By our State DIrector, Dave Tolputt

In the five years I’ve been State Director with SU Vic, there have been huge changes. We’ve relocated the ministries to Northcote, met the challenges of strengthening the financial position, increased our staff by nearly 50% with significant growth in all major ministry areas, reset the priority of schools camping, developed real innovation in schools ministry, and re-valued both Theos and Family Missions.

However, some of the most significant changes have been in our thinking. Prayer, reflection and application of insights gained are helping us to reframe the next generation of our work. Here are four things we believe that God has been speaking to us about.

1. Revelation precedes planning

Strategic Planning has become the buzz phrase for organisations. The challenge for Christian organisations is how to set plans that allow the Holy Spirit to continually speak. The temptation is to allow planning to squeeze out revelation. We are discovering that revelation precedes planning. Planning is about how things get done; revelation is about where God is at work. Planning enables us to move from revelation to action. We are convinced that the Holy Spirit is in a dynamic relationship with His people, and that ‘when the Spirit says go, we must go’. We are learning to hold our plans loosely so that God can lead us. This is enabling us to respond to what God places before us – rather like Paul and the Macedonian man. (Acts 16)

2. A recovery of evangelism

For a while, it seemed that evangelism became a dirty word because of the cringe factor of outdated methods. However, without proclamation the Gospel can become simple humanism. In recent years, God has laid on our hearts afresh the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ – His life, death and resurrection – to effect total transformation in individuals and communities. Nothing else can do what the Gospel does. We are convinced about God’s ultimate objectives for the Gospel: the healing and restoration of all brokenness as people come under the Lordship of Christ. This has given us renewed passion, confidence and courage to make Jesus known through both Word and Deed, to ‘shine like stars in the universe as we hold forth the word of life’. (Philippians 2:16)

3. What it means to partner with churches

SU is committed to extending the mission of the church; to facilitate mission which the churches would not otherwise be able to do; to mobilise teams to connect with people where they are and share the Good News on their patch, in their culture. These mission teams are being equipped as leaders, experienced in mission with a wide variety of people, and willing to build up the churches that have sent them and received them as missionaries. We are not so interested in populating our programs, as we are in how our volunteers might extend the influence and impact of their local church through their training and experiences in SU programs.

4. The role of SU in the wider Christian community

The Body of Christ is made up of many parts (1 Cor 12:14) – and many communities. We asked God what role He has given SU for the building up of the Body. Our conviction is that He has called us to fulfil the role of Apostle / Evangelist. The Apostolic role in the New Testament is leading and equipping God’s people into places and spaces beyond where they currently are. The evangelistic role in the New Testament points to making the Good News of Jesus Christ known, and helping people to respond in faith to Him. This excites us, and we can’t stop talking about and acting on this sacred charge.
This is just a small insight into how God has been shaping our thinking. We’d welcome your feedback. Will you pray with us as we continue to listen for what God might be saying to us?

An Open Letter to All SU Outreach Readers

2008 saw an unprecedented financial crisis sweep the globe. Some of the word’s largest companies literally disappeared overnight and the repercussions have been felt everywhere. SU is also feeling the effects.

In the initial period of the financial crisis our general donation income for the period August to November was down by around 20%, putting some exciting new ministry developments under real pressure. In a year where we embrace unprecedented opportunity, we also face unprecedented financial uncertainty.

In faith, this time last year, we believed God called us to relaunch our schools camping ministry at Coolamatong. In faith $185,000 was raised to refurbish the Lake campsite. Based on our improved financial position in early 2008, in faith, we felt led to strengthen our schools Ministry staff team and open new work. The growth in our missions meant taking another step in faith to increase the admin support time. In all these moves, we are convinced that God was calling us to express our faith, to believe Him for the resources and keep our eye on the ministry.

God has honoured that faith. The Fairhills Secondary College ministry is a most exciting development and has huge implications for future school ministry development. our other primary and secondary schools ministry took off last year, whilst the level of volunteer engagement in our camping strategy has been huge, not mention our recent missions season which has been amazing. And even more lies ahead.

That’s why we feel compelled to wite to you. You have shared this journey with us, and we have felt your encouragement to set our sails to the wind of the Spirit.

In faith, we are laying SU’s needs before you all. We need our friends as never before. Can we count on you? If you receive this newsletter and don’t currently support SU we ask you to start doing so. A response slip is provided.

God bless you as you respond.

Dave’s Reflection – Baptism

1) He already tried starting over in Genesis 6 to no avail. So..

