At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”

- John 8:2-5

Sex: our culture seems obsessed and confused by it all at once. If Christians are often accused of being hung up on sex, maybe it’s because the stories and words of Scripture expose our pain and our longing for a better way.

On Sunday, we looked at the seventh commandment: do not commit adultery. When the Bible talks about faithfulness, it paints a picture of deep, faithful love. Marriage, in the Bible, mirrors God’s relationship with His people: a bond of promise - a covenant. When we’re faithful to our spouses, we’re reflecting God’s own steadfast love. And when that faithfulness breaks down it points to a deeper unfaithfulness towards God. So when it comes to adultery, God seems to take it personally.

Jesus takes the conversation deeper still. "But i tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:28). He doesn’t just tighten the moral rules, but calls for a recognition of our brokenness and radical action for transformation.

That’s why the story of the woman caught in adultery resonates so powerfully. The crowd was ready to stone her. In such an act of collective punishment, no-one could be identified as guilty for her death. Jesus turns this round, and asks if any single one of them would dare to step forward and claim the kind of moral integrity that could qualify them to execute justice. All of them turn around and walk away.

The irony is, of course, that Jesus is qualified to execute judgement. But he doesn't condemn her. Instead, he releases her and invites her into life. Such mercy doesn’t excuse sin, and it does something far more than punish it. It breaks sin's power and releases the offender from death.

This is for us too. None of us can stand without need of grace — and that grace is always ready to meet us. Jesus still stoops low, still writes in the dust, and still offers new beginnings.

Honour your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
Exodus: 20:12

This is the first commandment in the list of the ten commandments about loving others. And not only is it the first commandment about loving others but it's the first commandment with a promise. Honour your parents "so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you".

God wants to bless his people. After generations of slavery in Egypt, He is giving them their own land, a beautiful garden land. And if God’s people want things to go well in the land It starts with correctly ordered family relationships.

We the church can live in a way where we are a sign of restored familial relationship that showcase God’s faithfulness and point to the hope of fully restored human relationships. I pray that is particularly hopeful for you if you come from a family of origin where your parents have not honoured you as they should and that maybe it has become the case that the way to honour them best is to have boundaries so that no one is dishonoured.

You have a new family and God will call us all to honour our earthly parents in a way that is safe and appropriate. But we can receive from God, our good Father, all that we need to be able to do that. The healing and transformation we encounter today points in hope to when one day God fully dwells with his people and all broken family relationships are fully restored.

To give us a clearer idea of what lies behind the idea of “the name of the Lord” in the bible, fast forward to the dedication of the temple. In 1 Kings 8 King Solomon dedicates the temple with a prayer. He prays: As for the foreigner … will hear of your great name and your mighty hand and your outstretched arm—when they come and pray toward this temple. ‘The name’ is completely linked to the actions and intentions and reputation of the owner of the name. The point was that anyone should be able to look to the temple and learn of the character of God and respond in loyalty.

The verb before “the name” is actually two words and it literally means ‘to lift up (or carry)’ - ‘in vain’. In Exodus 28 the robes of the high priest are described. On his chest he was to wear 12 precious stones each with the name of a tribe engraved on it. It says he was to lift up or carry (same verb) these stones as he went before Yahweh. As the priest went into the holy place of the temple he would carry the names of the tribes. He would represent all the 12 tribes to God.

To bear the name of someone in vain is to be a bad representative of that person. It means to misrepresent someone, to give a misleading idea of the character of the person or organisation we are claiming to represent. God was saying to his people that others should be able to tell just by looking at us who we belong to. To carry the name in vain is to claim we are in a covenant relationship with him but for that claim to make no difference to how we live.

At Sinai, Yahweh claimed a nation as his very own and released them to live out their calling. Our calling is to bear Yahweh’s name among the nations, to represent him well. At Sinai, he warns the people not to bear his name in vain. Keeping this command, then, involves much more than not saying gosh or OMG. Keeping the command not to bear Yahweh’s name in vain changes everything about how we live."

Jesus answered, ‘Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, “You must be born again.” The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.’
- John 3:5-8

When people hear the words “born again,” a lot of us think of that as something for other Christians. Maybe for the ones who’ve really messed up—people with addiction stories, people who hit rock bottom, and then found got religion. But if we actually look at John 3, the very first person Jesus says “you must be born again” to is Nicodemus.

Now Nicodemus isn’t a failure. He’s not on the margins. He’s a respected leader, a teacher of Israel, educated, stable, religious, moral. In other words, if anyone didn’t need to start over, it would have been him. And yet Jesus looks him in the eye and says: “Amen, amen… no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.”

That’s what baptism is all about. Not just a symbol, not just a ritual. It’s death and resurrection. It’s saying: the old life is gone, and a whole new life begins. When we watched Dami, Ren, Abraham, Solomon and Jennifer go down into the water at their baptisms, that wasn’t just a nice ceremony. That was them dying with Christ and being raised into new life.

The image is shocking—because it is meant to be. Think of that Mission Impossible moment when Ethan Hunt has a bomb in his head, and the only way to save him is for his wife to stop his heart and shock him back to life. It looks like death, but it’s the only way to live. That’s baptism. The only way to live is to die.

Why does Jesus make it so drastic? Because small tweaks won’t cut it. You can’t just polish up your life and hope it’s enough. An apple tree can’t grow oranges no matter how much you prune or fertilise it. To bear different fruit, you need a new root. That’s why Jesus says, “Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.”

