Student Meal @ Friday Night Church

This friday night before church Resonate are running a FREE student meal. We are a student/young workers ministry and really hungry to make an impact in our community. So lets do our best to bless the student community by giving them a free feed to kick off the weekend.

The meal is happening from 5.30 - 7pm. If people want to come they need to contact the youth phone to book their place (we want to make sure we give them a great feed with lots of food!
So pass this onto your mates and invite them along! They are more than welcome to go to the church service after but there is no obligation to do so, and no pressure!! Should be an awesome night!

Okay so in order to make this work we need helpers!! So if you are available to help that would be awesome!! Let me or ray know asap if you are keen. we need people to help set up, cook, serve, clean up, mingle etc!!!

Have a fantastic week and don't forget to make an impact!

Shazz

10 Keys to Servanthood

Key number 2: Great servants make good leaders

Servanthood is really leadership with the right motive and heart

Leadership and servanthood are closely linked. In fact to be a leader following the biblical model you have to be willing to serve and when you serve you are actually portraying leadership. “The first shall be last and the last shall be first”.

In the end everyone serves something, it is either yourself or someone else.

It is dangerous to appoint someone who is not willing to serve in the capacity that you ask because it raises the question “are they wanting to serve the vision under your leadership or themselves and there own agenda?”

This is where sacrifice and faith come in. It is a sacrifice to put aside your own vision in order to serve someone else’s and it is faith that in serving someone else’s vision God will actually outwork the vision he has placed in you.

10 Keys to Servanthood

Intro to Servanthood

1. Jesus the servant King
2. Great servants make good leaders
3. Servants support their leaders
4. Servants carry the vision and give a good report
5. Servants don’t seek the glory of leadership
6. Servants do what it takes and love it
7. Servants don’t always need to be asked
8. Servants give more then required
9. Servants are fed while doing the work
10. Ways you can serve


Key number 1: Jesus the servant King

Jesus modeled his whole ministry on servanthood and so should we. Jesus is God and has the authority of God yet at the same time he served us to beyond the point of death.

Essentially he gave up everything in order to serve us!

Often we hear the question “are we giving our lives in order to serve God?” But the question we should ask based on the example of Jesus is this, “are we giving our lives in order to serve each other?”

We can Love, and believe in, and worship God all we like, but if this doesn’t translate into serving each other to the point of sacrifice then we are not reflecting Jesus and what he died for at all.

“I want to be his hands and his feet” on this earth

Intro to Servanthood

Intro to servanthood: Servanthood is faith in action

I asked a group of people the other day what they thought of when they herd the word servanthood, the majority considered that to be a servant was not much different to being a slave or do all this work that they don’t really enjoy or want to do, “servanthood is just slaves in the hood” as someone said.

The reality is that servanthood is actually the outworking of your faith.

If you believe in Jesus Christ and his Church and its appointed leaders then at some point your belief will have to have some sort of substance or evidence (faith) to it otherwise you are blindly believing and allowing yourself to float along life’s journey at the mercy of “fate”.

Christ wants us to make a definitive decision with vision (as opposed to blind faith) about following him. “With out vision the people perish” the bible says (Pro 29:18). Without vision we put ourselves at the mercy of fate and will perish and we all know who is in charge of making things perish don’t we?

So those that have fate are at the mercy of the devil and those that have faith are at the mercy of Christ who is the head of the Church, which the bible says everything revolves about (Eph 1:23 Msg).

Now we have come full circle. If you believe in Jesus and in his Church and its leaders then at some point your belief will have to have evidence to it, in other words your faith will have to have the substance of action.

This action translates to Servanthood!!

I believe that servanthood, even the menial tasks that need done, is actually the out working of my faith. I believe that in servanthood, even picking up that piece of rubbish, I’m actually advancing the Church and the Kingdom of God.

Life is beautiful but hectic...

Sorry the blog is a little light this week – but it has been a huge and encouraging ministry week. Ice cream Olympics are on tonight, so I’m massively looking forward to that. More updates during the weekend, I promise

Peru update: Earthquake - Safe N Sound.

