Responding to God's Call
TALK IT OVER
Embark on a journey through the depths of God's incredible love and His unwavering pursuit of humanity. Engage with scripture that reveals the hope, forgiveness, and reconciliation that His love offers to all.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Do you have a story of an encounter with God that has changed your life? A transformative event. Share it with your group.
If you've walked with Jesus for a long time, reflect on how your life is different because of the very first encounter you had with Him. If you are new to faith in Christ, take time to share your hopes for your life moving forward.
A relationship requires us to work at it! God wants relationship with us - how do you cultivate a strong relationship with God? What draws you closer to him?
Does serving come easily to you? Ps Simon said that the best version of us happens when we put ourselves aside and serve others. Is this true for you? What role does serving play in your own life?
In your SOAP devotions how has God been challenging you? Are there any reoccurring themes? How are you responding to Him?
"A life with Jesus is not all Lattes and Tim Tams, but if you choose to respond to Jesus, you will have an anchor that will keep you steady for life." - Ps Simon
TRANSCRIPT
And so this morning we are wrapping up and we're looking at embracing the encounter. Embracing the encounter. So this, this part actually has a, a requirement from us. It has a response that needs to happen from us. And what it is, it is it's our, as we discover that we can respond to the divine invitation that God makes to each of us.
And we discover the transformative power that takes place when we choose to open our heart. We open our lives and allow Him in. And that's what I was talking about, that response that's going to be required from us. As we learn to embrace the encounter. Embrace the encounter. Now, I looked up, as I was preparing, I looked up the word encounter in the dictionary.
What it means. What encounter means. And this is interesting. This is what I found. And it says, encounter. It's an unexpected meeting. An unexpected meeting with someone or something. Another definition says, describes it as a transformative event. A transformative event. And then so after this particular event, you're transformed, your life generally is not the same.
So we think about encounter, so think about that word encounter, an unexpected event that can transform your life. You know we could go around the room, probably chat online or whatever, we go around the room and we could hear about people's... Encounters, people's transformative events that have taken place.
Brushes with fame, if you like, or celebrity. I guess a classic one always is like a near death experience. You hear people's encounters with near death experience. And those ones pretty much stand out. I've had some in my life. I class them as near death. They're probably not. They probably don't sound too bad.
At the moment, they were pretty bad, you know. My brother and I nearly burnt down our family home. I had an issue with a can of baked beans and a campfire once. But one that stood out to me, and now just a little clause here. I'm not alone on this, I've heard many people have experienced the same or similar event with the same outcome.
So it's not just me, I'm not alone, alright. But I had an issue once, or a situation, it felt like a near death experience, when I was 18. I was 18 and I was, I went on my very first ever overseas trip. I went to New Zealand. It is. It is. So that's overseas, isn't it? ? It's a whole other country. You need a passport and everything.
I was 18, I went and I was on on my own. I went on an overseas trip to New Zealand on my own. Went to visit some friends for a couple of weeks, and I was there for a couple of weeks and on my way back I had an early flight to come home. So I thought, you know what I'll do? I'll book an accommodation, I'll book a night's accommodation close to the airport so I can get to the airport on time.
And so I booked. A hotel. Now, this is the first time I'd ever been in a hotel, alright. I was like, wow, this is a bit fancy. It wasn't too exciting, but it was fancy for me. And so I went to this hotel, and I was all excited, I was looking in the doors and the drawers and checking it all out, and the little tea and coffee and all that.
And then I noticed that in the bathroom there was a spa bath. A spa bath. Now, I'd never had a spa bath inside before. I'd been in like spa tubs, but not a spa bath. I thought, I'm gonna try that out. I'm gonna try that. So that, I got myself all ready, and I went into the bath, got the water going, warmed it up.
This is crackling on me, is it? Yeah, yeah, crackling on me. One, two. Do I just leave this thing on? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Cool. All right. So yeah, so I got the water going, got it all nice and warm, got undressed, stood there in the bath, and I've waited. Now, I'm not, now I'm not dumb, I know, I'm not, this, hang on a minute, yeah, This, it was only a small, it was only a small, but it only had four jets.
