| |
Church Planting in the Adelaide
Hills |
|
| |
What's at the
heart of your church? |
Chris Edwards |
| |
It's
either an easy question - or a trick question. Saying
"God" or "Jesus" used to get me
through the Sunday School quizzes. Will these answers
work for me now?
Trick question or not, it seems to be a question that has
left many Parish Councils debating long into the wee
small hours of the night. And it has certainly produced
some long and cumbersome mission statements that only
fall off your tongue because of their sheer weight rather
than because of their profound simplicity. |
Ministers at Holy Trinity
Adelaide |
| |
I work at Holy
Trinity North Terrace in Adelaide. We too have been
through the process of developing a mission statement on
the way to developing a model for ministry. After looking
over the shoulders of churches both here and overseas,
our rector noticed that many of the statements told God
what that particular church would do for him. |
|
| |
Yet the Bible constantly
tells us the opposite. It makes abundantly clear what
God has done for us. |
|
| |
So as we developed our model
for ministry at Trinity we wanted to embrace the idea
that God's grace comes before anything we might attempt.
Any activities we undertake should be in response to his
grace to us in Christ. |
|
| |
But the question of what we
should do remained. We want to glorify God. We want him
and his name to be honoured. And, yes, we do want to do
it in response to his grace to us. But what do we do? |
|
| |
Oh no. Another trick question? |
|
| |
Actually it isn't so tricky.
Anyone seeking to glorify God needs to align themselves
with Jesus' mission – to continue his programme. And
he made clear what his program would be when he declared
in Matthew 16:18 that he would build his church. |
|
| |
The rest of the New Testament
reveals the initial stages of this program. As you read
the Scriptures you discover that disciples were made,
baptised and taught in accord with Jesus' Great
Commission. Even when these disciples were scattered to
the ends of the Roman World, they did not relinquish
their commission. They made disciples, and new churches
were planted to the ends of the earth. |
|
| |
Persecution, heresy and any
number of obstacles did not change Jesus' programme.
Whether evangelism was done by deliberate missionary
enterprise or through spiritual awakenings it led to, and
always will lead to, the building of his church. |
|
| |
Now if responding to God's
grace is really at our heart and seeking to glorify him
is the motive for our actions then Christ's programme,
building the church, must be our programme too. |
|
| |
Churches must be built on
Christ (1 Corinthians 3:11). That means we must preach
Christ alone. If we preach anything more it will be
significantly less. "Preaching" may well be
losing popularity. After all, in the post-modern 21st
century who wants to be preached at? But as Tony Campolo
warns in his book Following Jesus without embarrassing
God, we must not fall for the values and methods of
the post-modern domain. Churches will not be built by
relying on user-friendly methodologies that are dominated
by issues of musical style, dramatic presentations and
logo bearing T-shirts, drink bottles and baseball caps. |
|
| |
If there's one thing we have
discovered at Trinity it is this: there is no better
method for building the church than by preaching the
gospel. That's why we need more churches. Because
preaching the gospel of Christ will always lead to the
building of his church. |
|
| |
Trinity is South Australia's
oldest church. A Trust Deed that predates the State
allows us to own property. Now, I am no expert in
Anglican property ownership, but I am aware that we are
in an unusual situation. That Trinity can own its own
property is unusual enough but back in 1836 it was
absolutely vital. After all, there was no Diocese. In
fact when the Deed was written there were no other
churches, no other clergy and no other parishes. |
|
| |
By retaining the Deed we
continue to find ourselves in "unusual
situations" at a number of points. But property
ownership is not at our heart. We desire to respond to
God's grace by embracing Christ's programme for the
world. We want to build the church. |
|
| |
Historically Trinity has found
the most effective way to build has been by commencing
new congregations. Back in the early days of the State
this was done on horse back as the preacher from Trinity
rode to various locations around the new colony.