From Lynda on 18/8/7!

Hey guys!

Dont know if you heard about the earthquake here..? It hit on Wed. night, and was a level 8 on the richter scale, Peru´s largest earthquake. Just wanted to let you know I've got out and I'm ok. The town we (my cuz and I) were in was hit, its only a few k´s from the epicentre. It gave me the scare of my life. There was no warning, the ground just started shaking and shaking, and then the power line snapped, and all the lights went out. There were a couple of girls wailing and screaming, so I just tried to calm THEM down, not having a clue what to do myself! Walls were falling down,and there were powerlines above us. All that training about going under a doorway just didnt seem so sure when the buildings are made of mud brick..! We were in a small town in a desert, surrounded by sand dunes, and we figured the safest place to go was up one of those, away from buildings and powerlines. We ended up spending the night out there, no way you´d get me to go back inside a building with all the aftershocks. I was so thankful, a group of Colombians and Ecuadorians took us under their wing, and brought out blankets, food, water and even a tent for us to cram into for the night.

I just want to praise God for His protection... We had been sitting outside at a table when it hit... and jumped up and ran out to the street. A few moments later the wall above where we were fell down and crushed the table and chairs we´d been on. arrrgghhh!!! Thankyou God for Your protection!!!!

Anyways, just so you know we finally got out of there now that the roads are passable, and are now safely in Lima. There´s so much destruction of houses here, and lots of people have lost their lives. Please pray for the Peruvians in this time.

My love to you all, I´ll be home in one week from Sunday.

Lynda xoxo

For the Weekend Warriors...

Here's a few links just to tide you over for the weekend - I'm preparing my first Sunday message - working title is "What does your door look like?" or "Doorkeepers". Prayer would be greatly appreciated.

Anyway, here's the links (some of the things I considered blogging about, but just ran out of time).

Personal DNA quiz - A fantastic and intriguing take on a personality quiz which gives you a visual summary to post on your blogs, sigs, social networks and so on. A great concept, with the link sourced from The Hourglass Blog (Michaela you are doing a fantastic job by the way). Have a look at my personal dna at the bottom of the page (no comment on my high femininity rating...).

Minesweeper - The Movie. Honestly, this is one of the funniest parodies I've seen. Funny on several levels:

• It's an excellent send up of "The Guardian"
• It makes minesweeper cool again.
• The movie website is the file path for minesweeper.

Go and have a look.

Finally, here's a serious article for those of you looking for inspiration or a challenge during the weekend:
Have you fallen for these 7 Negative attitudes?
I'd be interested in seeing a post from one of the reson8rs on this article.

Blessings, and have a great weekend. I'll post a summary of my message after the weekend (if it goes well :) ), hopefully with a podcast to follow.

Church in the future...

What is church going to look like in the future? I stumbled across an article saying that there is an Anglican minister who is currently being ordained in order to serve at a parish in Second Life. Crazy! I always thought that it would be something that us raging pentecostals would be responsible for...

The link is Let us pray in online world

Update!
Oh, ok, I did just find a couple of quite interesting churches already represented. Check out the following...

Religion in second life
ALM Cyberchurch
Living Sounds

To be honest, I'm not ready to go there just yet (as in have a completely online ministry experience), but it may just be a matter of time. In the meantime, blogging and social networking are my tools of choice for online ministry.

Leader Focus: Lyle Penisula

I thought it would be a great idea to look at some of the Christian leaders in our nation. Lyle and Debbie Penisula are the Senior Ministers @ Hawkes Bay Equipper's Church in NZ. Lyle is a passionate communicator and a gifted artist (the painting to the right should leave you in no doubt). He has a heart for seeing revival in NZ, and firmly believes that it will start with our generation's youth. Anyway, here's a self-introduction, and a post from Lyle's Bebo which illustrates his vision for revival.

Ray

---------------------------------------------

FYI: I AM a husband (Debbie's man), a father (4 boys & 1 girl), a son, a brother (2 Sisters), an uncle. And I abolutely love my aiga (family) to bits... we serve Jesus and His cause.

