Responding

Reading comes from John 1, verse 35, until verse 42.

The next day, John was there again, with two of his disciples.

When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, Look, the Lamb of God.

When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus.

Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, What do you want?

They said, Rabbi, which means teacher.

Where are you staying?

Come, he replied, and you will see.

So they went and saw where he was staying, and they spent that day with him.

It was about four in the afternoon.

Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus.

The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, we have found the Messiah, that is the Christ, and he brought him to Jesus.

Jesus looked at him and said, you are Simon, son of John, you will be called Sefas, which when translated is Peter.

Hi, I'm Scott Pilgrim, Executive Director of Baptist Mission Australia.

And today we can include our Mending!

series, inviting the question, what's our response?

What's our response to a mending God?

Who graciously invites us to join him as co-menders in our local communities and across the world.

Mending!, joining with God in mending a beautiful broken world.

I had the privilege recently of meeting a wonderful Lebanese Baptist pastor, and hearing some of his inspiring story.

A humble, ordinary follower of Jesus, a gifted leader, but a man who made himself available to God in a new way, attentive to the Spirit's leading, and who in acting is seeing some amazing outcomes as he joins God as a commender in our broken world.

The pastor leads a small Baptist church community, quite conservative, smaller congregation, but close to the Syrian border.

And he saw the needs of Syrian refugees, kind of just down the road, across the street in some ways.

But his congregation was fairly insular and closed, and had no relationship with Syrian refugees.

It seemed like a giant stride to connect and look at ministry opportunities.

But this pastor had a heart that was available.

He said yes to God and was open to God's Spirit, stirring and doing something new in his life and his ministry.

And a vision began to grow of how they could serve the local Syrian refugees.

It was time to act.

They identified the greatest need in this area was actually a laundromat.

That might seem strange in your local community, but here were refugees, desperate, vulnerable people with only the clothes on their back.

And in that dusty, dirty environment, the desire that they could wash their clothes was a simple act of beautiful hospitality and generosity.

And so the church journeyed with the pastor and his vision, and a laundromat was constructed.

And the refugees could come down the road and access this laundromat.

And as they began to wash their clothes, of course, there was some downtime.

And the pastor and his congregation began to see they could add some services around, some safe spaces where people could sit and enjoy food and hospitality, where there could be conversation, where there could be refuge.

And what's developed?

A beautiful community hub just down from the refugee camp, commenced by a local Baptist church with the heart of a local Baptist pastor who made himself available, who was attentive to the Holy Spirit's leading, and who courageously acted with a sense of vision and compassion.

It's a beautiful story.

We come to wrap up our Mending!

series today.

And I want to invite you as I challenge myself, what's our response in this series?

What's our response to what God's Spirit is doing in our lives, in our church communities, in our local communities?

We've talked about God's renewing work, the desire of the Holy Spirit to be at work, renewing our lives, cultivating us to people who look and live, who love and lead more like Jesus.

We've talked about God's vision for mission in the context of relationships, a God who wants to restore and reconcile relationships, a God who calls us into mission together in community.

We've talked about our restorative God's global vision for people and planet, and his invitation that we might join him as co-menders as he brings shalom and restoration across the world.

And so today we lean into our final response.

What's God's challenge to you and I in our lives and our faith communities today?

As I think about the Lebanese pastor, I'm drawn back to the scripture passage that we've heard read for us today, as Jesus again invites the first disciples to come around him.

Throughout this series, we've reminded ourselves of Jesus calling others into ministry with him, that we don't go out on mission alone, that we go together as a faith community led by the Spirit.

But what do we see in this passage we've heard read for us today and in other gospel stories where Jesus calls the first disciples, what we see is immediately, we see availability.

We see Peter, Simon Peter making himself available, saying yes to the call of Jesus on his life.

We see that in the lives and responses of the other disciples.

We see a posture of availability.

The Lebanese pastor makes himself available to see what God may want to do afresh in his life.

I was talking to one of our new team members recently, Elliot, who's joining our Baptist Mission Australia team as our First Nations Engagement Facilitator.

A new role for us in a new space, as Elliot seeks to come alongside First Nations leaders and churches and communities, that Baptist Mission Australia and our broader movement might better listen to the voices and that we might learn together and journey together in ministry alongside our First Nations brothers and sisters.

As I sat with Elliot and Sarah, and I heard their beautiful story around how they began to engage with First Nations people across the country in really meaningful ways, it began with availability.

It was a new space for them, but they sensed God was calling them into it, and their response was to say yes, and then see what God would do.

And what has God done?

God's Spirit opened doors for them in terms of visits to sit with First Nations people on country around the nation, open doors to visit with First Nations leaders and churches, open doors that they might engage increasingly in understanding some of the needs and challenges and mission opportunities among First Nations people.

It began with a yes.

It began with an availability.

And Elliot had no idea that down the track, God would open the door for this new role with us at Baptist Mission Australia.

I think God's Spirit so often works that way.

It began with the disciples, the first disciples with a yes in making themselves available.

It began with Elliot with a yes in making himself available.

