Eltham Park Baptist Church

Dear Friends,

At the turn of the New Year, as we said goodbye to the decade known as The Noughties,  many people will have made resolutions. Most will be a vain attempt to self-improvement, such as eating or drinking less. Many will not last a week before promises are broken and old habits return, bringing with them floods of new guilt and feelings of failure.

In contrast to this, I invite you to make a covenant with God. The words below form the Covenant from The Methodist Worship Book. Surely the only response to the God who gave everything for us is to echo the Carol, ‘yet what I can, I give him. Give my heart.’ I pray that you may make these words your own, for then you will find that God takes your words and makes them a reality in your life.

I am no longer my own but yours.

Put me to what you will,

rank me with whom you will;

put me to doing, put me to suffering;

let me be employed for you or laid aside for you,

exalted for you or brought low for you;

let me be full, let me be empty,

let me have all things, let me have nothing;

I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things to your pleasure and disposal.

Rev. Paul, Jan 2010