I AM an Artist... inspired, influenced, motivated, and gifted by the greatest artist of all the one and only Creator of the Universe, God Himself... by the way God and I are friends.

I AM a preacher called by God commissioned by Jesus and endorsed by the Holy Spirit... Yeah, I AM blessed.

I AM Samoan, I AM Palagi (Scottish) I AM a son of Aoteroa, New Zealand... However my citizenship is not of this world. I AM a child of God an ambassador of Jesus Christ... I AM on a mission from God!!!...

How about you? have you found your purpose in life? True purpose can only be found in the great I AM Jesus Christ! Common I dare you to ask Him right NOW to reveal Himself to you. What have you got to lose?

Youth Revival

The vision? The vision is JESUS ? obsessively, dangerously, undeniably Jesus. The vision is an army of young people. You see bones? I see an army. And they are FREE from materialism. They laugh at 9-5 little prisons. They could eat caviar on Monday and crusts on Tuesday. They wouldn't even notice.

They are mobile like the wind, they belong to the nations. They need no passport.. People write their addresses in pencil and wonder at their strange existence. They are free yet they are slaves of the hurting and dirty and dying.

Such heroes are as radical on Monday morning as Sunday night. They don't need fame from names. Instead they grin quietly upwards and hear the crowds chanting again and again: "COME ON!"

And the army is disciplined. Young people who beat their bodies into submission. Every soldier would take a bullet for his comrade at arms. The tattoo on their back boasts "for me to live is Christ and to die is gain".

Sacrifice fuels the fire of victory in their upward eyes. Winners. Martyrs. Who can stop them? Can hormones hold them back? Can failure succeed? Can fear scare them or death kill them?

And the generation prays like a dying man with groans beyond talking, with warrior cries, sulphuric tears and with great barrow loads of laughter! Whatever it takes they will give: Breaking the rules. Shaking mediocrity from its cosy little hide. Laying down their rights and their precious little wrongs, laughing at labels, fasting essentials. The advertisers cannot mould them. Hollywood cannot hold them. Peer-pressure is powerless to shake their resolve at late night parties before the cockerel cries.

They are incredibly cool, dangerously attractive inside. On the outside? They hardly care. They wear clothes like costumes to communicate and celebrate but never to hide.

Would they surrender their image or their popularity? They would lay down their very lives - swap seats with the man on death row - guilty as hell. A throne for an electric chair.

With blood and sweat and many tears, with sleepless nights and fruitless days, they pray as if it all depends on God and live as if it all depends on them.

Their DNA chooses JESUS. (He breathes out, they breathe in.) Their subconscious sings. They had a blood transfusion with Jesus. Their words make demons scream in shopping centres.

Don't you hear them coming? Herald the weirdo's! Summon the losers and the freaks. Here come the frightened and forgotten with fire in their eyes. They walk tall and trees applaud, skyscrapers bow, mountains are dwarfed by these children of another dimension. Their prayers summon the hounds of heaven and invoke the ancient dream of Eden.

And this vision will be. It will come to pass; it will come easily; it will come soon. How do I know? Because this is the longing of creation itself, the groaning of the Spirit, the very dream of God.

My/Your prayer of faith invokes a thunderous, resounding, bone-shaking great 'Amen!' from countless angels, from hero's of the faith, from Christ himself - the original dreamer, the ultimate winner.

Christian Ninjas Unite Part Deux

I've been playing with a cool comic creation tool at stripgenerator.com, and have come up with something which I believe is mildly funny :), and hopefully a little inspirational. Let me know what you think.

If anyone thinks they can do better (oh ye of little faith...), then have a crack, and I'd be happy to post it here. It does need to be Christian in content (or at least appropriate... ok semi-appropriate), and have some kind of positive message, or just be really funny. On that note, I know a great pirate joke... mind you everyone knows pirates and ninjas don't go together well. Maybe another time.

Note to self: Who do I pray to?

