It was an absolute joy for me to return to Pitlochry Baptist Church to speak at their Sunday morning service recently. I have had a relationship with Pitlochry Baptist that goes back way before Solas had even been thought of, and used to speak there regularly when they had a long pastoral vacancy many years ago. It’s been wonderful to renew fellowship with them over the last few years too, during which the David Barrie has been leading the fellowship.
Recently Solas has worked with Pitlochry Baptist Church on an outreach event, at the theatre in Pitlochry. David Barrie has also been a guest on our PEPtalk Podcast when he came on to talk about his work in sports chaplaincy which he does alongside his pastoral work. He’s the chaplain at St Johnstone FC in Perth, it’s well worth a listen!
I was invited up to Pitlochry because the Barrie family are away on holiday – and David gave me free reign to choose a text to preach from. My initial thinking had been to do something quite cheerful from Philippians, but much to my surprise as I prayed about the service I couldn’t settle comfortably on it at all. Rather, I thought I should go back to Psalm 51, which is a more sobering and serious text. It concerns the fall into sin of a great man (King David) who committed adultery with a woman called Bathsheba – and how he cried out to God for forgiveness and cleansing. The story doesn’t end on a gloomy note though, it is apparent that God answered David’s prayer and restored his life. The key text for us in Psalm 51 was:
Create [a]in me a clean heart, O God;
And renew a [right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence;
And take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation;
And uphold me with a willing spirit.
You can hear the whole sermon on the link below:
It was great to chat with people from all across highland Perthshire who are regulars at Pitlochry Baptist, as well as holiday makers from all over the world who were there for the week. Chatting to the leadership team there too revealed that they’d love to do some more events with Solas – so watch this space.
