Light of the World, a City on A Hill
…thinking out loud about living missionally in the city of Sydney so that the city will come to know Jesus…Archive for relationships
Festivities, Fireworks and Pumpkin Soup
Well the Annual Stanhope Fireworks festival happened last night (postponed from orginal timing because of rain).
It was a really great night…but let me start from the beginning:
We (Stanhope Anglican) had the opportunity to participate in the Festival in some capacity and after some strategising we decided we needed to do something that a) blessed the community and b) gave us opportunities to meet and talk to people.
From these objectives the idea of a soup stall came together and this is what we did.
We set up a big marquee with a serving table for dispensing soup and selling glow sticks. We also provided an area of tables and chairs where people could sit, relax and enjoy their soup. This was warmed by a couple of outdoor gas heaters to provide maximum comfort. To top it off, kids colouring activities were provided free of charge to help out the parents. The whole area was heavily branded with our logos, so there was no doubt as to who we were.
Aside form the glow sticks, Pumpkin soup was our sole product…and it was a winner. By the end of the night, we had sold over 170 cups of steaming soup. I can pin the success down to 2 factors: 1) the soup was really, really good (in fact a number of people told us it was the best they had ever tasted!) and 2) at $1 a cup, it was outstanding value on a cold night.
Now at $1 a cup we weren’t in it to make money (though I’m pretty sure we covered our costs). Our objective was community connection and to this end I believe God blessed our endeavours. 170 cups meant at least 100 connections with different people. Some of these were short (20 seconds) and some were longer (I had a few 5-10 min conversations). In all cases we were able to serve with a smile and a heart to bless.
If anyone is looking for a way to meet people and connect with their communites, getting involved in events like the Stanhope Festival is a great way to do it.
Connecting with Stanhope
The annual Stanhope Winter Festival & Fireworks is happening next weekend.
My church is using the opportunity to be involved and connect with our community in a hopefully meaningful way.
We had two aims in deciding what to do:
- Be a blessing to the people there
- Provide an opportunity to talk to people for a few minutes
To this end we are running a stall selling nice hot pumkin soup. To encourage people to stay and chat we are offering tables and chairs and free kids helium balloon decoration. All under some gas heaters which should be appreciated on what will be a cold night.
Please pray for us…
Fatherhood and Faith
I am a father twice over, about to make that third time lucky in June.
My eldest is almost 5 and is my budsky, my little man.
I am convinced that God invented fatherhood as a way of helping us dopey blokes understand, in some small way, how he relates to us as a father, indeed the Heavenly Father.
Consider Jesus’ words in Matthew 7:
Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! Matt 7:9-11 [ESV]
Since becoming a dad, this verse has made so much more sense to me. I LOVEto give gifts to my kids, especially my son. Sharing their joy at receiving a toy or gift is wonderful and enough to make my heart almost explode at times. I actually have to restrain myself from buying them more gifts than I do, lest I foster an expectation and lack of appreciation.
Being the gift giver also helps you understand that giving kids everything they want, when they want it does not produce thankfullness and character. Of course you then realise God does the same for us - not indulging our every want so that our character will be shaped and formed in Christlikeness.
Amen to that.
Playground Connection
I had a good Easter weekend. My main challenge was to keep refocusing my kids on Jesus and away from Chocolate and the Easter Bunny. Cursed Secularism!
Got along to services (I’ve stopped calling them “Church”) on Friday (Rouse Hill) and Sunday (Stanhope) both of which were encouraging times of remembering Jesus’ work on the Cross.
Numbers seemed a little down in my estimation. Some people were holidaying no doubt. I heard someone say, though, that a bunch of people were up at KEC (Easter Convention up the Mountains). Now churching up there is all good, but does this leave the gatherings back down the mountain somewhat anaemic on one of the days of the year where visitors are likely to be joining? Something to think about.
I took the kids to the park across the road yesterday for a play. Before long another dad came along with his two kids to do the same. I pushed past my natural tendency to keep quiet and introduced myself with a handshake. My new acquaintance and I chatted for 15 minutes, getting to know a bit about each other. He and his wife live around the corner and as we were parting company he told me to give him a call if ever I needed help with anything.
Wow. Just like that.
Connection is sometimes easier than we think.
Connect 09 is taking shape
I posted some time back some commentary/criticism levelled at the Sydney Anglican Diocese, which I felt had merit.
What particularly concerned me was the suggestion that the demographic of people typically in Anglican churches in Sydney was overwhelming either white or of Chinese heritage, middle-class, university educated and professional.