Missions Focus: Andrew Buxton

Hey reson8rs,

I just recieved an update from a really great friend of mine named Andrew Buxton. He's been completing missionary work in Ethiopia, and I personally find his story inspirational. I first met Andrew when he was a youth leader in Tapanui (a small town of less than 1000 people in the south of New Zealand), and we attended more than one Easter Camp together at Camp Columba. He's one of the most humble and servant hearted guys I've ever met, bar none, and I'm just blown away by the mighty way God has been able to use him simply by being available and ready to serve. Anyway, here's a copy of the email I recieved.

Hi Friends

Just wanted to let you know the change of direction that my life is taking. Near the end of the time I spent in Ethiopia this year I got talking with the people that are beginning to reestablish the work of SIM in Southern Sudan (SIM is an interdenominational Christian missions organisation, see www.sim.org for more info) and was tentatively offered me a position on the team. I have pursued this and yesterday was officially accepted as a full member of SIM and so will now be heading to the Southern Sudan as soon as I have raised the support I need.

The project is called "Rebuilding Southern Sudan: Church & Nation". A peace accord was signed for Southern Sudan in 2005 which has brought relative peace to most of the region and refugees are starting to return to their homes. SIM is working in some of the camps where the refugees are/have been staying and have been asked to come back to Sudan and help support the Sudanese people rebuild their communities. The main thrust of the work that SIM will be doing is related to health and education being done in partnership with local communities and church. A good overview of this project can be seen at http://www.sim.org/country.asp?fun=11&sid=78&slide=0&cid=62&mid=&pgid= (copy this web address and paste it into the address line in your web browser if the link doesn't work).

There are a few missionaries already in Sudan (from neigbouring African countries as well as the western world) but currently the work is being coordinated and supported from Nairobi, Kenya. SIM wants to have a base in Southern Sudan from which to do this and this is where I fit in. Myself and another guy will go into a city called Malakal to establish the facilities and relationships needed for SIM to make this a reality. This will initially involve renovating 2 houses on a compound that the church SIM partners with has. These houses will be used in the short term while we facilitate and supervise the contruction of a facility for this purpose. At the same time as the renovation and building work I will be learning Sudanese Arabic and have involvement with other ministry opportunities that I can realistically fit into my day.

Hopefully the building work in Malakal will be completed by the end of 2009. I plan on still being part of the work in Sudan after this, in what role that will be determined nearer the time. To do this I need a team of supporters that can support me through prayer, finances and friendship. If this is something that you would like to be a part of or would like to learn more about the Rebuilding Southern Sudan: Church & Nation project please contact me.

Thank you and God bless
Andrew Buxton

Mission Accomplished?

Hey guys,

Well, I dont know if my mission is ´accomplished´ but its over anyway, which is a fully unreal thought... What a week... Ive packed up, said my goodbyes, and today left Abancay on a bus to begin my 3week journey home.

I'm in Cusco, and as of today I am no longer a missionary, but just a lowly tourist for the next few weeks. My eyes hurt from crying like a baby, and Im just in a funny sorta headspace, closing that chapter of my life. I feel like I need to sit down (for like a year) and think through everything thats happened! I really need your prayers over the next few weeks, with all the travel, and Im already exhausted before I even begin..!

This is such an amazing country, with beautiful people, and is a hard place to leave. Praise God that here I am, 6 months later, still alive and well. He has been my strength and my shield and I give Him the glory.

Will keep in touch on my travels, and look forward to seeing you all oh sooo sooon!
love Lynda xoxo

Its all in the attitude

Pray without ceasing. Have you ever thought about the implications and impracticalities of this scripture? (1 Thessalonians 5:17) I mean lets be honest - does God really expect us to pray every second of the day? how does that affect our lives ? Can it actually be done?

There is actually more to that scripture than is often looked into - 1 Thessalonians 5: 16 -18 says "Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is Gods will for you in Christ Jesus." (NLT)

God is not asking us to spend every moment of our day on our knees in prayer, but He encourages us to have a prayerful attitude. This attitude affects our reactions to the stuff, good and bad, that occurs in our lives. It determines whether we will be atmosphere takers or atmosphere makers. A prayerful attitude recognises and acknowledges our need for God, our dependence on Him, and takes the focus off ourselves. It means that even in the crap times , in the darkness when we think no one cares, we can have an assurance that God is there, He cares and we can turn our focus to Him.

