Communion Service — Alan Redpath

Good evening, I welcome you to this, our communion service, the culmination of this first Keswick and Bucky Convention, and I welcome you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the head of the church, his body, and who is the host at this table.

Worshiping God With Thanksgiving

Come, let us sing to the Lord, let us shout aloud to the rock of our salvation, let us come before him with thanksgiving, and extol him with music and songs. Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our maker, for he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care.

Let us worship God as we sing the hymn 168, all for a thousand tongues to sing, my great Redeemer's praise. In prayer, let us pray. O God, our heavenly Father, as we come before your presence this night, our hearts are filled with praise and thanksgiving for so great a salvation which is ours through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

We long that we had a thousand tongues, which are really not enough to praise you, to praise you as you deserve. And yet, Father, as we come before you this evening, we ask if you would accept the praise and worship of your gathered people, because we come here to express our love for you, to give expression to our worship and our praise.

And we come also to gather round your table. We remember that night in which you were betrayed, how you gathered around the table with your disciples and you took common element, bread and wine, and left for us a festival, a sacrament for all time.

But Lord, as we gather round this table and as we partake of the bread and the wine spread before us, we remember that this is a temporary institution, because one day you will come in your power and your glory, and no longer will we need to partake of this feast, because we will have you here in your presence.

Father, we bless you and praise you for that great hope which is ours in our Lord Jesus Christ. We praise you that our suffering Saviour is also the conquering King and the coming Saviour and Lord. Father, we pray that you would forgive us.

We gaze upon that cross and we see so clearly your love, your love for a lost and rebellious world, a world like ours, people like us, who spun your love, who refused to hear you. Lord, we would confess that there are so many times when, even knowing your love, we are but poor examples of the love which we see in Jesus here this night, O Lord, as we gather together and take this bread and this wine, food unto our souls.

So may you draw nigh and feed our spirits, O Lord, that we may know you better, that we may love you more, and that we may go from this place with a new desire and hunger to serve you with all our being.

We bless you and praise you for this week, O Father. We know that it is all of your glory, it is you who has done it all, and we just stand back in awe and wonder at your greatness. Be pleased, O Lord, to accept the praise of your people, for we ask it through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Amen. Now the scriptures will be read for us by Mr. Billy Stratton. The lesson this evening comes from the gospel according to John, and I'm reading from the 20th chapter, and I'm beginning at the 19th verse.

John 20 and 19. Then the same day evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst and said unto them, Peace be unto you.

And when he had so said, he showed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you. As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.

And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whosoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them. And whosoever sins ye retain, they are retained. But Thomas, one of the twelve called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came.

The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.

And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst and said, Peace be unto you. Then said he to Thomas, Reach hither your finger, and behold my hand.

And reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side. And be not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God. And Jesus said unto him, Thomas, because you have seen me, you have believed.

Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book, but these are written, that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name.

And this is the word of God. And one or two evenings of this convention week we have been richly blessed by the music ministry of Mrs. Annette Jaffe, and she's going to sing for us this evening.

And El Shaddai is Hebrew for God Almighty. There are some other Hebrew words in the chorus of the song. Eliyona Adonai means God in the highest, O Lord. And El Kamkana Adonai means we will love you, O Lord.

So let me know what I'm singing about.

Indeed, Annette, for your ministry to us this evening. With a thankful heart to you, O Lord, we bring these, our gifts, as a token of our gratitude to you for the blessings of this week of ministry. We pray that you would use these gifts for the glory of your name through the ministry of this convention, and to you alone be the glory and the praise forever.

Amen. Good evening, everyone. Thank you. Just before I bring the message, I feel I must, on behalf of my dear brethren sharing the ministry, say to you all how deeply we have appreciated the love and fellowship of this week, and your eager attention to the word of God, and your personal care over each one of us.

We have all been staying, I didn't know there were so many, in three five-star hotels. The only problem has been, we all have only one meal a day, it lasts all day, and we are all twice the men we were before we came here.

