John and Anna Grace Farrington, who put this together for us! Sing along if you want to, or just read the words and meditate on the words and we will was fantastic! I love that song Reckless Love. It was such a great song to play after John's talk. Don't you reckon Sal? Yeah. Brilliant. It fitted in so well. And such an important thing to remember that love that God has for us is just kind of overwhelming, isn't it when you think about it in those terms? Definitely one of my faves there Matt. Deffo! It is one of mine as well. I do like that song. And it ties in awesomely with the story of Judas. And so what I want to do now, I'm going to click this button on my keypad here and hopefully we are going to bring in the most Reverend John Harding himself! And get to chat to him about his talk. So if you've got any questions, thoughts or comments, do put them in the comments below. As we bring in John. John, hey, how you doing? There he is. Hi, John! Hi, Matt. Hi, Sal. Hi, everyone! How you doing, bud? I'm doing very well. Thanks, Matt. And with those ever increasing beautiful introductions that I get, it makes me wonder if if we keep going I might hope for something like that in a few months time. Definitely potential for that. Why not! I'd love to see you in that hat Bud, I'm not gonna Yeah, I think you could definitely pull off the robes there John, if you wanted to go that way. It's the pope slippers, isn't it? The pope slippers that everyone wants. Well we know what to get John for Christmas now, so that's good! Can you buy those on Amazon? I'm not quite sure. But anyway, getting back to the talk. Loads to think about there, John, thank you. That was really, really good. And yeah, lots of lots of questions I'm sure that people will have. So do keep putting your questions and thoughts in the comments, because means we can probe a little bit deeper and see John's people say on some of these practical things as well. Yeah, absolutely. Now, John, to kick things off. I liked how you, I mean, you started talking about the money issue, but you very quickly moved on to this whole idea of villains and victims. And that became the main point of the talk. Is that because that's what stood out to you most as you were prepping? Yeah, I think so. I think that it's very easy to write Judas off as evil. And if you do that, well, the number of things happens. But the main thing that happens is you failed to see the brokenness in humanity, that leads people to act in certain ways. So, so really, I went down that route, because I wanted the talk to be as applicable as possible and relevant as possible to all of our lives. And confronting our own brokenness and our own capacity to, yes, do immense good, but also immense evil. You know, it's something that I think all of us need to face. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I thought that you were saying, particularly about how you respond to those difficult things, you know, in work or in personal situations, I thought that was really interesting. And I was wondering what your thoughts were and practically, what could you do, if you if you do feel that you know, at work, you're constantly getting the kind of, you know, the butt of people's anger and fear and anxiety, but they're taking out on you practically? How can you deal with that? Well, I mean, it needs to be practical, doesn't it? God's word always has a practical application if we can just remove from a moment, I know, there are situations where perhaps people do things to other people that are quite extreme. And people face all sorts of horrific abuse. And I think how you would answer that is different to perhaps a general thing. So if that does describe someone's experience, I think that long and slow, steady journey with others, counselling, all that sort of stuff can help people to, to find a sense of freedom from the past. But I think really, what we're talking about is the the day to day, really where we feel we're in conflict with people, we feel that people are against us, I certainly think if you label them a villain, then you will always play to those types in your story. And, I mean, it was back in the 90s and the noughties, NLP, neuro linguistic programming, was quite popular and, and the way we label people defines how we relate to them. So we're always going to create these negative spirals with people that are evil, or a villain. So I think the best things we can do is change the label that we place on that person. So I'm trying to think of a little example...When I first started school teaching, I had put a label on my manager, which was, I mean, this is a long time ago that they neglected me, they weren't interested in my development as a new teacher, they weren't doing their job correctly. And, I think what happened was, I always related to that person in quite a negative way. And then when I try to refrain that label and actually say, they trust me, they think I'm competent. And they want me to get on with it. And think that I'll ask for help if I need it, it started to create a much more positive dynamic between the two of us. So I think having a more positive label and what the gospel what the good news of Jesus does forwards is it allows all of us to create a label for someone that is God's label for them, which is loved by God. Accepted by God. Someone with the potential to be healed and transformed by God. So those labels focus to have a much more positive relationship with people. That's a really great answer. And it's so powerful! How we label people matters. And it matters. I guess, John, who does it matter to right? So when you labelled your manager at school