Over the past few months I have had an illness that had the potential to take over every part of mine and my family's lives. Everything turned to crap (am I allowed to say crap on the blog? Oops crap I did it again!) and I felt I was in a downward spiral there was no escape from.. Now I don't share this to gain your sympathy or to shock, but out of this experience ( and I still have a long way to go) I have learned a very important God perspective that keeps me going.

John 10:10 "The thief comes to steal, kill and destroy, but I have come that they may have life in abundance." This is a scripture I have heard countless times but whenever I have considered abundant life I have looked at it from a vantage point of Gods provision - paying my bills, meeting my physical needs etc.. What I didn't consider was (and God gave me revelation of this) abundant life is more than this.

Abundance of life includes the experiences we go through and the lessons we learn. This changed me in my situation completely. I know that God is with me in my situation, and while He did not cause it, He is allowing me to go through it because the lessons I learn and the reward I gain on the other side are far greater than if I did not walk this journey.

Even though my situation sucks, knowing God is there and walking with me makes the pain easier to endure, and dare I say it, I am even thankful. Not that I am sick, but thankful that God has a plan greater than I can currently see, thankful that God is bigger than my situation and thankful for this experience because its enriching and strengthening me- as a person, as a wife and mother and as a woman walking a journey with Christ.

By developing a prayerful attitude ( and believe me I'm a work in progress!) when things get tough I can turn to God and take the focus off myself. This a conscious decision, a choice I have to make continually, and some days the choice is far easier than others and sometimes I don't succeed at all. But thats the amazing thing about Grace - God still reaches out His hand to pick us up and set us on our feet time after time, day after day. (and thats a whole new post on its own)

Be joyful always, pray continually and give thanks in all circumstances - I might not succeed in this all the time, but I am going to make a go at it. I want to encourage you - embrace God no matter what your circumstances are and be enriched and amazed by what you learn and the experiences you gain.

Letting Go of Our Sins

Some days, I just feel so unholy. (I know, great first entry on the Resonate blog. :P I am sure I will soon hear from Ray if this is not theologically sound!)

And I feel far away from God. I am a Christian who has experienced enough of God to know that life without God would be meaningless for me. Yet, at times I just feel totally unworthy and that makes me pull away from Him. Read on if you can identify with this, because at times like that, I cling on to the things that I know deep down, and that helps me through. I hope it helps you too.

It is a vicious cycle - in moments of weakness I sin (judge others, gossip, act self-centred, lose patience, rage, you name it...), then I feel guilty about it and avoid God (as if He didn't already read my mind as I thought all those terrible things!), then I miss out on my quiet time with Him, then it's all a bit awkward from then on, and I gradually just drift farther and farther away from Him. And without Him, you see, I am weak. And moments of weakness become the norm.

Times like that, I think... God, if You have really forgiven me, why aren't You talking to me? Why won't You just tell me that everything's okay?

Usually, after moping for a while, I pause for long enough to hear His answer: You already know that I have forgiven you. You just haven't soaked it all up yet. You are losing sight of what you know to be true because of the guilt that you feel. I'm telling you that everything is okay - you just aren't listening. It is you that won't spare me the time of day to listen to what I have to say to you. Get over it!

Which reminds me of a story I heard in my old church in Auckland... (If you've heard a slightly different version of this elsewhere, it's because this is my version, recreated from the bits that I remember.)

There was a bunch of sinners registering for kind of an... absolution conference, where they would pay their dues for all the things they had done wrong. At the registration booth, they were given one of those stick-on name tags where they had to write not only their names, but also why they were there. After that, they went round the room introducing themselves.

"I'm John, I'm a murderer." John bowed his head in shame.

"I'm Lucy, I'm a thief." Lucy looked glad she was after John.

"Sally... an adultress." Sally could barely say the words.

And so this went on. Eventually a man without a name tag stood up and said, "My name is Jesus, I have not sinned."