But very seriously, we have just enjoyed, and there's no word can describe it. I remember that the Lord Jesus said, inasmuch as you have done it, as to one of the least of these my servants, you have done it unto me.

And all of us would share in that, and say thank you, a thousand times. And most of all, we do indeed praise the Lord for the way in which Robert, our chairman, has led this, and taken initiative, and guided.

I don't know that any of us, who have said this to each other, have ever experienced a convention which has been so thoroughly prepared, and pre-prayed. And that's why the Lord has stepped in to bless us.

I'm sure this is only the beginning, and great things will happen here in Berkeley. We want to be kept informed, how the Lord is really working in this blessing. Thank you so much for everything. That's quite inadequate, but I think you know our hearts.

This will be in a minute. Now, I would like you to sing a chorus. Thank you God for sending Jesus. Thank you Jesus that you came. Holy Spirit, won't you teach me more about his lovely name. How many of you have never heard this before?

Any of you, never heard it? You've all been here at least once, anyway. Before the Lord, sing it once more. As we wait on the Lord for his word, speak, Lord, for thy servant hereof. Speak just now, some message to meet my need, which thou only dost know.

Speak now through thy holy word, and make me see. Some wonderful truth thou hast to show to me. For Jesus' sake, Amen. Would you just open your New Testament again at the portion which Billy read for us?

From Calvary to the Great Commission

John chapter 20, let me read it, verse 20. When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, peace be with you.

As the Father has sent me, even so send I you. I think it's very appropriate that this convention, this lovely week, closes with a communion service. Which reminds us, of course, of Calvary. Take this right back to the price that God paid to redeem us.

But you can't in Scripture regard Calvary on its own, because the cross led to the resurrection, and the resurrection to the ascension, and to the Great Commission. Because the cross is the expression of the nature of God.

And tonight we don't only look back at the cross and thank Him, but we are seeking to know in our hearts, how and where and what the Lord would have us do, and where he would have us go. We had a very wonderful missionary service this morning.

All of us found great help from those who gave testimony, and from the message which Nick Carr brought. And we felt that this is just beginning. And so tonight we are looking back at Calvary, and we're looking on to the Great Commission.

As the Father has sent me, even so send I you. He showed them His hands and His eyes, that He was risen. And as, just as the Father sent me, even so I send you. And I want to think with you for a little while about the meaning of these words.

Because I believe that the call of God to us is always expressive of His nature. As the Father has sent me, even so send I you. My wife and I came up from Birmingham. We're going back in a day or two.

And I'm saying that with some lovely words I've learned. I'm never going to get in a hanker anymore, or fankle. I'm sorry, some new words. And now I know what it means when we say, it's just at the back of it.

We'll need interpreting in Birmingham, I can assure you. But when we came up from Birmingham, we went over to Loch Lern Head and spent an evening and a night there. And I was tremendously impressed with the crash of waterfalls.

It had been pouring with rain for two or three days. And every waterfall was in full size. Coming down with a tremendous noise and tremendous crash. It was very spectacular. And I was reminded that when I saw them all, all those waterfalls have their own shape.

And they're really only in that shape when there's an outpouring. There's a tremendous flow of water through them. And when there's a dry season, of course, they begin to lose their shape. And I thought to myself, that's what Christians are like.

We all have our own shapes, don't we? And we can rapidly lose that shape when things get dry. And our prayer is that these weeks, this week, has been restoring the shape and the spirit that begin to flow.

And as we left Loch Lern Head, we came to past Loch Lern. And as you remember, perhaps, as you leave the loch, you go up into mountains. I can't remember the names of the valleys or anything. But I know we came up and saw amazing mountains and wonderful valleys.

And at one point, we stopped the car. And I got out of it and stood and listened. Listened to nothing. There was no sound. You couldn't hear a single thing. It was absolutely silent. And I began to realize something of, oh, we often speak, or people do, of the call of the sea, the call of the sunset, the call of mountains.

