Your Malta

Good morning, church! It’s great to be back with you. As many of you know, I’ve spent the last month in the US at a church planting conference.

Something you might not know about me is that I have a deep passion for church planting. I love finding new ways to reach people who haven’t heard the gospel, and I believe church planting is the most effective evangelistic tool we have.

On that note, my role here looks a little different this year. I’m spending 50% of my time with the church plant we launched a few years ago. In the 50% I have with the congregation, I’ll mainly be focusing on catalysing our teens and young adults to become effective leaders, and it’s been great to see how God is already using this generation for his purposes.

Speaking of missionary adventures and church planting, we’ve been following the journey of the greatest church planter of all: the apostle Paul.

Paul’s dream of Rome

Paul goes on several missionary journeys, and during his third he writes the letter to the Romans. In it he reveals his big dream: to go to Rome, use it as a home base, and then head to Spain, which he saw as the ends of the earth (Romans 15:23–24). He doesn’t just want to plant churches locally anymore. He wants to take the church global.

In Acts, Paul returns to Jerusalem with a gift for the poor and is arrested after a riot breaks out. For the next two years he sits in a prison cell in Caesarea. When he’s about to be sent back to Jerusalem for what would be a biased trial, he plays his trump card as a Roman citizen: “I appeal to Caesar!” (Acts 25:11). That’s how he secures a fair trial in Rome. But he isn’t going to Rome only because of a legal appeal. It’s part of God’s purpose and a missionary strategy.

So Paul heads to Rome, believing it’s the fulfilment of God’s promise. And on the way he ends up somewhere completely unexpected.

Unexpected places

Have you ever ended up somewhere unexpected while travelling? There are two schools of thought when it comes to travel. One is organisation, details and spreadsheets. The other is to go with the flow. Which one are you?

I’m definitely the second, so I’m always ending up in unexpected places, like Nebraska Avenue, or hitchhiking. I think going with the flow is the way to travel, because the unexpected stories are the ones you remember: the ones that weren’t part of the plan.

The journey to Rome

Paul warns the crew not to sail because it’s the wrong season. They ignore him, and of course Paul is right. They’re caught in a storm and stranded at sea for fourteen days. Everyone on board loses hope and stops eating.

Right in the middle of it, an angel tells Paul, “Do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand trial before Caesar; and God has graciously given you the lives of all who sail with you” (Acts 27:24). Paul encourages everyone to eat. After fourteen days they finally see land and decide to run the ship aground. The soldiers think about killing the prisoners, but because the centurion likes Paul, they don’t. Those who can swim make it to shore, and the rest float in safely on planks.

They discover they’ve landed on a tiny island called Malta. No one had really heard of it. Where on earth is Malta? (Here’s a map.)

Paul had spent a decade planning his moves, two years praying in a prison cell for a way to Rome, and two weeks fighting for his life in a storm. Then he finally hits land, not at the docks of Rome but on a muddy beach on an unknown island. Instead of standing before Caesar, he’s standing before islanders with some pretty funky beliefs. That’s where we pick up the story.

Once safely on shore, we found out that the island was called Malta. The islanders showed us unusual kindness. They built a fire and welcomed us all because it was raining and cold. Paul gathered a pile of brushwood and, as he put it on the fire, a viper, driven out by the heat, fastened itself on his hand. When the islanders saw the snake hanging from his hand, they said to each other, “This man must be a murderer; for though he escaped from the sea, the goddess Justice has not allowed him to live.” But Paul shook the snake off into the fire and suffered no ill effects. The people expected him to swell up or suddenly fall dead; but after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god.

There was an estate nearby that belonged to Publius, the chief official of the island. He welcomed us to his home and showed us generous hospitality for three days. His father was sick in bed, suffering from fever and dysentery. Paul went in to see him and, after prayer, placed his hands on him and healed him. When this had happened, the rest of the sick on the island came and were cured. They honoured us in many ways; and when we were ready to sail, they furnished us with the supplies we needed.