"What do you mean you haven't sinned?" asked the organisers in a rage, "What is your name and what have you done? Where is your name tag? You need to register and you need to say what you've done wrong."

Jesus walked around the room and took the name tags off all the sinners there. He stuck them on His chest, one by one. And He said, "My name is Jesus, I have not sinned. Here are my name tags. My name is John. My name is Lucy. My name is Sally..."

Fundamentally, we sin and fall short of His glory. So try not to sin. But when we do, we need to get up, get right and move on. We need to see that it isn't enough just handing over our name tags to Him - we also have to stop calling ourselves names.

Sin separates us from God because He is holy. That is the whole reason for the Cross! But a sin committed, and left on its own to grow into a festering wound of guilt, really has the potential to damage our relationship with Him. Once we repent, that's it - we really have to let God deal with it - we really have to let God.

When Good Pastors go Bad :)

Here's a video of our illustrious youth pastor having a great time... Grant you are a legend!



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svYIpLl89nI

Parties, LAN and Political

Hey Guys!
The Dave here again with another update on life in sunny Christchurch. At the moment, I'm sitting in The Lair AKA my pimped out gamer garage, waiting for other people to show up to our LAN party that we're having tonight. ("we" being my flatmate will and I) For those n00bs who don't know what a LAN is, I'll explain. It's when a group of geeks get together, hook their PC's up and play games for around 24 hours or so. It's great fun, and it's always good to catch up with people you haven't seen in a while. It's kind of like church, you get together to hang out, and do something, in the case of church; worship god. The really great thing that I've been realizing about God more and more lately, is you don't need to be at church, or at a cell group to access him. you can access him 24/7, much like the internet! It's so great to be able to talk to him whenever I'm worried, or just wanna say "Hey Big Fella! YOU ROCK!". The biggest thing to remember that while god is fun in "single-player mode" - by yourself, he's much more fun when shared in "multi-player mode" AKA church, cell group etc, and the best thing is this: You can share God, and not get done for piracy! LOL

In other news, I'm running in Elections for the UCSA (University of Canterbury Student Association) Executive. They're kinda like the school council for Uni. Campaign is going well, but your support in prayer would be greatly appreciated! It's time we got some God into management up here in Canterbury!

See you all in around 3 weeks!

Dave.

Update from Byron Bay 2: Shane Overboard

Hi,
How's it all going back there in Invercargill
Another week has gone and the day is getting closer to when I return home.

This week has been a busy one as my class has spent most of it at studio 301 helping out the recording of Nardo's first album. Made
a new friend this week, his name is Arun and he is from India and he is also a christian (cool). He was part of the sound team when Red
Rain was playing in India. (Its a small world after all). Temperatures are starting to climb here, yesterday we reach 26 and it
didn't drop much below 20 last night with another hot day forecast
for today with the temperature all ready into the mid 20's. I have
developed an ear infection which is not good as I need my ears for
recording and mixing songs, please pray for me in this area.
Lead the worship in church last Sunday as both song leaders were
away, (been a longtime since I last lead worship).

Last Sunday I managed to catch a bit of Hillsong TV just at the right
time, Pastor Brain Houston was preaching and his message was simply
titled "Just turn up". It quite amazing how we as humans expect God
to turn up even when we feel distant from Him but the fact of the
matter is , is that He is waiting for us to turn up. He is always
there.

When you look at David and his life, the trials and his
downfalls he always turned up and God was always waiting for him. No
matter what came his way he knew his God, even when he fell he always
turned to Him. Psalm 23 says it all, The Lord is my shepherd I shall
not want (lack for anything) This is something I'm having to learn
over here away from friend and family and that is to trust in Him
more and to spend more time with Him.

When I was back home I was
constantly busy but now I have so much spare time it can get boring
but when I heard this sermon it changed how I spend my spare time as
God has being waiting for me just to turn up and meet with Him not
the other way around. Even though I face constant battles with myself
God is there just waitng for me just to turn. So if anyone who is
reading this is having a hard time, God is waiting for you just to
turn up and talk to him, He is always there.

God bless,
Shane

Intelligent design?

Makes you think doesn't it?