As I move around the world and connect with our team members, be it Maz and Esther in Southeast Asia, be it Matt and Shannon in Calcaringi in Northern Territory, be it David and Susie in Malawi, all our team members around the world, what is common to their story is ordinary humble foals of Jesus.

Common to their story is a yes, a yes, a desire to make themselves wholly and fully available to serve Jesus and to be used by God as co-menders around the world.

That's our first challenge this morning, our invitation to consider our posture of availability.

We live in a crazily busy world, don't we?

I don't need more things in my world.

We compete with the kind of different balls that we juggle every day, with the busyness of life and family and work and community engagement and ministry.

We live in a world with information overload.

We're bombarded with so many choices.

The evil ones desire to take hold of our flesh desires, our sinful desires to pull us away from the ways of Jesus.

Yes, life can be stretching and challenging.

And in the midst of all of that, in this series, we're invited to catch our breath and to come back to some core foundational questions.

And one of the most foundational of all, am I making myself available to be used by Jesus in my local neighbourhood?

Am I making myself available to be used by Jesus in crossing the street and living as a longsider with what Jesus has put in my hands and my heart?

Am I making myself available to join God in what He's doing around the world?

And we'll talk more about the wonderful opportunities of partnering with Baptist Mission Australia.

For Peter, we see his life transforms.

We see the leader he will become, but it began with immediacy and urgency as he says yes to Jesus, as he makes himself available to God's call upon his life.

Today, is there a posture of availability in our lives?

And then what do we see occur in Peter's life as we progress through the gospels and in the book of Acts?

And we see the same thing with the Lebanese pastor that I spoke of at the beginning today.

We see a posture of attentiveness.

The Holy Spirit comes at Pentecost and Peter's life is transformed.

There was the Peter we read of in the gospels, and then there's the promise of what Jesus saw in his life.

When Peter's first called, Jesus sees Peter as he was, but as he could become.

And we see that beautiful transformation.

And the Spirit comes at Pentecost and Peter comes alive, Spirit led, Spirit empowered with courage.

And we see Peter step out in leadership and amazing things happen through his ministry.

But in his attentiveness, he's open to God doing new things.

We see in the Book of Acts, some of the challenging encounters as the Spirit comes in Peter's vision.

And Peter's forced to open his eyes and see the Gentile world and see that the good news is not just for Jewish people.

And Peter's openness to what the Spirit will do, that radical change.

And yet in being available and attentive, he's ready to be used by God in this new way, as the good news, as the gospel is fostered and taken hold of and goes to the Gentile world.

As I move around the world, as I'm privileged to move around churches in Australia, I see how God uses people who are available, but attentive.

Attentive to what God's Spirit is doing in their lives and in their local communities, as God's Spirit raises up the possibility of new ministries, of new ideas.

I see that in the city-wide church in Hobart who we partner with, who were attentive to what God was doing in the local community, as Nepalese people moved into the neighbourhood, as the Nepalese population increased from a few hundred to more than 10,000.

And where the local pastoral team and local members of that church community had their eyes open and were ready to make themselves available, but to be attentive to God's leading.

And as God connected them into that Nepalese community, their openness to say, what might that new thing be that God would have us do?

And to see that church join with Baptist Mission Australia in a new missional collaboration, and through a driving school, and through a community transport bus, to see a Maginot mission birthed, and to see people coming to faith, and to see co-menders joining God in Hobart in bringing the hope of Jesus in the most practical, loving, caring ways.

The challenge begins with each of us personally.

The call to make ourselves available, and the call to be attentive.

In this series, we've reminded ourselves that God is already at work in our world, that God's Spirit is ahead of us, that God doesn't need your local church community or Baptist Mission Australia or Scott Pilgrim, but He graciously invites us to join Him.

And as we join God in mission and we open our lives to Holy Spirit and be attentive, God points us to individuals, to people, to ministry needs, to new possibilities, to missional imagination, to where might God be wanting to use you and your church community in new ways, in your community and in collaborations and partnerships across the world.

The call to availability, the posture of availability, the posture of attentiveness in being open to what the Spirit is doing.

And then of course, action.

Yes, Peter's available, and yes, Peter's attentive, but of course, Peter needs to put that availability and attentiveness into action as he steps out boldly, courageously, sacrificially, in embracing the invitation of Jesus.

We go from Peter's kind of recommissioning, you know, where Jesus forgives and restores Peter after his denials and he's invited to feed Jesus' sheep, to love people.

And there's this beautiful restoration and transformation.

And then we move into the Book of Acts and we see Peter alive and active, wholeheartedly committed to that ministry.

Peter will go on to lay down his life for the good news, from one who denied Jesus to one who will sacrificially give his life in the service of his King.

Yes, we're called to be available.

We're called to be attentive.

But of every one of us, the rubber hits the road when we step out in faith, humbly but boldly across the street, into our communities, into our neighbourhoods, across the world.

And we act, we join God, rolling up our sleeves as the hands and feet of Jesus.

It's what our team members do across the world.

It's what Mark and Nock are doing in Indochina, as they come alongside people with disabilities.

And as they point to the Jesus way, a different way.