And I felt something get at me in the sense of the nearness of God and all of that. The nature of the mountains. And when God speaks to us, he's communicating his will and revealing his nature. And he's wanting to tell us tonight, you know, as the Father sent me, even so sent are you.

Union With Christ and the Power of the Holy Spirit

Just as Jesus was sent, so are we sent. May I remind you quickly of some things about that. Our Lord was not sent into the world alone. John 14, 10. Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?

He was not in the world alone. The Father sent him into the world, one with himself. And he speaks of the effect of that relationship in the same verse. The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me, he does the work.

Our Savior was not in the world alone. But being in the world, he was in the Father, and the Father was in him. In his own allegory of the branch and the vine, you remember, in John 15. Because the branch is in the vine, the life of the vine is in the branch.

And even so, he sends us. As Christians, we are in the same relationship to the Risen Lord, as he, as a man, was with his Father. It's A. J. Gordon who crystallizes this for us in this simple statement.

We do not stand in the world bearing witness to Christ, but we stand in Christ bearing witness to the world. The secret of everything, isn't it? God has not sent us into the world alone. He's not even sent us and then promised to help us.

We are sent in absolute union with the Living Lord Jesus, exactly in the same union as he had with his Father. That's the secret of power. You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses unto me.

Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost part of the world. Jesus was not sent into the world alone, neither am I. Again, when the Father sent the Son into the world, Jesus was absolutely helpless in himself, in his humanity.

We hear him say, John 5, 19, the Son can do nothing of his own accord. John 5, verse 30, I can of my own authority do nothing. Even the sinless humanity of our Lord Jesus profited him nothing. When he came into the world, he came absolutely helpless in his humanity, but he was nonetheless God than he had been eternally.

But the one who had been God from all eternity voluntarily laid aside the one, the use of every attribute of deity and assumed a complete human nature without sin. And in that humanity he was absolutely helpless, in his humanity dependent upon his Father.

And you remember what the Lord Jesus said, without me you can do nothing. As the Father sent him, so he has sent us, absolutely helpless in ourselves. And any work for him that is done in any way except in the power of the Spirit of God is merely a repetition of our own sinfulness.

I can of myself do nothing. And anything that I seek to do for him that is not absolutely under his control and energy and fullness of life is simply breeding more sin. The words that I speak, the things I do, they come no longer from myself.

Crucified With Christ

Christ who dwells in me does the work. We need to recall that and remember it. But listen. When the Father sent the Lord Jesus into the world, it was absolutely necessary for him to be crucified before he could carry out the mission for which he'd come.

Unless a corn of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it abides alone. But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. And if the Lord Jesus had not been crucified, he would still have been alone and you and I would be lost.

The Father sent the Son and that way he was sent meant Calvary. And if I am to accomplish the purpose he has for my life, and if you are, I too must be crucified. There's no way to deter it. There's no way to argue about it, theologically.

No way to refuse it on any doctrinal grounds. Nobody denies that Jesus must go to the cross. As the Father has sent me, even so send I you. And he showed them his hand and his side. The only thing that could have hindered and prevented God's purpose of salvation and redemption being accomplished would have been if Jesus had refused the cross.

But he didn't. And the only thing that could prevent God's purpose in your life and in mine is our refusal to die on the same cross. If I die, there's nothing but victory. If I live, there's nothing but loss.

I have to acknowledge that very often the victory may appear to be defeat. The loss may appear to be gain. But heaven looks at things from a different viewpoint. He that whosoever would save his life shall lose it.

The very thing we seek to protect we lose. Whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel, the same shall save it. The Father sent the Son into the world, and if the Son is to do that for which he is sent, he must go to Calvary.

I wonder if you've ever asked yourself the question, when Jesus left heaven, what was to be his destination? Where was he going? Well, you say he was coming to the world, yes, true, but his destination was not that for him.