It had one at the front, and one at the back, and one on either side, and down the bottom there was a, like a valve, that's the sucky in valve, apparently, and that's where, you know, the water sucks in from there, and I know, I wasn't, I'm not stupid, I know that the water level has to get over that, before you turn the button on, or else it could burn the motor out.
Alright, so I sat there and I was waiting, and I was waiting, and then I watched and the water level got over there, so great, so I pressed the button, and I heard the motor, but nothing happened, and I was waiting, this gurgling sound, and then all of a sudden the high pressure jet just got me in the front, and then got me in the back, and then the side, and I was like, oh, I thought my life flashed before my eyes, this is, this is how it ends, this is so I jumped out of the bath, And then the water hit the side of the tub and went straight up.
And when I turned around, there was these four big fountains of water just all pouring all over this little tiny bathroom in the hotel. And I was like, No! And then, because the water level had gotten so low, it, it got below that thing and then clunk, clunk, bang! This thing just stopped. Oh, the water all just stopped.
There's water dripping everywhere. I'm standing there completely naked. Imagine that. No, don't. Don't imagine that. The towels are all sopping wet. The toilet rolls are hanging off the thing. It was near death. I thought, I thought this is it. This is how it ends for me.
We hear stories like that. You hear stories of people that have brushed with celebrity and fame, don't you? Who's ever, who's ever met someone famous? We all, we live on the Gold Coast, so we all know someone that knows someone that lives next door to someone whose cousin saw Chris Hemsworth in Byron Bay.
So me and Chris, we're like buds now. But little did we know that as a church we've all had a brush with celebrity and fame. Our very own Pastor Kev, he was the lead singer of a band. Lead singer of a band. So for many years we've been in, we've been in the presence of fame and fortune. Is that right? What was the band?
Rigor Mortis? Was it Rigor? Was that the name of the band? No. Oh man, Google got that way wrong. You might want to have a word to them.
But encounter. Encounter is an unexpected meeting or an unexpected event that takes place in our lives. Unexpected. And so over this series we've been looking at A God encounter in our lives. A God encounter. And as I mentioned, if you hang around church, Christian people, believers long enough, you start to hear these stories that come out.
God encounters and things that you just go, whoa, I can't believe that. But like we'd spoke with Kev, that you can't deny it when it comes from people that have experienced it. So we look at a God encounter and we looked at the characteristics of our God. A God who has a relentless love and a God who has your number.
He's got your number. He's got, he knows everything about you and he wants the best for you. He wants you to reach your potential. That is God's plan. But here's the deal. Here's the deal. The unexpected part, the unexpected part of a God encounter is actually on our side. It's on our side. You see, we are the ones who are closed.
We're closed. You know, we know that we want something. We know that there's got to be more than this. There's, we know that there's, we've got something else to give in life, but we don't know where to look for it. We don't know where to look for it, don't where to find it. And we have this yearning and this purpose for more in our lives, like Ruth shared about on their very first week.
We have a need for love and for security. All of us have that. And we have it, we have that because that's how we're designed. We're actually made that way. It doesn't matter what your personality is like or what your interests are or where your talents lie. Every single one of us have that built into us because we are created that way.
That's, that's who we are. God. created us that way. There is a master creator, a master designer and he worked it all out and he thought about you. Did you hear that? He thought about you. When he was creating, he was designing, he thought about you. Let me read you a few words.
Ephesians, Bible here, look at that. The book of Ephesians chapter 1 and verse 4. It says for he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world. Now I don't know how old everyone is. We go around the room and get people to call that we won't do that.
But I'm pretty sure the creation of the world happened a little bit before most of us were born. So we're talking it was a long time ago, the creation of the world.
And Scripture says that He knew us, He thought about us before that even happened. He was thinking about you. That's what it tells me. God was thinking about you before the creation of the world even. And He gave us some little hints along the way. Some little hints, there's another one here. I've got to highlight, I've got a little sticky note in my Bible.
How many, how long ago did we do that? Goodness. Some little hints along the way. This is a well known scripture that we've used and heard a lot. It comes from the book of Jeremiah chapter 29 and verse 11. It says, for I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you.
That's always a good thing. Plans to give you a hope and a future. For I know the plans I have for you. It's written up here, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope. Now that is from the Old Testament, but it's the same God that we still listen to today.