As they come alongside these men and women who the local community and culture might push to the margins, but they come with a sense of dignity and care and wellbeing and with training and employment opportunities.

They're seeing lives transformed and these people living with disability suddenly recognising that they can serve others in their community, that they can be the hands and feet of Jesus, that they can be co-menders in this broken but beautiful world.

For Mark and Nock, there was a desire to make themselves available the call of God on their lives to go to Indochina.

They were attentive to where God would have them serve, but ultimately they rolled their sleeves up in ministry.

They get involved in the messiness and brokenness of life and they act and we see Jesus using them in such beautiful ways.

And that's not just true for our Baptist mission Australia team members around the world.

They're our ministry partners.

It's true for people who sit in the seats in this local church community here in Melbourne.

It's true in your church.

As people move out in their communities, ordinary people being their hands and feet, being salt and light, making themselves available to be used by Jesus.

And what do we see happening?

The most amazing myriad of ministries as people serve kids and refugees, women escaping domestic violence, people living with mental health, people of different cultures, people in retirement villages on residential aged care, people serving in cafes, in soup kitchens, people doing the most amazing things, in alpha courses, in opening up the Bible, in teaching English.

There's so many wonderful things happening across our Australian Baptist movement as people make themselves available, as they're attentive to God's Spirit in their lives and the calling of God in their lives.

New possibilities for ministry.

But of course, we all have to roll up our sleeves and wholeheartedly act, step out of the comfort of our four walls, come alongside others and serve Jesus in our communities.

And beyond serving locally, the Baptist Mission Australia story is a story of partnership.

For more than 150 years, local people in their local communities, in their Baptist churches have chosen to collaborate and join together to partner with us in what God wants to do through Australian Baptists across the world.

We live in a wonderful but a challenging time when it comes to global mission.

There's a rapid change in our world.

We see the rise of the global South Church, and by 2030, 70% of followers of Jesus will live in the non-Western world.

And that creates challenge, but also amazing opportunities.

At Baptist Mission Australia, we're committed to still sending Australian people to serve alongside others to bring the hope of Jesus by word and deed.

We're about proclamation and demonstration.

But we're also committed to forming partnerships around the world.

We see those partnerships expanding as in Africa, or India, or PNG, and across the global South.

We come alongside ministry partners.

We support national leaders.

We support church planting.

We support integral mission initiatives.

We partner with others.

And through Sending and Partnering, what do we see?

We see more people experiencing the love and hope of Jesus.

We see more people expressing the love of hope in Jesus as they become first generation disciples, and as they take the good news by word and deed out into their local communities, we see God doing amazing things.

We're hopeful for the future.

We're not hopeful in our own strength or our own vision.

We're hopeful because we trust in a God who's led us for 150 years, a God who goes before us, a God who is ahead of us, a God who graciously invites all of us to join him in what he is doing around the world.

And so as we conclude this Mending!

series, as we celebrate God's gracious invitation to join him as co-menders, could I invite you to consider where is God leading you in your local community?

What is your local response when you think about availability, attentiveness and action?

But beyond that, can I prayerfully invite you to consider partnering with us at Baptist Mission Australia?

In speaking this message to Baptist churches across the country, the reality is we can only do what we do as a Baptist intercultural mission arm because Australian Baptists back us in, stand alongside us, support and partner with us.

Can I invite you to go to our website today, baptismissionaustralia.org and find out more.

But most of all, can I prayerfully invite you to consider acting today and joining us in partnership?

As we stand with Mark and Nock in Indochina, as we stand with Kath and Cam in Mozambique, as we celebrate what Maz and Esther are doing in Southeast Asia and Matt and Shannon in Central Australia and our team and partners across the world.

And what does partnership look like?

It begins with prayer.

It begins as you join us and pray for our team members, our partners, our work across the world.

For 150 years, our ministry has been fuelled by prayer.

It begins with generosity.

As Australian Baptist people financially support our exciting, our compelling vision around the globe.

As people faithfully support team members, ministry partners and projects.

We only exist because of the generosity of our wonderful partners across the nation.

Prayer, generosity and action.

What's it mean for you to roll up your sleeves and to join our mission community, to join our team?

That could mean a short-term trip.

It could mean a global exposure visit.

It could mean collecting stamps.

It could mean prayer.

It could mean hosting a fundraising activity in your church.

It could be coming alongside our team members.

It could be volunteering with us.

It could mean a myriad of things, but most of all, it means you're part of our team and you're part of what God is doing through Baptist Mission Australia across the world.

Prayer, generosity, and action.

Thank you for being part of our Mending!

series.

Thank you for your partnership with us as we join God as co-menders across the street and around the world.

Today's challenge, to consider our availability, our attentiveness to God's Spirit and the new things He wants to do in our lives, and readiness to step out in faith and act in serving Jesus.

And to join Baptist Mission Australia in partnership.

To pray, to be generous, to join us as a ministry partner, and to be part of the change today.

As God is at work, mending our worlds.

As God is at work, bringing shalom.

As God is at work, restoring his worlds.

Let's join him and be the hands and feet of Jesus.

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