Wanted: Youth Pastor

PCCBC is seeking to appoint a Youth Pastor/Worker. This is the Position Description.

Salary & Conditions: This is a two day (0.4) position. Salary will be based on a proportion of the BUV Pastor’s Stipend according to qualifications and experience. Conditions will be as per BUV guidelines.

Background: Point Cook Community Baptist Church has new secondary school age young people attending worship services joining our small number of existing young people. Given the growth area in which we minister, such a trend may well continue. Successive attempts at offering youth activities have not been able to be maintained by volunteers, especially given the small number of young people, and the difficulty of scheduling and developing a core base. We are also concerned for the increasing number of young people hanging around in the local area without anything to do and looking lost. The local papers are currently highlighting the strategic need for services for young people in our area. PCCBC is committed to being part of the response to this need. There will be many council (and other) grants available to us in the future for projects that address youth issues. Therefore, there are significant ministry opportunities for our church and specifically for the appointed youth pastor. These include: the pastoral care and gift development of our current young people, developing a core group, assessing local youth needs, and establishing PCCBC as a credible youth service provider in our local community. Support and supervision will be available. The youth pastor position is a church appointment, and is responsible to the PCCBC steering committee through the senior pastor. Other information about PCCBC can be gained from our website http://www.pointcookcommunitybaptistchurch.org.au/.

The Position will involve:
· Planning and conducting youth activities
· Strategically grouping the young people – so that they will want to meet together regularly and form a core group (which is easy to promote to newcomers and in the community)
· Developing greater youth involvement in Sunday morning services
· Pastoral care of young people and their families
· Youth mentoring arrangements – we would consider our older young people as potential leaders who need to be developed in this direction
· Local mission through connecting with community groups and places of gathering e.g. City of Wyndham groups, Point Cook Town Centre, McDonalds; and volunteering (on our behalf) in the community
· Involvement at the Point Cook Market & Christmas By The Lake
· Where helpful, liaising and cooperating with other local church youth groups and their leaders
· Preaching at Sunday Worship (especially if also theological graduate or student)
· Meetings with supervisor, pastor, steering committee and membership

The Successful Candidate will have:
· Previous involvement in Christian based youth programs
· Previously exercised leadership roles in a church setting
· Completed or currently undertaking youth leadership/ministry training course
· A growing relationship with God, a commitment to follow Jesus in everyday living, a deep love and concern for the well-being of young people, and a keen sense of the value of a church community to a young life
· Initiative as a self-starter, but also be a team player, good communicator, and able to effectively report back progress and/or difficulties
· Proficiency in modern methods of information sharing
· A demonstrated capacity to address position description
· A desire to take up opportunities of professional development (including the formulation of a BUV PDP)
· A current Working With Children card and police check

Applications can be made in writing and sent with current resume and referees to: warren.hodge@pointcookcommunitybaptistchurch.org.au, or addressed to:
Rev Warren Hodge Point Cook Community Baptist Church PO Box 6080 Point Cook 3030
For more information email or call 93958253

"Generous Hearts" - a sermon on 2 Corinthians 8 & 9

RECOMMENDED FILM TO GO WITH THIS THEME IS: "PAY IT FORWARD" (2000).

Paul in chapters 8 & 9 of 2nd Corinthians was trying to motivate members of the churches in Corinth about supporting the poor in the city of Jerusalem. This is something that the church officials back in Jerusalem had asked Paul to remember whilst he went off on mission to the Gentile peoples. But it is also something that Paul was keen to do anyway.

As we well know, God is not pleased that the vast resources that he has given to planet Earth have not been distributed well or fairly! Paul was certainly aware of this, and where possible was going to promote some micro-solutions.

In doing so, Paul was not averse to using some strategy, in this case, telling the Corinthians what great givers others had been (even those who could be regarded as struggling themselves). Later he said that he would like to boast back how generous the Corinthian church had proved to be!

It was in chapter 8 and verse 1, that Paul commends the Macedonians for their generosity, and describes this in terms of being a demonstration of God’s grace amongst them. Despite their poverty they gave “... even beyond their means” (8:3). And so he was using the Macedonian example to stir up the Corinthians ... something like: Emma has raised a lot for the 40-hour famine, how will Anna go? It would be great to boast back to Emma that Anna was in front!

Now apparently the Corinthian Christians had been preparing to make contributions to the Jerusalem poor for a year now, but needed to be challenged that it was time to act. Paul in one of the great fundraising statements of all time says, “I do not say this as a command, but I am testing the genuineness of your love against the earnestness of others” (8:8).