That was merely a stopping place. One day he came to the cross. Now, had he reached the destination for which he came? No. Very important stopping, but not the end. The most important stop of all, and without it nothing else could have been done, but the cross was not his end.

One day he came out from that cross, from an empty tomb, in all the majesty and the glory of his person, on the third day. One day he went back to heaven, literally, bodily. A cloud received him out of their sight.

Was heaven his destination? I mean, when he left heaven, just to get back again? No, just another step on the way. Because, you see, when he went back to heaven in a glorified body, it was simply that he might get nearer to us.

It is to your advantage that I go away. And there came a day in your life and mine, in all sorts of different ways, but there did come a day when you and I heard a knock at the door. And a voice saying, if any man open the door, I will come in.

Has he reached his destination now? Yes, but no. But as he also said, other sheep I have which are not of this world, them also I must bring. And now I begin to see what was his destination. And he began, when we begin to see the pathway by which we must travel, if it is reached that destination.

Jesus must go to Calvary. As the Father has life in himself, he has given life to his Son that he might have life in himself. And the one in whom there is life, the life that I need, he must lay it down.

Then he takes it again, with you and with me, and with a great multitude from every nation in the world, whom he will redeem. On the cross his life was released to meet the need of a world dead in sin, but released only at Calvary, and only through people who have been to Calvary with him.

Humility and the Missionary Calling

As the Father sent me, even so send I him. I was reading the April issue of the magazine World Vision. Dr. Oswald Sanders, who some years ago was chairman of the OMF, writes an article and says, the Western missionary being replaced, we want many categories of missionaries, but remember what we want is Christ-intoxicated missionaries.

High requirement indeed. It's easy to be obsessed with demands of specialisation and increased academic standards, the validity of which I don't question. But on which qualifications did the Lord of the harvest put the greatest stress?

The ideal missionary for tomorrow is one who has, listen, the inescapable call of God, one who is characterised by a deep, deep humility, in whose heart there lurks no sense of superiority, who cherishes a boundless compassion for the lost, who has an insatiable hunger for likeness to Jesus, and whose heart is kindled at the altar fire of Calvary, who is prepared to pay the uttermost cost in discipleship, whose ardent desire is to possess and display the mind of Christ, who humbled himself to become a servant.

For missionaries like this, there are innumerable open doors in the Far East. But the thing that hit me about all that was the principles are just the same here. There are millions of people today in Britain just as ignorant of the Gospel as those far overseas.

I wonder, I really do, if the reason for the frustration of the Church and the fact that so few really respond is that God won't let us go until we've learned the lesson. He wants us to know what it is that we're not alone.

If ourselves were not able, absolutely incapable, insufficient, the only explanation for your life and mine must be the indwelling Holy Spirit. We must, however, above all, know what it is to be crucified.

This is my body, which is given for you. Am I willing for that? That's what we're going to remember. This is my body, broken, given for you. Am I really ready for that? God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of Jesus Christ, by which I am crucified to the world and the world unto me, says Paul.

Henceforth let no man trouble me. I bear in my body the mark of the Lord Jesus. As a pastor in the States for some ten years, we started holding a Mid-America Keswick in Chicago, and we invited speakers from this country as well as from the States.

And one of those who came was Gerald Rakeson. You may not know that name. Some of you may do. He's probably a good deal older than most of you. I believe just recently he went to heaven. But he was a man with such a smiling face, such a raging face.

He made Jesus so real. And how he enjoyed his ministry that year. At the end of it, he gave me a little bit of paper, and he said, read that sometime, that's for you, with my love. I took it and read it and thought, well, that's quite good, but I wasn't very impressed, I didn't trouble very much.

But a few years ago I found it in a massive note. And I read it again. And somehow I wondered, now did he give that specially for me? I'm going to ask him that when I meet him in heaven. But I think he did.

It's in such a mess I can scarcely read. But I want to read to you. This is what it says. To my dear friend, Alan. It really is words by Amy Carmichael. Listen. Hast thou no scar, no hidden scar on foot or side or hand?