Here’s the best part: you don’t make yourself born again. Babies don’t give birth to themselves! Birth is the work of another. And in our case, it’s the work of Christ—lifted up on the cross, suffering so that we could have life.

So whether you’ve been in church for decades or you’re just exploring faith, the call of Jesus is the same: you must be born again. Not just reformed, not just improved—renewed.

Idols bring death but Jesus brings life.

Jesus’s invitation to follow him,
Is an invitation to put our faith in him.
To put our faith in the fact that
He entered into our humanity with us,
went into death for us
And that if we want believe that and accept that invitation
the same power that rose Jesus from the dead.
The power of the holy spirit is at work in us
As a deposit of what is now our inheritance
The inheritance that one day we will fully be like Jesus,
we too will pass through death into new life.
And that each day we can walk the beautiful way.
Becoming more fully human.
A person who is being transformed and renewed
Into someone who can truly love God and love others.

Jesus’s invitation
Is an invitation to be set free from the lies of false gods
that promise us freedom and security
but enslave and destroy us.

Then Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain and said, ‘This is what you are to say to the descendants of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel: “You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.’
- Exodus 19:3-6

Last Sunday we started a series on the Ten Commandments - or, to be more precise - what the Bible calls the Ten Words. But before diving in, we need to get something straight.

When most people think of Christianity, they imagine rules: a moral code, a list of dos and don’ts, a cosmic scorecard. Be good, and you go to heaven. Slip up, and you’re out. But Exodus 20 – the famous “Ten Commandments” – tells a very different story.

Before Israel ever received the commandments, God rescued them: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery” (Ex. 20:2). Salvation was not earned by good behaviour, by either ritual practice or moral practice. God carried them “on eagles’ wings” before they knew the law.

In other words, grace comes first.

And the opposite of grace is not judgment but transaction – the assumption that a covenant is the same as some trade. In a teaching about the Law, Jesus tells the Rich Young Man to give up his bargaining power (whether his money, or his behaviour - "what must I do to enter eternal life") and follow him empty-handed. It comes right after Jesus' encounter with children, where we learn that faith like theirs is required to enter the kingdom; they don't tend to come with wealth, or status, to trade on. They can only trust.

So why commandments at all? They are not conditions of God’s love but invitations to live out a calling. Israel was chosen to be “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Ex. 19:6). Their obedience was meant to reveal God’s character to the world: they should be a people of peace in a violent culture, a people who rest in a world of endless striving, a people marked by gratitude instead of envy.

When Israel failed, it wasn’t about breaking arbitrary rules but about failing their vocation. That same calling continues in Christ. Jesus fulfils Israel’s role, becoming the true priest and mediator, and now the church is described as “a royal priesthood” (1 Pet. 2:9). The Ten Words, then, are not a cold checklist. They are a vision of flourishing – boundaries that make us more human, not less – lived out as a response to grace and as a witness to God’s goodness in a broken world.

Are there times when you’re seeking to enter a transaction with God - trying to earn His love or blessing - instead of resting in His grace and living out of your identity as His beloved child? Take a while to ask what Jesus is asking you to put down, so that you can be ready to hear what you should take up.

As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
Ephesians 4:1-6

Paul encourages the church in Ephesus to “live a life worthy of the calling” they’ve received. His worry is that they might exist in a state of spiritual immaturity—muddling around in the gap between the extraordinary new life offered in Christ and the way they had lived in their own past.

What’s striking is that Paul doesn’t start by urging us toward more religious effort or personal achievement, or offer models of great spiritual and moral achievement. Instead, he calls for humility, gentleness, patience, and love. In other words, spiritual maturity is deeply tied to how we treat one another within the Christian community.

Paul emphasises that we are one body, united by one Spirit, one hope, one Lord. This unity is the foundation of the church. And yet, within that unity, there is beautiful diversity: Christ has given different people different gifts—apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers—not for their personal elevation, but to equip the church for service and to help it grow in maturity.

The mature church is not just a place where consumer needs are met or sermons are impressive, but where each member plays their part in love and truth. Spiritual growth happens in the context of community—not an idealised version of it, but the real, sometimes difficult, community that God has placed us in.

So the invitation is this: what does your “yes” to the church look like right now? Perhaps it’s showing up consistently, praying with others, serving, or giving. To discern where your gifts might meet the church’s needs. Look outward to what moves you, inward to what you’re good at, and upward to what others affirm in you (if you want to dig deeper, have a look at this article from Tim Keller).

The church needs what God has placed in you—so take your next step, offer what you have, and watch what God builds through it.

"For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come."
Ephesians 1:15–21

"For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God."
Ephesians 3:14–19

Paul doesn’t pray for quick fixes. He prays that we would see. That the Spirit would open the eyes of our hearts to grasp the hope, power, and love already ours in Christ. His prayers are not transactional (pray and receive), but transformational: shaping how we see God, ourselves, and the world.

This kind of prayer matters most when we’re waiting. When we’re crying out for loved ones to meet Jesus. When we’re facing silence and uncertainty. Perhaps we're burdened for our family, what it means for them not to know Christ yet, and how hard that silence can be. But Paul reminds us: God is at work even when we can’t see it.

This week, let us reflect on where God might be transforming us. Has someone said, “You seem more peaceful lately”? That might be the Spirit at work. Let’s keep praying for deeper roots in love.