Paul then draws a vivid analogy with the generosity of Jesus in his work of salvation on our behalf – that he became “poor” so that we who were spiritually “poor” might become spiritually “rich” (8:9). This analogy also reminds us that we cannot divorce our spirituality from the material needs of the poor. To give to the poor is a practical application of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. Through Jesus (the glorious Son of God) becoming “poor” and dying on the cross, the Macedonians understood that God loved and accepted them. They knew they were God’s loved children and so they were free to love others and be rich toward their neighbours who were also precious to God.

There should be a mutual and global style “eagerness” to right the wrongs of injustice; as Paul writes, “I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may be for your need, in order that there may be a fair balance” (8:13-14). One at this point senses that Paul was the radical ‘socialist’ seeking a major distribution of wealth. But this was not going to happen through governmental decree or policy, but rather happen through the transformation of human hearts, attitudes, ethics and priorities.

Here Paul seems to quote from Exodus (16:18) and the incident of the manna descending from heaven – “The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little” (8:15). What a grand vision!

Paul reassures us that there is enough food and resources for all of us. God created a good world and we are designed to use our resources to care for each other. The poverty of the Macedonian Christians means they have every reason to think that they need to look after themselves and keep what they have to themselves – but strangely, they don’t! They want to share, and trust that they will have enough to provide for their own needs.

I spend a fair bit of time around about boasting about this church and the good work it’s doing within the local community. Later in chapter 8:24 and then into chapter 9, Paul says that he will be able to boast about the church in Corinth (as he did about the Macedonians) as they prove their love in their eager generosity. Yet it seems this is said more as a motivation than a commendation – something like ... ‘I have spoken highly of you – don’t prove me wrong’ ... ‘I’m expecting great things of you – don’t let others see you fail’!

It’s then somewhat ironic, given the pressure being applied, when Paul then says, “... so that it may be ready as a voluntary gift and not as an extortion” (9:5b). Yet, this gives us a picture of what can happen when someone is committed to a cause, even when they know they cannot control the outcome any that any response is voluntary – they press hard on their theme – like any good preacher – and why not! Paul was trying to promote, coerce, almost oblige, there to be open hearts of generosity (counter-cultural and way beyond what was normally encountered). For this would be the natural implication of following Jesus ... who was (as has already been pointed out) the epitome of generosity!

Yet this need for generosity to be a voluntary act is supported later (in verse 7) where Paul promotes the idea of the “cheerful giver” as opposed to the “reluctant” giver. A “cheerful” giver is the only type of giver God wants. So, does this mean that if we can’t be “cheerful” about giving then we have a get-out clause? Absolutely not!! Bringing all these thoughts together, it means that if we can’t be “cheerful” about giving, then we have to have a work done on us by God’s Spirit to change our attitude ... and then “cheerfully” give!

And so the idea is that we don’t have any excuse to not be generous; any thought of our own poverty is no excuse; a bad attitude is no excuse; and we can say being uninformed is no excuse either. Back in 9:6, Paul says – “... the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully” (which sounds like Proverbs 11:24 – “Some give freely, yet grow all the richer; others withhold what is due, and only suffer want”). There is a sense here of participation in something bigger, something worthwhile, something transformative, something that works for good i.e. God’s mission in the world. And through participation in God’s mission, there comes a great level of satisfaction and purpose and hope and peace.

Paul continues to make this point as he then quotes from Psalm 112:9 – “He scatters abroad, he gives to the poor; his righteousness endures forever” – which Paul uses, given what follows, in the sense of our generosity connecting with, developing and revealing our own quality of right living, which then in turn reflects back glory upon God.

In Paul’s world it was the struggling poor of Jerusalem that was the ethical issue for the more well-off Jesus followers to consider. Yet Paul was elevating a basic principle: the need for us to have generous hearts and be able to naturally respond to human tragedy, suffering and need. Where is there need today? Right across the world! But some countries and some areas are far worse off, and far more effected by poverty and climate change and the global financial crisis.

Our 21st Birthday - a Reflection on the Parable of the "Prodigal Son" - 'This is our Story' (Luke 15:11-32)

Most of you have heard the story about when I lost my DVD movie camera. There was a real sense of loss for those four or so hours while it was missing. The loss of a camera I really loved, and had spent so much time learning how to use well … I’d even shock horror read the instruction book! Then there was the disc inside with the last part of our Hawaii holiday. I’d in some way felt that I had lost something that was so much a part of me. It had been my constant companion the past couple of weeks. Then the joy when it was returned … after the initial sense of relief, it was certainly time to celebrate!

Now I’ve lost my little brown leather covered notebook, with all sorts of bits and pieces written in it – another sense of loss, not just the notebook, but this new tendency I’ve got to lose things.

God suffers feelings of loss when someone goes astray, but ever more so rejoices when someone is found. Let’s look briefly at Jesus’ story of the prodigal son … for in one way or another – this is also our story!