I hear thee hailed as mighty in the land. Hast thou no scar, the bright ascendant star? No scar, no wound? Yes, as the master shall the servant be, and pierced are the feet that follow thee. But thine a hole can he have followed far, who has no wound, no scar?

That really went home. I bear in my body, said Paul, the marks of the Lord Jesus. As the Father sent me, even so send I you. Have I no scar? Has the Lord been putting his marks upon you recently? I wonder.

Do you pray, O Lord, give me personal Pentecost? And I wonder if Jesus looks at you and says, what I want from you is Calvary. For I only release the Holy Spirit in freedom and power through a man and a woman, let alone a girl who knows what it is to live at Calvary.

Dirty Hands and a Warm Heart

A year or two ago I went in Glasgow to speak at Glasgow University, Christian Union, and I stayed with a minister whom I knew very well as a friend in downtown Glasgow, in Hill Head, which used to be a very lovely area, but which is now a sort of red light area.

And I went to his home. I hadn't seen him for some years. And they both, he and his wife, looked a bit tired. And after we had tea together he said, no, we have to go out tonight. We shall be leaving home about ten and we are coming back about four.

I didn't ask any questions, but I wondered. And sure enough we went out at ten. And at four o 'clock in the morning I heard an awful noise. Lots of people talking downstairs. I didn't get up. I listened.

And about seven o 'clock in the morning I got up and went down for breakfast. And they were both there. And both of them, husband and wife, looked absolutely exhausted on the point of death. And he said, I suppose you're wondering where we've been.

Let me tell you. Twice a week my wife and I go out into the streets of Glasgow to get hold of people. And last night we got hold of two girls lying on the road. Went up to them and said, we'd like to take you home with us.

And they said, OK, just leave us where we are. And they said, what do you mean, we would like to take you home? Well, they said, this is home. What do you mean? Oh, we live in that shop window. How old are you?

One of them was, I think, eighteen. The other, sixteen. The one aged eighteen was blind drunk. The other, sixteen, was pregnant. And he said, how long have you been living here? Oh, about fourteen years.

About fourteen years? Yeah. Who's your father? Don't know. Loved the men around. Who's your mother? Don't know. She left us when we were just kids. And you lived here all that time? Yes. Do you know that that man and his wife, that minister and his wife, took those two girls, brought them home, bathed them, clothed them, put them to bed, and kept them in their own house for two weeks.

And during that two weeks, spoke to them every day for more than an hour about the Lord Jesus. And I said to him, my dear brother, you cannot possibly pastor a church and do this sort of thing. You'll die, they'll kill you.

Why don't you get somebody to help you? And he said, nobody will. Nobody will. I know that admission to heaven demands clean hands and a pure heart. But I also know that preparation for it calls for dirty hands and a warm heart.

A heart that really cares. And Jesus shows us tonight his hands and his side. And he says to us personally, as the Father has sent me, even so send I you. And as we break bread together and take this wine, I just pray that on my heart, as perhaps never before, there'll be a prayer, Lord, please make me willing to be a very humble link in a very big chain to lead a very needy person to Jesus.

So that when we break bread together, we're not only thinking about the past and remembering it and recalling it and his great love for us, but we're responding to action ready for whatsoever he would use us for.

Let's just pray for a moment, shall we? Word of the whole realm of nature, my, such an offering as that, all of ourselves would be too small. Love so amazing and so divine demands my soul, my heart, my all.

Of course it demands it, but has it got it? Can we say to him, love so amazing and so divine demands, or shall have, or can you say tonight, love so amazing and so divine now has. He showed us his hands and his side.

As the Father sent me, even so send I you. Lord, may our response to your call and to your love tonight bring joy into your heart. In Jesus' name. Jesus, the joy of loving heart, true source of life and light of men, from the best bliss that earth impart, we turn unfilled to you again.