AB Jensen, who I have great respect for, has been doing a series of short video presentations in conjunction with the Connect 09program, which is the Syd Ang push for reconnecting with the Sydney community. In the most recent one (here) the Archbishop openly states that ” Anglican Churches have become very ‘Professional’ and that we need to break out of that ghetto”.
The more I hear from AB Jensen on what Connect 09 means, the more I like the direction the program is taking. What started out (in what was communicated at least) as some sort of bible distribution program, has started to take more of a missional shape. Ministers and Pastors are being encouraged to free up their diaries to focus on connecting with their communities. This is a good thing. And the recognition from the top that we have become way to demographically homogeneous is also a very positive message.
I am now looking forward to seeing Connect 09 come to life.
A Tale of Two Cities
I’ve been to bible study/growth group/home group/community group twice this week…once in Sydney and once in Melbourne.
I am a Sydney-sider so my regular group was on Tuesday night. I was in Melbourne for work on Wed night and was invited to visit a home group of some Melbournian friends of mine.
It was great. It is wonderful to be able to meet with God’s people in all sorts of different places.
Jesus truly brings a unity that transcends location.
What to do when Church Programs aren’t sucking your time
I posted a while ago here regarding what I saw as one of the downsides of an Attractional strategy, namely that the time taken in pursuing this approach meant less time for connecting with people and building relationships.
Well opinion was divided with some contending that even if some time was liberated, most people wouldn’t use it for connecting with people anyway, and in the meantime the churches program quality starts to suck.
This may well be true, but let me relate a story…
Some friends of mine are looking for a new church, and in the interim are not doing any “church ministry” i.e. no service involvement, no after hours meetings/sessions etc. My mate tells me that they now have so much extra time available which they are largely directing towards relationship building.
Now not everyone is as motivated as my friends (I love these guys, they are my model for building relationships), but surely we should think seriously about over-programming our people?
Counter Cultural Living - Part 4
Andrew Cameron (Social Exec Committee - Syd Anglicans) responds to a recent article in today’s SMH.
The original article is here. In it, the writer seeks to legitimise “middle age” women taking their happiness into their own hands and giving their less-than-perfect husbands the flick.
I really like Andrew’s response, and I think we can learn something from it.
He presents an alternative picture, of what it looks like to work through the trials of tribulations of marriage towards the deep sense of oneness that God intended (and not surprisingly even secular people yearn for). Cameron holds out his own marriage, not to boast, but to show this alternative picture grounded in reality.
I think this is what we must do.
How do you tell a women her child needs a good smack?
You may recall a post I did a while ago on “Smacking”.
Well, Miranda Devine (of SMH fame) has come out today with this piece on disciplining children.
She even manages to get a link in to the recent Corey Delaney story (you know the one…kid throws a party while the folks are away and 500 idiots turn up). Craig was concerned here that Corey was being unfairly hammered. It seems Devine would agree and she lays the blame mostly at Corey’s parents describing them as “laissez-faire baby-boomer parents who haven’t learned to say “No”".
Is this harsh? Some think so. Some contend that their parents didn’t really discipline them and they turned out alright.
Perhaps…it would be interesting to see a study on how kids were (or weren’t disciplined) vs how they turned out going into adolescence and adulthood.
The seekers are looking, but not in the Church
This article flashed up from the SydAng ‘vaults’ today, and Jodie McNeil proposes cancelling all evangelistic events (craft nights, sporting nights etc) in favour of ploughing the time & money released by doing so into upping the quality of the Sunday church service. The theory is that even the Christians don’t like church (which is probably true), so surely those non-attenders will also not like it, so let’s make it better.
I completely disagree (sorry Jodie).
I contend that most people (yes most, not a few or some) are not all that impressed with super slick church with all the artistic bells and whistles, wonderful cakes and glorious coffee. The result is that a large proportion of the community is not going to step foot into a church (aside from the occasional wedding or funeral) no matter how many times you ask them. Never.
The Kevin Costner approach (build it and they will come) simply will not cut it and is a poor use of resources.
So how do people meet Jesus? By God’s people showing Jesus to them, where they are (not on our ‘home turf’), through a missionally lived life. This will take a massive re-orientation of people’s perspectives and views of being the church (which was never about Sunday if you read the NT), but once you get ‘it’, thinking of the Sunday gathering as the locus of sharing Jesus just does not make sense.