2) He decides to choose a people group starting with Abraham in Gen 12

I always wondered why God picked the Israelites over others….were they just lucky? were they somehow superior to the other nations? Does God have favorites?

I don’t think God chose the Israelites as his people to the exclusion of others. I think God chose a people so he could show to the whole world what life following God’s way is like. He was looking for an example to show the nations.

Isa 49:6

I have placed you here as a light for other nations you must take my saving power to everyone on earth.

Naturally when God’s people were following God, they were a good advert for God to the other nations but a bad advert when they refused to follow him.

Over to you….

However half way through making it i realised my milk was off.

I decided to press on without milk…..

and frankly friends…if your not going to bother with the milk you might as well not bother making a pasta sauce…It was yuk!  It was hard and crusty.

I was reminded…there are many  ingredients that go into a successful ministry: Planning, team building, structure, skills, resources etc. BUT

If we neglect God’s power then it’s like a sauce without milk.

Kids are not transformed by programs or events. It is God who brings about transformation.

 John3:6 Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life

We should never neglect praying for God to do his transforming work! It’s the main ingredient!!

One of my friends looked at me with the expression “are you sure you want me to do this?”  I told him very clearly i thought he was the best person i could think of. (after this he looked as if i was lying or just hadn’t thought very much). He is giving the project positive consideration.I think he’ll say “Deal”

Another friend wasn’t really surprised that i asked him to do something. He expects me to ask him to do things, this request was bigger then normal. He wasn’t very warm to it however. I was asking him to consider something that would definitely push his comfort zone and he said ‘no deal’ (he might change his mind though….i’ll ask next week)

2 Chron 16:9 For the eyes of the LORD range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. God looks.

Looks for people who say “Deal” to God and are all in!

Looks not for the half hearted or half willing.

Not for those who are considering turning back halfway through.

If either of these boys decide Deal! to go with God’s call. They can expect God to give them great strength of heart for the mission. If they said No Deal they miss out on all God might have done through them i guess.

Over to you…

Given that there are larger amounts of Christians in larger towns why do i get so many calls from the remote and the rural. My thoughts.

A) Country Churches loose 95% of their young people to larger towns. They cannot rely on enthusiastic young people

B) Country Churches are in many cases more in touch with reality then Churches in larger towns. Many Country Churches can no longer afford a minister and realise if they don’t do outreach. No one will be reached. Unlike city churches they cannot hope to pick up transfers from other churches

C) Country Churches that are dying realise they ought not just to die quietly, They better do something to show Christ in their community.

D) Country Churches realise they need to work with other churches more then churches from larger centers. They can’t put on outreach events without working together.

I think some wonderful outcomes for God’s Kingdom are going to take place in very small places that no one’s heard of in the coming years.

Over to you…

University contributes to a modern society, i read yesterday during the very boring ceremony. (I listened to 284 students graduate…Cara was 140th). I agree with the statement, yet disagree with it just as much.

Universities manage to cancel their good values via their negative values.

Universities encourage people to contribute to our society

Universities encourage drunkenness

drunkenness encourages violence & cheating in relationships

drunkenness takes away from society

Universities words speak of society benefits

University actions nullify their words.

Over to you…

I was reading Church on the mezzanine floor by Gil Cann. I began asking myself lots of questions about how we view a successful church. Some but not all were prompted by his writings.

1. Which is better: The number of people in Church on Sunday or the the number of people that are being directly influenced by the Church goers on Monday?

2. The amount of money that comes in or the amount of service that the Church does?

3. Growth rate numerically or the growth in spiritual gifts among the believers?

4. Everyone being happy or everyone being involved in mission in some way?

5. The amount of space in our churches or the amount of space in our hearts for God and knowing him personally.

I’m okay with a church being big, having money and evening having a big building. We often measure those things. Are they the things most deserving of being measured?

I crave that Christian leaders would bring great focus to their work. Many are juggling 8-9 different hats and responsibilities and it isn’t possible to do them all well.

Gordon Ramsey is a man with foul language but is a genius at turning a struggling restaurant around. In the most recent episode he cut in the menu in half and got the staff focused on their task on succeeding as a restaurant.

How focused are you on the mission God’s given you? Are good things getting in the way of succeeding in that mission?

The apostle Paul was a focused man this is what he said about his mission.

“I don’t care about my own life. The most important thing is that I complete my mission, the work that the Lord Jesus gave me—to tell people the Good News about God’s grace.” -Acts 20:24