Led by: Revd George Mwaura

Preacher & Presiding Minister: Revd Lisa Kerry,
Baptist Regional Minister Team Leader

Gathering Music

Call to Worship

Come, people of God, known and loved by the One who searches our hearts.
Where can we go from God’s presence? Where can we flee from God’s love?

Whether in joy or sorrow, in darkness or light, God is with us and before us.
We come with hope, for the Spirit bears witness that we are God’s children.

Creation groans, and we groan with longing, yet we wait with patience for the glory to come.
Let us worship God, whose love surrounds us and whose hope sustains us.

Amen

Opening Prayer

Loving God, you know us completely and love us without measure.
Before a word is on our lips, you know it; when darkness surrounds us, your light still shines.
Through your Spirit, you have made us your children and heirs with Christ to a future filled with glory.
As we gather in your presence, renew our hope, strengthen our faith,
and fill us with the joy of your salvation, that we may worship you with thankful hearts
and serve you with willing hands; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Greetings and Welcome

Hymn: My hope is built on nothing less

My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
but wholly trust in Jesus’ name,
but wholly trust in Jesus’ name.

Christ alone; Cornerstone –
weak made strong; in the Saviour’s love.
Through the storm, he is Lord,
Lord of all.

When darkness seems to hide his face
I rest on his unchanging grace,
in every high and stormy gale
my anchor holds within the veil,
my anchor holds within the veil.

Christ alone; Cornerstone …

When he shall come with trumpet sound,
O may I then in him be found;
dressed in his righteousness alone,
faultless stand before the throne.
faultless stand before the throne.

Christ alone; Cornerstone …

Eric Liljero, Edward Mote, Jonas Myrin, Reuben Morgan (2012)
CCL31580

Prayers of Thanksgiving and Confession

Gracious and loving God, we thank you that you know us completely
and yet call us your beloved children.
We thank you for your unfailing presence, for your Spirit dwelling within us,
for the hope that sustains us when life is difficult,
and for the promise that nothing can separate us from your love.

Yet we confess that we often live as though we are alone.
We allow fear to govern us rather than faith. We become impatient when hope seems delayed.
We cling to things that cannot save and fail to trust the future into your hands.
Search us, O God, and know our hearts. Test us and know our thoughts.
Reveal whatever keeps us from your ways and lead us in the way everlasting.
Forgive us through Jesus Christ.
Renew us by your Holy Spirit, and teach us to live as children of hope,
sharing your love with a groaning world.

[Silence]

Words of Grace

Hear the good news: The God who searches our hearts also knows our deepest need
and loves us with an everlasting love.
Through Jesus Christ, we are no longer slaves to fear, but children of God,
and by the power of the Holy Spirit we are forgiven, renewed, and set free to live in hope.
Therefore, in the name of Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven.

Thanks be to God.

Amen

Kyrie

Prayer of the Week

God of hope, whose Spirit assures us that we are your children
and whose love surrounds us wherever we go, grant us courage for the days ahead.
When we face uncertainty, give us patience; when we encounter suffering, give us faith;
when hope grows dim, remind us of your promises.
Keep us steadfast in the way everlasting,
until the day when all creation rejoices in your glory;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Ministry of the Word

Psalm 139: 1–12 & 23–24

Read by Rosemary Goldie

¹ You have searched me, Lord,
and you know me.
² You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
you, Lord, know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in behind and before,
and you lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.

⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,’
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

^…

²³ Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.

NIV®

This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

Hymn: Blessèd assurance, Jesus is mine

Blessèd assurance, Jesus is mine:
O what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of salvation, purchase of God;
born of his Spirit, washed in his blood:
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long.

Perfect submission, perfect delight,
visions of rapture burst on my sight;
angels descending bring from above
echoes of mercy, whispers of love:
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long.

Perfect submission, all is at rest,
I on my Saviour am happy and blest —
watching and waiting, looking above,
filled with his goodness, lost in his love:
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long.

Fanny Crosby (née Frances J. van Alstyne) (1820–1915)
CCL31580

Romans 8: 12–25

Read by Chibby Chima-Okoro

¹² Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation – but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. ¹³ For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.

¹⁴ For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. ¹⁵ The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ ¹⁶ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. ¹⁷ Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

Present suffering and future glory

¹⁸ I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. ¹⁹ For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

²² We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. ²³ Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? ²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

NIV®

This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

Sermon

By Revd Lisa Kerry, Baptist Regional Minister Team Leader

Musical Meditation

Affirmation of Faith

We believe in God, who created us in love, knows us completely, and never abandons us.

We believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who suffered, died, and rose again,
bringing hope to the world and calling us into the freedom of God’s children.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, who dwells within us, strengthens us in weakness,
and teaches us to wait with hope and patience.

We believe that nothing in life or death can separate us from the love of God,
and that God’s kingdom shall come in fullness.

Amen

Prayers of Intercession

Led by Cheryl Montgomery

Sharing Peace

Christ has made us children of God, and through the Spirit we are united in hope and love.
Friends, may the Peace of the Lord Jesus Christ be always with you.

And also with you.

Let us share with one another a sign of Christ’s peace.

Holy Communion

Invitation

Come, not because you are strong but because Christ is gracious.
Come, not because you have all the answers, but because God knows you and loves you.
Come, for the Spirit bears witness that you belong to God.
Come in faith, come in hope, come in peace.

Hymn: In Christ alone

In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my light, my strength, my song;
this cornerstone, this solid ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
when fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My comforter, my all in all,
here in the love of Christ I stand.