differently, that changed you more than it changed them, I'm assuming right? Absolutely, that's the point when I say living a life without villains, I just don't think it does me, or you Matt, or you Sall, or anyone any good, to create these badies in our lives. Because all we do is empower them to have the greatest negative impact on us. And what Jesus was saying through the cross was, actually even in the midst of this awful situation, I know that God is with me and will lead me through it into victory. Yeah, that's so powerful. So so powerful. It really is. And then when we know, you know, what Jesus faced and how horrific it was for him to go through what he went through our, you know, with him we can get through hard things that we're going through as well. Yeah, that's really, really helpful. Thanks, John. Let's just have a little look at the comments and see what people are saying.Matt's saying, "I love the fact that I shouldn't feel defined by people who feel like villains in my life!" Which is just what you were saying now, isn't it John? I'm sorry to interrupt there. Does that come to this label thing again, john? So, if your manager understood that was the label you were putting on him, that he wasn't interested in you? How does that make him feel? Do we start living with the labels that people put on us, for example? Well, I think that is true, Matt. And you know, we would never excuse people's behaviour, or use upbringing, or whatever is an excuse for that. We have to all take responsibility for our own behaviour. But the truth is, we all I mean, Sal your in education, we all see the negative impact of negative labels that are placed upon people in the formative years of their lives. So in the broadest sense, Matt, yes. And the labels of people, place on us, they can really shape us. And so I'm not saying it's easy to re-script, our own labels of our own lives. But I certainly know, in a church community, we spend a lot of time thinking about identity. Yeah, that's really good. I think that's really important. I know, people that have carried those labels with them from their childhood, all through their adult life that somebody has put on them when they're younger. They're not God's labels, they're not the labels that they would have. But someone else has given them that and they've, they just haven't been able to kind of see themselves as God sees them. So that's really important isn't it? That we are looking at ourselves and others from God's perspective and how he sees us. Yeah, it's interesting. And I wonder, I mean, going back to Judas, I'm kind of wondering, I wonder what went through the man's mind, Do you know what I mean? Like you said, he'd given up a lot to follow Jesus, this was not like it was an uncostly thing to do. And then at some point during that journey, or whether it was always with him, or what, he started to take the money, and then that, that sin, sort of became bigger and bigger, the greed became bigger and bigger, and the consequences became bigger and bigger, didn't they? Well, indeed. And I think, the number of characters like that in the Scriptures, and Pharaoh who takes the slaves in Egypt, and Nebuchadnezzar, who, again, makes God's people, slaves and Judas, and he describes them as being given over to their sinful desires. And so I think what happens often is people start on a negative path. And that trajectory, one or two steps, that starts to snowball into what we would describe as a villain, that sought evil behaviour, no one ends up like that overnight. So when I think of Judas, I have a lot of sympathy for him in some ways, because nobody expected God's Saviour, to say, who's suffering. No one expected that the disciples didn't expect that Peter didn't expect that. It was prophesied in old the scriptures and the old prophecies that he would say, through suffering through death. But no one got that. He was expecting Jesus to be this warrior, who would overthrow the Romans and overthrow their enemies with a great military victory. So when you realise that wasn't happening, he became disillusioned. Now, I think you probably go on to talk about Peter denying Jesus. But when you read Mark, Judas has remorse. But Peter is repentant. So in other words, Judas feel sorry for himself and sorry about what he's done. But Peter makes a decision to get back on course and correct it. And I think that's the difference when we find ourselves having betrayed people or let people down or harmed others. Do you just feel sorry for yourself ? Feel bad about it? Or do you make decisions to correct it. Yeah, that's really, really good. And I wonder how much of it for Judas was, like you say, the disappointment with Jesus not living up to his expectations? I wonder if that kind of, in his own mind, excuse some of the behaviours that he was taking. Do you know what I mean? Bottled down to it, that's the point, isn't it? Of all, that we're talking about, like, any example I've used, it's people who I felt didn't live up to my expectation of them. And really what I've tried to do is give those people grace. Yeah. And say, whether it be my dad who died or whatever, it's like, you didn't live up to my expectation, the broken fallen human being who had your own problems to deal with that I probably don't even understand. Yeah. We're not saying that that's an easy thing to do. You know, when you've been through something difficult, that's a really difficult kind of daily thing to do almost, isn't it? And letting that kind of hurts go. And it's not easy. It's, it's always harder to find the positive than it is to find the negative. You ever notice that? How easy it