— Acts 28:1–10

Shipwrecked in Malta

Malta wasn’t part of the plan. Paul was heading for Rome and instead took a detour to a tiny dot in the Mediterranean, small, insignificant and not in the plan at all. And it wasn’t even his fault. He ended up there because the crew wouldn’t listen to him.

Have you ever been on your way to the “Rome” of your life, chasing a career goal, a relationship or a ministry dream, only to find yourself shipwrecked in a “Malta”? A place that feels insignificant, messy, and definitely not part of the plan?

Paul shook it off

Look at how Paul responds. He doesn’t sit on the shore sulking about everything that’s gone wrong, how he isn’t in Rome, how he’s lost all his luggage. He serves. The great apostle is picking up sticks for the fire. He isn’t too big for the little tasks.

Then, just when you think things can’t get worse, a viper comes out of the fire and bites him. The locals decide he’s a murderer, then decide he’s a god. Paul doesn’t care about either label. He just shakes the snake off into the fire.

Then he accepts the islanders’ hospitality and heals the chief official’s father. After that, the rest of the island’s sick come to him, and he ministers to them in word and in deed.

Paul never plays the victim. He shows up and looks for who he can serve, paying attention to the needs around him, whether that’s picking up sticks or praying for the sick.

Purpose comes not from knowing your what but from knowing your who. We sometimes overcomplicate purpose and calling, as if they’re something we have to go searching for. But purpose is found in the people God has placed around you, and in choosing to be a blessing wherever you are.

Strategic stumbling

The most amazing moments in ministry are rarely the ones we strategise. They’re the ones we stumble into. Ministry is really all about strategic stumbling. God works in the messy everyday.

Maybe you’re in a workplace you don’t like, a house that feels temporary, or a season of weakness you’re trying to pray your way out of. We should make plans and pray for them to come to fruition. But if they don’t, it’s because God has something better in store. There’s an opportunity in every season, even the unexpected ones that make no sense.

Paul spent three months in the obscurity of Malta, and his ministry there was both serving and doing good, and sharing the gospel. Malta turned out to be a high point in Paul’s ministry, a time of blessing when God worked in marvellous ways and Paul’s spirit was refreshed. But it came in an unexpected place that looked like a disaster.

Paul writes about the hardships of ministry in 2 Corinthians, and remember, he wrote this before Malta:

Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was pelted with stones, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my fellow Jews, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false believers. I have laboured and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked. Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn? If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness.

— 2 Corinthians 11:25–30

God works in unexpected places because uncertainty exposes our human weakness and makes us depend on him more. Paul had learned that the only thing worth boasting about is his weakness, because that’s where God’s strength comes through.

Jesus in our Malta

Jesus is the ultimate example. The gospel is a picture of God’s power taking on human weakness in an unexpected place, and it was in that weakness that God’s glory shone through. Jesus too was beaten, stretched out and left to hang cold and naked, through no fault of his own, and in it God’s glory was revealed in an unexpected way. He felt everything Paul felt, and more. His greatest struggle, too, was the burden he carried for the people he loved.

For Paul, Malta was a detour that wasn’t in his plan. For Jesus, who is God, the cross looked like a detour, but it was the plan all along, to save and redeem. Jesus was stretched and struck so that we could be healed.

So in the unexpected places where you feel the full extent of your weakness, know that God does his best work there, and that he has been there himself.

Your Malta

Church, we serve an extraordinary God who loves to use ordinary, shipwrecked people. Today you might feel like you’re in Malta. You’re tired, things haven’t gone to plan, and you feel weak. But I want to tell you this:

• Your Malta has a purpose.
• Your Malta is the start of something new.
• Your Malta is a time to show God’s glory.

It’s not wrong to want to go to Rome, and you’ll probably make it there at some point. But right now you’re in Malta. In Malta it’s not the time to curl up in a ball and be angry that you’re not in Rome. It’s the time to serve, and the time to be refreshed.

If you’re ready to stop living for yourself and step out in faith into the unknown, for God’s purposes and his glory, choosing to serve and to do something new, I invite you to stand with me.