In Christ alone! – who took on flesh,
fullness of God in helpless Babe!
This gift of love and righteousness,
scorned by the ones he came to save
till on that cross as Jesus died,
the wrath of God was satisfied,
for every sin on Him was laid;
here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground his body lay,
light of the world by darkness slain,
then bursting forth in glorious day,
up from the grave He rose again!
And as he stands in victory
sin’s curse has lost its grip on me,
for I am His and He is mine –
bought with the precious blood of Christ.

No guilt in life, no fear in death,
this is the power of Christ in me;
from life’s first cry to final breath,
Jesus commands my destiny.
No power of hell, no scheme of man,
can ever pluck me from His hand;
till He returns or calls me home,
here in the power of Christ I’ll stand!

Stuart Townend (b. 1963)
CCL31580

The Great Thanksgiving

The Lord be with you,
and also with you.

Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give thanks and praise.

It is indeed right and good, always and everywhere, to give you thanks, holy and loving Father.
You formed us in your image and know us more deeply than we know ourselves.
When we wandered from your ways, you never abandoned us
but surrounded us with mercy and steadfast love.

In Jesus Christ you shared our humanity, entered our suffering,
and through his resurrection opened the way to new life and living hope.
By your Holy Spirit, you make us your children and give us courage
to wait with patient expectation for the redemption of all creation.
Therefore, with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven,
we proclaim your glory and sing:

Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.

Holy God, send your Holy Spirit upon us and upon these gifts of bread and wine,
that they may be for us the body and blood of Christ.
On the night before he died, Jesus took bread, gave thanks, broke it and gave it to his disciples saying:
‘Take, eat; this is my body given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’

After supper he took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them saying:
‘Drink from this, all of you; this is my blood of the new covenant, shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.’

Therefore, we proclaim the mystery of faith:

Christ has died.
Christ is risen.
Christ will come again.

Remembering his death and resurrection
and looking with hope toward the day when all creation will be renewed,
we offer ourselves in praise and thanksgiving.
Through Christ, with Christ and in Christ, in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
all glory and honour are yours, almighty Father, now and for ever.

Amen

The Lord’s Prayer

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours
now and for ever.

Amen

Breaking of the Bread

We break this bread to share in the body of Christ.
Though we are many, we are one body, because we all share in one bread.

Invitation to Communion

These are the gifts of God for the people of God.
Come, for Christ knows you.
Come, for Christ welcomes you.
Come, for Christ is our hope.

Meal is Shared

Post-Communion Prayer

Faithful God, we thank you for feeding us with the body and blood of your Son.
Strengthened by this holy meal, send us into the world as people of hope,
to bear one another’s burdens, to comfort the sorrowful, to seek justice and peace,
and to await with joy the fulfilment of your kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Notices and Offertory

Cornerstone Gift Day and Fundraising Event

Sunday, 19 July 2026

A reminder that this Sunday is our Gift Day, including a fundraising event after the morning service.

Thank you so much to everyone who has already made their donation towards our target to raise £7000 to help us work towards creating our Oasis of Hope in Central Milton Keynes. If you have not already done so, here are the ways to donate:

Pay by cash or cheque

Please put your cash or cheque in the yellow ‘Gift Day’ envelopes.
Make any cheques payable to ‘Christ the Cornerstone’.
Put your envelope in the collection baskets at a Sunday morning service or hand it in at the reception desk during the week.
Cheques can be posted to: Gift Day, Christ the Cornerstone, 300 Saxon Gate West, Milton Keynes, MK9 2ES

Use online or telephone banking

Please use the following account details:

Account name: Christ the Cornerstone Ecumenical Partnership
Sort code: 23 05 80 (Metro Bank)
Account number: 54451865
Please write ‘Gift Day’ as payment reference.

Use card machine in reception area

Please choose the ‘Gift Day’ box on the card reader screen and follow instructions.

Please remember that gift-aiding your donation increases its value to us by 25%.

Fundraising Event

Please stay after the service on Sunday morning for refreshments, our cake sale, book sale and auction of goods and services, etc.

Please bring plenty of cash, but payments will also be possible by card machine. If possible, details of the goods and services to be auctioned will be circulated before the event, so you can decide what you might like to bid for!

Thank you!
Peter Cope

We resume our Bible Study through the Book of Acts

7.00 pm Wednesday, 22 July 2026 by Zoom

If you would like to join the study group, please send your email address to robin_kyd@yahoo.co.uk and you will be added to the mailing list.

Offertory Prayer

Gracious God, all abundance flows from your endless love.
We humbly present these offerings before you, those placed before your altar today
and those given faithfully throughout the week,
whether shared in person or offered electronically, seen and unseen.
Receive them all as signs of our gratitude and tokens of our trust in you.
Bless these gifts and those who give them, that they may serve your purposes, proclaim your kingdom,
and reflect the generous love revealed to us in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Hymn:
Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father

Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father,
there is no shadow of turning with thee;
thou changest not, thy compassions they fail not;
as thou hast been thou for ever wilt be:
Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
all I have needed thy hand has provided,
great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
join with all nature in manifold witness
to thy great faithfulness, mercy and love:
Great is thy faithfulness! …

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,
thy own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!
Great is thy faithfulness! …

Thomas Chisholm (1866–1960)
CCL31580

Blessings and Sending out

May the God who knows you completely and loves you eternally fill your hearts with hope.
May Christ, who suffered and rose again, strengthen you in every trial and keep you steadfast in faith.
And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
be among us and remain with us always.

Amen

Church, go in peace, knowing that you are surrounded by God’s love.
Wait with hope, serve with joy, and walk in the Spirit
knowing that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory to be revealed.

Thanks be to God. In the name of Christ, we will.

Amen