is to slip into the negative, when actually the positive takes a bit more effort to do. It's true, you know! Think about when you're kind of dealing with your kids, it's easier, isn't it to kind of say something negative than then to kind of think about, well, how can I do this in a positive way? So it does take that act of your will, it does take that effort to do it. With God's help, then, you know, that makes it easier, doesn't it? Absolutely. Very good. Sharon's put here, John, I don't actually know. I'm just thinking about time here. And how would you apply this to situations where there is actually abuse? Well let's do it. I mean, that is a really powerful question, and one we should be talking about within the church. And I think that the simple answer is, I think we can never use it to excuse behaviour. I just know that there is the possibility to journey into healing from that. Yeah, many Christians will share that knowing Jesus has helped them to be free from the power that people have had over them. At the same time as a pastor, I've known people and I'm not judging them one moment for this, but they have held on to that experience in a way that has shaped and defined them and harmed them every day on a daily basis. So again, as Sal had said, these things are not easy. But we do know, there is hope, and that people can actually start to journey into freedom. And there's lots of incredible resources and counsellors, people that can help you to process that. Yeah. And it goes without saying, If that's you, and if you do want help, and you do want to reach out, then by all means, connect with us. And we'll, if we can't help directly, we will point you in the right direction where we can you can reach us on the WhatsApp number, which is now on your screen and send that in obviously, don't put stuff in the comments, but you can definitely reach out on the WhatsApp number. Now, John, we have a tradition here. Well, I say tradition, It's been going on the last few weeks. Let's just be real about Nicholas questions. So to round off the Q&A section... Once we've had all the difficult questions, then we go into there the really hard hitting stuff. Now, Matt jumped in last week and asked the question before Nicola so that, you know, caused all sorts of problems. But Nicolas got in there this week with her question. And the question is, if a cow laughed, would milk come out of its nose? Well, I mean, as someone who studied philosophy academically for years, I feel well placed to answer that. Mainly because I grew up in Yorkshire, and some of the coldest parts of the country. The real question is, if a cow would laugh, and it was freezing, would ice cream come out of its nose? I'm not sure. I think we're missing the key point. The cow would have to have something in its mouth for the milk or the ice cream to come out of his nose. Surely? I mean, Karl Popper, the philosopher would say until you can falsify that that's ever happened. You can't write it off. I think that's the best answer. I've heard on any questions so far John. I'm not gonna lie. I think we'll immortalise that somehow. Brilliant John Listen, It's been absolutely brilliant chatting to you, thank you so much for doing the talk. And thanks for joining us on this q&a session bud, been an absolute privilege. Thanks, buddy. Now we are gonna go straight into catchup. So let me press the button on my on my little pad here, and we'll bring it straight onto the screen. Hello, and welcome to this week's Sunday catch up. Now for those of you who don't know me, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Josh Edmundson. I am a student at the University of St. Andrews studying physics, and I am a member of the team here at CROWD church. Now, if you have never watched the stream before, welcome, it's great to have you. Let me just quickly explain what catch up actually is. Every week we get in pictures and videos from members of the community. And we put them together in this little segment just so that we get to see what everyone else is getting up to. In usual fashion, I will kick things off this week has been pretty uneventful. I've done lots of little things throughout the week, I met up with a lot of friends, which has been really nice. My mum and I watched Tan France's masterclass, which was really, really interesting. That's enough for me, let's get on to the catch up clips. I just want to say a quick thank you to everybody who has given towards the Imagine If, gift day that we held two weeks ago, we've raised an incredible 21,000 pounds! I've been absolutely blown away. I've had messages of support and encouragement. So thank you so much for your generosity. With the extra money that we've raised, we're going to cover the cost of moving and also we're going to redecorate the flats and refurbish them with brand new appliances. So thank you so much to those who have given sacrificially and in faith as you support us in this brand new adventure. This exciting adventure to take these flats and expand the offer that we can make. Thank you so much. God bless you all! Wow, it's so good to hear about all the fantastic stuff that Imagine if is doing just in case you don't know, imagine if is this fantastic organisation that works in Liverpool. And one of their core passions and projects is helping the homeless, they are really a fantastic organisation. If you want to learn more about them, go check out their website, I'm sure that they would love any support that you can give. Thank you very much for sending all those in. I really love watching the catch up videos. We love watching the catch up videos. So please, please, please, if