Hi everyone,
Alix and I and some of our team have had a brilliant week in Sydney at Hillsong. The theme this year was “Speak We’re Listening”, which was a great theme woven throughout the week; the importance of not just knowing God but recognising and tuning in to His voice.

Last night the message was powerful but incredibly personal to nearly all of the 30,000 people in the arena. Jenzen Franklin talked about Jacob wrestling with God.

We’re probably familiar with the thought that Jacob was not prepared to let go of God until He was blessed. But why did he need to wrestle all night? It wasn’t like God was struggling to over power him. The wrestle was all about Jacob – not God! God doesn’t change, nor does He need to prove Himself.

What God did need to do was get all of Jacob out of Jacob, so much so that He gave him a brand new name, which meant, “He who prevails or presses into God”. The struggle was to come to grips with who he really was and get to a point where he had “Power with God and favour with Man”.

Maybe we need to be more intentional or even aggressive as we press into God for the things that we’re believing for. As we do, He can bless us because we are empty of ourselves and can receive. We have a new name; the one that God has given us, not the one from our past, our disappointments, our hurts or people’s perceptions.

This Sunday let’s press into God like never before, walk in His favour and expect great things!

See you in church,

Dave

Dear Church,
This Sunday is Kingdom Foundation Sunday! It is an exciting day in our year!

We’ve have enjoyed a brilliant first half of 2015 as we‘ve been focusing on doing things different this year. But, the year is not finished, there is still so much to look forward to, so much to get excited for and so much to believe for.

We are part of such a generous church. Every week people give sacrificially toward our weekly tithes and offerings and once a year we commit with generosity to our Miracle Offering & Heart For The House Offering. This year we have combined the two into one offering called Kingdom Foundation. Our Kingdom Foundation is all about; Building the Church and Blessing the Community.

THIS IS OUR TIME – we are here to make an eternal difference and contribute to something significant. At Energizer we are building a Kingdom Foundation – a foundation that will remain.

Kingdom foundations stand in hostile environments; they stand the test of time and support and carry future generations into their God given purpose. Together we can build something that is not only significant, but that will make an eternal difference.

As we approach this Sunday please pray about how you can be part of making an eternal difference and building a Kingdom Foundation. We are better together.

Our vision won’t be realised by one or two individuals, but it’s a vision that will require everyone to play their part. You can be part of the solution – Regardless of our background and experience, God wants to use us as builders. We’re building lives, we’re building families, we’re building hope, we’re building faith, we’re building the spiritual climate of our City and we’re building generations.

We are builders: whether that’s building the church here in Hobart and across our local region or planting churches in Nepal, we choose to partner with Jesus who said ‘I will build my Church’.

We are here to make a difference – we’ve been blessed to bless others. What’s your part in this year’s solution?

See You Sunday!

Ps Dave & Alix Morse
Senior Pastors
Energizer Church

“Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord for we walk by faith, not by sight”. 2 Corinthians 5:7

Life as a high school teacher (and a mum, and a wife, and a leader, and a friend, and a plain old human being!) is a crazy juggle. I’ve written about this before, but lately it’s been on my mind more that usual. Lately, I’ve been feeling like my brain and my diary are so full of curriculum documents, marking folders, parent phone calls, classroom displays and staff meetings, that my faith can’t possibly be making any impact in my workplace. How could it? I barely have time to talk to God during a work day, let alone talk to anyone about him!

It is not unreasonable for me to think like that, amidst my busy teaching day, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised (again) by God. It turns out, and hold onto your hats; this is revolutionary, that God’s ability to move is not hampered in anyway by my limitations. Just because I can’t see what he is up to, doesn’t mean he is inactive.

Most of the time, I don’t see God moving in my work life. It’s like a really overcast day in a way; I can’t see the sunshine, I can’t feel the warmth, but I know that it is still sustaining life. That’s walking by faith, trusting in a God whose hand you can’t always see working. And every so often, those clouds part and for a glorious moment, I get the see those rays of sunlight beam down and do their thing.

This week, I got one of those glorious moments. I have one particularly student in my grade eight class whose journey up to this point has not been an easy one for a number of reasons, not least the death of his mum last year. Needless to say, there are days when this young man finds every day school stuff difficult to cope with and by extension, I find his behaviour difficult to cope with. The only thing I know how to do in these situations is pray. I’ve driven to and from work with this broken up, angry, emotional kid on my mind, pouring out my frustrations and hopes for him to God, asking him to help me.

Prayer changes things. Gradually, on those days when I haven’t been able to see anything happening, a trust has been developing. Opportunities that I never could’ve anticipated have arisen. I even got brave and, at the prompting of the Holy Spirit, had a very frank conversation with this student about our lovely new school psychologist and how she might be able to help him get to the bottom of some of the things that stop him being the kid he wants to be. Needless, to say, we fought about it, but I am the grown-up so I won.

Reluctantly, he trudged off to his first appointment, shooting me the world’s dirtiest looks. I watched him go, asking God whether this might be the end of the relationship I had so carefully nurtured, unable to see the sunshine peeking through the clouds.

At the beginning of recess, the same young man was back in my classroom, waiting for me to pack up. On my way out, without looking me in the eye, he held out a chocolate bar he had bought me at the canteen on his way back down from the psych’s office.
“I just wanted to say thank you”.

It’s not about the chocolate; it’s not even about the thank you. The sunshine that came pouring through the clouds that morning was one young person who realised that I was not going to give up just because it was hard and that maybe he was even worth the fight. God is moving all the time, even in the mundane, even when we can’t see the sun for the clouds.