Following the Billy Graham Crusades of 1959 a real surge
in church attendances took place in Adelaide. A
congregation of people from Trinity were
"planted" in the suburban Parish of Kidman
Park. More recently we have planted congregations at our
city site. |
|
| |
We didn't wait until all the
existing congregations were full. We gathered people who
were keen to see the church built and we asked them to
form a nucleus for a new congregation: firstly at 11am
and then, a few years later, another at 5pm. |
|
| |
We developed teams of people
who would be available to serve these new communities as
welcomers, musicians, bible group teachers, crèche
carers and pastoral workers.
|
|
| |
This team approach proved
has proven to be very effective for us. |
|
| |
Bringing people onto our site
five times on a Sunday really stretches resources and
facilities. As I said, we have the oldest church building
in the State and although the National Trust is excited
by the old fashioned building materials in our
structures, we are not so thrilled by them. They really
need a lot of maintenance. Also, as we are right in the
middle of the city, parking is a constant problem. |
|
| |
Even before we commenced the
new congregations on our existing site ,we recognised
that if we were to continue to build churches we would
need to think about locating ourselves elsewhere. |
|
| |
We once again began the task
of seeking out people who would be willing to form the
nucleus of a group that could become a new congregation. |
|
| |
We have always worked hard at
keeping a good database of names and addresses of the
people who come to Trinity. And we never delete a name!
This proved really valuable when we started trying to
work out where a new congregation could be planted. We
were able to work out where our regular people were
living, where visitors came from and where we had
contacts details without people becoming regulars. They
would automatically find their way onto an invitation
list! |
|
| |
The Adelaide Hills stood out as
a place where there were a good number of
"contacts", as well as a number of potential
core team members. So we started inviting them home for
meals and prayer days to dream together and to share
tasks as we gathered information on the local area. |
|
| |
One thing we needed was a
building to gather in. And we had a few requirements to
satisfy. It needed to be near one of the main centres,
family friendly with good toilets and plenty of seating.
God graciously provided us with a Community Hall that has
a kitchen, basement, storage space for all our equipment
and easy access to a kindergarten. It also boasts new
toilets! The Hall is used three nights a week as a cinema
and the (padded) cinema seats have to be left out every
week. In other words, we don't even need to set up the
hall! The seats are there ready for us each week, as is a
huge screen for our Power Point presentations. |
|
| |
Once the team was starting to
get a vision for what could be done, people became very
generous. Gifts of money were received and we were able
to purchase a number of items to help Sundays run well.
But people also donated equipment. A photocopier, a data
projector – even interest free loans so we could
build a house/ministry centre. |
|
| |
We have been able to hold all
sorts of events. We have run clubs for kids in the local
school, built Gingerbread houses for Christmas and played
rounds of golf with local blokes. We have had café
nights and craft days. We have started home fellowship
groups and prayer triplets. We have arranged youth and
children's programs and set up a group of men to tackle
home maintenance for those who can't. |
|
| |
We don't really do anything too
radical. What we do is we preach the gospel. In fact, at
all these events and programmes there is one rule: the
gospel must always be preached. |
|
| |
And whenever the gospel is
preached you can expect opposition. Some people in the
area felt that it was a little strange that one Anglican
Church would set up in a suburb that already had an
Anglican church. Indeed, some felt we were very much
invading their territory. |
|
| |
Attempts were made to explain
what we were doing – and why. Even after a number of
meetings with the local clergy and some of their laity we
were still a strange phenomenon to them. |
|
| |
It is also true that the
Diocese was against our strategy. I think their concern
was over the potential for sheep stealing and confusion
over who had responsibility for the cure of souls in this
parish. Legally we were quite within our rights to do
what we did. Parish boundaries do not apply in Adelaide
in quite the same way as other places. We didn't make any
illegal border crossings. And remember that quaint old
Deed I mentioned? It gives us the opportunity to purchase
our own property. |
|
| |
My hope, especially now we have
celebrated an anniversary, is that the other Anglicans
will see that we aren't after "transplants."
There are tens of thousands of people living in this area
who have not heard the gospel. We need even more churches
if we are to continue Jesus' programme for this world and
if these people are to hear the good news. So we are
planning to plant again. Another congregation will soon
be set up so we can continue the building programme. |
|
| |
What has made the congregation
grow? God has. We may well plant new congregations and we
may even "water" them but God gives them the
growth (1 Corinthians 3:6). And he does it as we preach
the gospel. |
|
| |
We have had the privilege of
seeing some saved. Our vision at Trinity is for a network
of churches all around the city where the gospel is
preached. We need to continue to sow the seed of the
gospel and to plant more new congregations of Trinity
Church. |
|
