by Zac Wille
As we begin the journey of re-pioneering the Navigators ministry at the University of Otago, we are aware of our need for God’s provision. Walking alongside people, investing in them, and seeing them grow in understanding and in living out the gospel is spiritual work. We depend on God in this work; he provides faith (Ephesians 2:8-9), and he carries on his work until the day of completion (Philippians 1:6). As we’ve spent the last year and a half preparing for re-pioneering and being down here on the ground, prayer has been a key part of our ministry.
Tim and Leah Simpson, the National Student Leaders for The Navigators of New Zealand, have prayed Isaiah 61:4-7 for student work in New Zealand for over a decade. These verses captured our hearts as we trusted God to use us in Dunedin. In Isaiah 61, it says, “they will rebuild the ancient ruins, and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities…strangers will shepherd your flocks; foreigners will work your fields and vineyards.” God’s heart was to rebuild and reestablish what was lost for the Israelites, and he used foreigners and strangers in the process.
Similarly, one of our hopes over the last decade has been to reestablish student work in New Zealand, and God has involved outsiders, mainly Americans and Canadians, in this process. For us, these verses clarify our contribution to the Navigators of New Zealand. Our hope and prayer is that God would use us to raise up the next generations of leaders and labourers in New Zealand, so that they might be “priests of the Lord…ministers of our God.”
As we’ve been in Dunedin and praying for God to use us, we’ve prayed for two types of people: people of peace and people of influence. We have prayed that God would connect us with non-believers who are warm toward the gospel and warm toward us (people of peace). And we have been praying to connect with students and spaces where we can meet networks of people, rather than just isolated individuals (people of influence). Our team has also been intentional in being on campus and building relationships with students. We’ve explored various avenues for connecting with people—everything from walking up to strangers to conducting surveys, joining clubs at the University, and engaging with people at the gym or run club.
At our end-of-semester staff meeting, we made a list of the students we’ve connected with and found we have 56 students, 28 believing and 28 non-believing, whom we befriended and started getting to know. While our hope and prayer are for depth, discipleship, and faith for many of these students, we give thanks to God for them and feel the Lord’s provision in these relationships.
One of our key promises, which we are praying, is taken from Isaiah 41:17-20. In this passage, Isaiah talks about how “the poor and needy search for water,” and how God will answer them, so that “people may see and know, may consider and understand, that the hand of the Lord has done this.” Our prayer is that God would lead us to the poor and needy in spirit, those searching and longing for more. We desire to be a ministry that reaches the lost, and we’re praying that, through the ways God uses us, many would see and know, consider, and understand who the Lord is, and put their faith in him.
As we continue to reach students on campus, we are mindful that God draws people to Himself and paves the way for connections. We have a God who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.