you have any catch up stuff that you want to see on the stream, please do send it in either to the WhatsApp number that you will have seen on the bottom of the screen or you can use the hashtag #crowdcatchup on Instagram. Thank you very much for watching. That is all from me. I will catch you next time. Brilliant Josh, thank you! You know what Matt? I'm really looking forward to you know, I love to catch up, And I love seeing the pets, the food, and the walks. This is the kind of theme isn't it? pets food and walks. I am really excited about the day and I feel like it's you know, we're hanging in there, it's not going to be that long. I'm gonna be able to share all the other things that we've been able to do the meeting up with friends and family again. All those things. It's so exciting to kind of see how that catch up might change over the next few weeks. Who knows what's gonna happen! Watch this space! We'll find out tomorrow. Hopefully things will ease a little bit! We're waiting! Now I have to say on the catch up, the 21 k for Imagine if so far is just fantastic. Amazing. Amazing. Just to echo what James said a big thank you to everyone that gave for that. We'll follow that story of the house and we'll get updates of all the stuff that's been going on. In case you you don't know, Imagine If has purchased a house to help house homeless people. And it's the third one that they've done. And they've just been given all this money from people in the church, which is fantastic. So awesome. Yeah. Very excited. It's been it's been fab again, Matt! Should we say to everyone what's coming up next week? You go for it, Sal. Do you know I do actually I do! Thank's for trying to catch me out there. Nice try Matt, but I am prepared. I think it's the amazing Nic Harding. No relation to John. But yeah, Nic Harding is one of the founding pastors of Frontline Church and he will be speaking on the next part of Mark next week, we would of course have the catch up, more walks, more pets, more food, an our usual worship and things. Now, if you would like to get connected with us in the week, we do have a small group where you can kind of join a zoom, and actually chat to people about your questions and your thoughts and things and that is called disciple and is on a Wednesday, so you can WhatsApp us if you would like some more details to join that. Yeah, absolutely. We'll let you know more details. It's been going for a couple of weeks, and it's great, but you're still more than welcome to join us. Always great to talk to people on zoom. So it's not just you know, us talking to camera, we actually get to connect with people, which is great. Now, I have to say, from the catch up video, Dixie, the dog in an Everton shirt. For me going a little bit too far. I'm not gonna lie. I'm not loving that. I have to say, especially after yesterday. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. I do say I have to say well done Everton. I am a Liverpool fan. For those of you who don't know, Liverpool played Everton, it's called the Merseyside Derby. These are two football teams in Liverpool. It's the biggest game or one of the biggest games of the year. And for the longest time, Liverpool have been winning a fair few of these matches. And I think we've got a little bit complacent, a little bit smug about the whole thing. And yesterday, we got mothered by Everton. So congratulations, Everton, proud of you. Hopefully Liverpool are gonna turn the corner soon Sal that's all I'm saying. I can't, I can't even go there. What has happened? I think it's always bad when we get on to the topic of football. So I think let's let's move swiftly on. Let's move swiftly on! Absolutely. Let's go on from that. So I think actually on that bombshell, we should probably end it. So thanks for joining us. Thanks for being with us this week. Looking forward to being with you, and Nic and Sally and everybody next week. It's gonna be amazing. I hope you have a great week, wherever you are. Yeah Absoluetly! Don't forget to send us any pictures you'd like to go into the catch up or you can go on Instagram and add hash, Hashtag crowd catch is that right? Hash. tag. Oh shut up you! Stop laughing at me! It's all that Tech stuff! I sound ancient, my kids are gonna just be so embarrassed. That's brilliant. You know what, we've got this recorded, and it will be on YouTube for you to watch again and again and again. So if you just need a bit of a pick me up. Or you are you're not loving your technical capabilities, just watch Sal talk about hashtags. It's amazing. Quick, Move on. Is that right though? It is hashtag catch up crowd? crowd catch up? Crowd catch up. So you can do #crowdcatchup up or even #crowdchurch. We don't mind both of them are running simultaneously. And you can use either of them. If you actually know what a hashtag is and how it works. I do know what it is! I just couldn't say it! I'll go put my teeth back in and you all have a lovely Sunday afternoon. Well, that's brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. As you can tell, this is totally unscripted. Right. I think on definitely end it. So as as everyone is now laughing hysterically. We're going to play a couple of worship tracks now. So if you want to hang around and do some more worship, and engage in some more worship, you're more than welcome. We've got a few tracks which you're going to play. Then after that the live stream will end automatically and that'll be it. You'll see so night next week, so Sal any more last goodbyes or do you think we've probably said enough? I think we have said more than enough. Have a great week everyone that can't wait to see