The past few weeks I had heard of so many of the struggles the churches in our city face in this “post-Covid” season. The low levels of reengagement from attendees all the way through to some pastors laying down their role in leadership really struck me. This led to several conclusions in my mind:

• Firstly, I am so thankful being part of this wonderful church and the wisdom in which we were lead through the pandemic!
• Secondly, the resolve to do only a few things in line with our mission rather than trying to fulfil all the needs of our community. This is the right route to take in this phase of the journey.
• Thirdly, being patient as people recover from the stresses due to all the environmental changes is important. People are still rebuilding capacity on an emotional, mental and spiritual level; and for some, even economically. 

The church is God’s only agent that will bring the gospel of God’s Kingdom to a world that is doing it tough – we therefore want to grow and plant strong faith communities.

'His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.'
Ephesians 3:10-11 NIV

We see this expressed in three decisions we made as a church at the end of last year:

1. We will take the first term of the year to have a broad-based discipleship process to help us align the 7 key areas of our lives with Christ’s purpose for us. For this we are running the Transformed Campaign.
2. It is biblical for all ministries to be led by strong teams, therefore we are focusing on re-establishing core teams for every critical ministry during this term.
3. We are reaching out to struggling congregations in partnership with Churches of Christ Victoria and Tasmania in order to empower them in this difficult season. 

Pray with us for God’s guidance in this, and build your capacity to be able to be His presence in every place!