God has a plan. He has a plan for your life. Now I really believe that there are people... here this morning. I just really felt this as I was getting ready through the week. I really believe that there's people here and maybe online that need to hear that. You need to hear that God has got a plan for your life.
He's got a plan for your life, and he's had it ready, and he's been working on it before the creation of the world even took place. He's got a plan, or maybe you've heard that before and you just needed to be reminded this morning. Just reminded that, hey, don't forget, God's got that plan for you. And church, it's a really good one.
It is a good one. We've heard about the relentless love of God that Kev shared about. A love that would stop at nothing. Stop at nothing, even to the point of giving up his own son, Jesus Christ, so that we could step into that plan. So when it comes to an encounter with God... When it comes to that unexpected meeting, the unexpected part is on our side.
Because as I'm reading here, it tells me that God had it planned all along. God's been working on it for a long time. So the unexpected part is on us and God is waiting. He is waiting for us to turn and go, wow, where did this come from?
He is waiting for us to turn around. Every now and then, He gives you a little tap on the shoulder. He gives you a little tap on the shoulder. It might be a nudge. It might be an event that happens, something that takes place in your life. Or it may be someone that you come across, that comes across your path.
Kev shared that story with his sister, those two guys. I believe, all my heart, I believe that they were angels. I believe in angels. Not a shame to say it. But every now and then God gives us a tap or a nudge, passes someone across your path to say something to you, to share something with you. And it's at that moment, that's that unexpected moment, and it's that moment when a switch turns on in your heart.
A switch turns on, something happens, something opens up. And we could go across the room. This is, this is the beauty about being in a church. We could go across the room and listen to people's stories about the moment that they had an encounter. The moment that that switch went off for them. And there's some awesome stories.
I've heard people's stories over the years. There's some awesome stories of how God tapped you on the shoulder and made you turn around and go, wow. For me, I was, I was a young teenager. It was January of 1984. So this January be 40 years. 40 years? I'm old! 40 years. I grew up in a, I grew up in a religious home.
We were devout Catholics. Our family came from a big family. We were devout Catholics. We would go to mass every Sunday, sometimes twice. I was an altar boy, yes, I wore the dress, I rang the bells, I swung the smoke, I did all that and you know I am grateful for my mum and dad for doing that for us as a family, for doing the best that they knew, to show us God and that was about it.
I knew about God growing up, I knew about him, the big guy in the sky, I probably was a bit scared of him even. And that's about as far as it went. And then when I was a young teenager I went along to a youth rally, a youth rally here on the Gold Coast at Miami Great Hall by the school there. Went to this youth rally and they had a band, it was really cool, it was all happening, I was like wow this is pretty cool and then this young guy got up and spoke.
Now he wasn't much older than I was at the time so I was like oh man, who's this guy talking? He got up and spoke and he spoke about God. He spoke about this God that loves me. This God that loves you. And he spoke about the relentless love of God. And he spoke about a God who wants to be part of your life.
He wants to be in your life. He wants to live through you and, and, and live for you. And I was like, what is this? That was like a tap on the shoulder for me. It's like this God, He told me all about this God that just wants to be part of my life. Wants me to be in Him. Wants me to, you know, wants us to open our hearts to Him.
And I thought, this is incredible. And that was my tap on the shoulder. This young guy said, if you'd like to meet this God, if you, if I could introduce you to Him and you can start your journey with Him, you know, put your hand up now. My hand shot straight up. I said, yes, please. I'll have that. That was 40 years ago.
40 years. Phew. Man.
And you hear those stories, those encounters. For me that was my encounter. That was my unexpected moment. I went along to that youth rally thinking, oh let's go see what's going on and listen to the band and there was an unexpected moment. The switch went off. So I want to encourage us. I want to encourage each person here and those online to, we need to learn to embrace the encounter, embrace it.
If we choose to respond to God's invitation, as I said, there's an action involved here. We respond to God's invitation to allow him to be in our lives, then flat out, flat out, I'm telling you, it will change you forever. It will change you forever. I believe there's someone here or some people here that need to hear that and maybe you need to re hear that because we can get stuck in a rut and keep going in the motions.