The hymn 128. Lord, suffer, for I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me. For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Giving Thanks for Christ’s Sacrifice

And our God will give thanks for the bread. Almighty and eternal God, our heavenly Father, we do thank thee that thou art God and does not even a shadow of thy coming. We thank thee, O God, that thou sent Jesus and we thank thee, Jesus, that thou came.

And as we gather here tonight to remember the love, the grace, and the mercy that thou hast shown to us in Jesus Christ thy Son, we from the depths of our hearts, univocally and unitedly, give thee praise and thanks for all that thou hast done.

We realize, O God, that thou entered heaven of its best and Jesus gave his all. We thank thee, O God, that in him we see thee and in him we also see ourselves. For we know, O God, that thou sent him and he has sent us, but in the sending of him we can see that he represents us in his humanity and yet in his deity we see that he represents thee.

And we thank thee, O God, that there is that unparalleled uniqueness to be found in the person of thy dear Son and we give thee our heartfelt thanks. We thank thee, O God, that he lived among men, walked and talked with men, and yet he was sinless, heartless, and pure.

We thank thee, O God, that he set his face as a flint towards Jerusalem, knowing the end from the very beginning, knowing the death that he had to die, and yet lay there a lamb, even without a murmur, in order that he might be sacrificed and be that lamb without, that he might be our substitute, that he might be our sacrifice, that he might die, that man might die no more.

We thank thee, O God, that death hath no sting and grief hath no victory through the finished work of Calvary, through the broken body, that body, O God, that was marred and bruised and broken for the sins of mankind, and for those who come repentant unto him, we give thee thanks.

And as we are reminded now, even of the broken body, we ask thee, O God, that these symbols that remind us of him and all that he has accomplished, we give thee our heartfelt thanks for that wonderful and sinless and glorious life, and yet to be our Lord and Savior, preparing a place for us in the glory.

We thank thee, O God, for all that he has accomplished. So as we give thee thanks, we pray that through the power of thy Spirit that thou might unite us together with the cause and to know that we are called by God, that as God has sent the Son, so as he sent us, that after this week of meetings and after this communion that we might go into the world knowing that we do not go alone, that he is in us as the Father is in him.

Hereas, O God, accept our thanks for all that we ask is in thy name and for thy faith. Amen. Let us quietly and prayerfully sing 242 Thou art worthy, thou art worthy, thou art worthy, O Lord, and after we have sung this hymn, the Reverend Nick Carr will give thanks for the wine.

Remembering the Shed Blood of Christ

Just a moment of absolute silence in the overflow meeting and in here as we think of the Lord Jesus Christ shedding his blood on Calvary for you just where you are seated, just for you and wonder of wonders for me just where I am standing.

Thank you, Lord Jesus, that your blood cleanses from all sin. Thank you that I have been redeemed together with thousands of others, millions of others through your shed blood. How I thank you I have been justified through your blood just as if I had never sinned because your blood was poured out and the sacrifice was complete.

How can we thank you, Lord? As we receive the wine help us to realize that we are fully associated with your shed blood on the cross forgiven, cleansed, redeemed made one with you. Lord Jesus, draw very near to us, we pray as we partake of the bread and as we partake of the wine for your glory.

The Lord Jesus Christ that night in which he was betrayed took bread and after he had given thanks he broke it and gave it to his disciples and said take and eat this is my body given for you do this in remembrance of me likewise he took the cup and after he had given thanks he gave it to them and said drink from it all of you this is the cup of the new covenant filled with my blood do this in remembrance of me take my yoke upon you and bear it with me for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

The things of God for God's people united us with Christ and given us the foretaste of the heavenly banquet that our praise and thanksgiving in the name of your Son our Lord Jesus Christ Amen. We stand to sing our closing hymn 238 Thine be the glory risen conquering Son 238 Who is able to keep us from falling and to present us falseless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy to the only wise God our Saviour be glory majesty dominion and power now until Jesus comes again and then forevermore Amen.