The younger son of this loving father wanted to do things his own way, and do so with his share of the valuable resources that his father had nurtured over so many years. For a son to ask for his inheritance ahead of time and before his father had died, in the world of Jesus’ time, was a gross violation of the required respect and honour. This was like saying, “Dad, I wish you were dead (so I can have what is coming to me)”. So this was an act of complete rejection of his father. Yet, despite certain disappointment, we don’t hear any thought of the father refusing this request, for his son had been given freewill to make his own decisions in life.

To hear that the son then gathered all his things together, suggests that he was intending to leave permanently. We should not be surprised that things went really badly for this son. Although we are not given the reason behind his wander lust, it seems that the son had an over-confident go-it-alone type attitude reflected in what Jesus described as “wild living”. This also reflects a live-for-today and a don’t-worry-about-tomorrow attitude, which might provide some initial pleasure, but will soon come up short. This sort of wasteful living often seeks to quell or relieve a lot of pain, and we can compassionately understand where the prodigal son might have been coming from.

This younger son had distanced himself from his father and family, and really began to waste his life. He did really hit rock bottom ... even envying the food that the pigs were eating. He had sold himself into slavery, perhaps to a rich pig producer. The independence that he had so much sought had been so brief, before turning in a really bad direction. All the vast resources of the father had been wasted. And as a Jew caring for pigs as a slave of a Gentile … culturally it can’t get any worse than this! Even the pigs were better off!

Yet it is clear that the father had never given up on this son. There was the real hope, even the expectation, that one day the son would come to his senses and return to the family home. The father loved the son wholeheartedly, completely and passionately. We hear in this story that indeed this prodigal son ‘came to himself’! This is to say that he had a good hard look at himself, and also considered again the relationship that had always been on offer with his father; and he headed for home looking for mercy.

This prodigal son had a real sense of regret for his wild and wasteful living, and for the hurt and concern that he had caused his father. He was so repentant and so desirous of home, that he was willing to exchange his slavery to a pig farmer to take up a role with his father’s “hired labourers” … who even had a lower status than slaves. He was now, having been failed by his quest for independence, prepared to forget that he was a son and take on a position of a hired worker. After all, in effect he had divorced his family by his previous actions, and he had no right to even think he would be accepted back on the property.

Yet, when the father found out that the son was returning, this loving father would have nothing of that! He would not reject his son from his family, and the son would not even have to slip quietly unnoticed in the back door. An expression of regret (as seen in his ‘about turn’ home) would be enough for the son to be fully forgiven and restored to his former glory.

There was the father awaiting, looking out, anticipating, and even willing the son’s return. And when this father caught a glimpse of his son in the distance, he did something very unusual for an eastern gentleman ... he threw out all convention concerning dignified action, and ran out to meet his son in full public view; you can just imagine him dancing for joy and calling out, “My son has returned”! He grabbed his son and hugged him and kissed him. This was a time for a party!

In one way or another – this is our story. We are the younger son who has been invited to party with God. Everyone who has been a part of this church has experienced God's love like this. God has forgiven our selfish behaviours and poor decisions and drawn us back into his family. In the midst of all our pain and sorrow, God welcomes us back into his kingdom, and accepts us afresh to where we belong. This is certainly something to celebrate!

Not only was the younger son gifted with forgiveness, but also with the best long robe, a beautiful ring, and really great sandals – denoting his return to honour within the family. Not only are we gifted with forgiveness, but we are given everything that we truly need when we need it. I’m thinking here mainly of the gifts of Holy Spirit given for the broad community good – so that we can be effective in our church, local community and world. And so our celebration we have is not just about ourselves … far from it. This is a celebration that embraces any and all others who may be prepared to listen to the good news.

We would not like to be like the party-pooper older brother, so full of his own self-importance, and so jealous, that he couldn’t see any point to such a party; in fact he completely refused to take any part in it. The older brother, even though he had been mightily blessed himself and lacked for nothing, was inflexible to these changing circumstances and the change of heart in his brother. He showed a hard-hearted attitude as he referred to his younger brother as his father’s son (“this son of yours”) rather than as his own brother (v.30).

We, on the other hand, want to be open to God outworking his love far and wide. God is on mission in the world and calls us to continue to partner with him. How many people have experienced God's love here through this church over 21 years? A good many … no doubt a real good many! But more to the point, how many people will experience the love and grace of God through this church in the next few years?? Are we expectant, anticipating all sorts of surprises and homecomings!?!

We can truly celebrate today this gathering of prodigals who are committed to connecting with other prodigals in Jesus' name.

“Let us celebrate and party away, [for] we have purpose with God every day”.

And by the way, has anyone seen my lost brown notebook – it needs to be found!?!