But flat out it can change your life. Now it's not all lattes and Tim Tams, alright that does sound nice, I think the cafe is open afterwards, but it's not, it's not all lattes and Tim Tams. Because, you've still got to do that little thing called life. Ha, ah, that gets in the way. You've still got to do life.
You still have struggles. You still go through storms. You're still going to have to deal with those people in life. But through all of it, if you choose to respond to God's invitation, if you choose to have Him living in you and living through you, then you get to have an anchor. that keeps you steady, keeps you steady when the seas rise up, when the storms come, you have that anchor that keeps you steady.
And it all starts with that encounter that God has, that we get to have with him. But we need to embrace it when you embrace that encounter.
You have that anchor that keeps you steady on your journey and church it is a faith journey. I'm not going to tell lies. It is a faith journey. But what's exciting is what Phil shared is that our God is a faithful God and he is a trustworthy God. If you want anyone on your side it's got to be him. He's the first one you pick for your team.
It's called a faith journey. We put our faith and our trust in God and we take one step at a time. One step at a time. We go through one day at a time. One, the next day at a time. Before you know it, 40 years has gone by. 40 years. Oh, you say it like that, it hurts.
It's a faith journey. You take one step at a time. I want to give you some key things to remember on this journey. Okay, some quick key things to remember. It's a faith journey and what we do is when you, when you embrace the encounter, when you respond to God's invitation, what you do is you step into a relationship with Him.
Step into a relationship. Now as I said, there's, this is probably something that most of us have heard many times but I really believe there's people that need to hear it again. There's even people here that need to hear this for the first time. That you step into a relationship with God when that happens.
And like any relationship you've got to work. You got to work at it. They don't just happen. Relationships don't just happen. You got to work at it. You got to communicate. It's like friendships or family or marriage or work colleagues. Any relationships you've got to work to make them work. And so you've got to learn to communicate, learn to talk, learn to listen to God's voice, learn to listen to God speaking to you.
Now he speaks in different ways sometimes, rarely, I haven't heard many people have this, but they orderly hear God's voice, like a hello voice, that'd be pretty amazing. But he speaks to us through other people, through other people we go to church with, other people that cross our path. But probably the best way that he speaks to us is through this, his Word, the Bible.
And you've heard us talk about it many, many times constantly here at our church. It's so important that we learn to read this as much as we possibly can. But we don't just read it, we digest it, we actually take it in. And I always like to pray, I actually pray a little bit before I start reading, I say, God speak to me today, show me something I haven't seen before.
And it's amazing what he does. So we learn to communicate, learn to listen to God, let him speak to you through this. And then we speak to him, we talk to him in prayer, develop a prayer life. Now prayer isn't some hoodoo crazy thing that goes on, it's just talking. Prayer is just talking to God. Talk to him as if he's sitting across the table.
Share with him your fears, share with him your happiness and your sadness. Tell him everything. Fill in the details. Give him all the details. He loves it. Loves to hear us speak. Wants to hear us speak. He wants us to talk to him. There's nothing you can not tell God. He knows all about us. So that works on that relationship.
We work on that relationship when we embrace the encounter. Another key thing is to spend time with other believers like we are right here this morning. Later on, all out having a coffee and doing what we do. Spend time with other believers. Be part of a church, be part of a Christian community, be part of a small group.
Spend time with other believers. You get to glean off each other, you get to encourage each other, strengthen each other. That's such a key thing to remember. Key, so important. We've said it before, I know Sam often says this, when you're not here in church we miss you. We miss you when you're not here. So make sure you get involved and get connected.
And last but not least, and this is probably major key is we need to learn to serve others, learn to serve others, learn to help others, learn to love others. I say this is a major key because generally this is one of the hardest things to do. It's hard. Serving others, helping others, loving others, but I guarantee you, if you do that simple act of loving others, you will become the best version of you that there possibly is.
The best version of you there possibly is comes when you set yourself aside and you put others first. Think about that for a moment. The best version of you. I want a bit of that. I want to be all I can be. So this morning I encourage us all to embrace the encounter, the unexpected event, the moment that God taps you on the shoulder and you can turn and say, wow, that is amazing.
At that moment. We have a choice to respond. We can respond to God's invitation. God's invitation to transform our lives.
He's got a plan. He's been working on it for a little while now and he's thinking about you. You.