Sunday 14 April 2024 - Co-Priest in Charge Report AGM 2024

And this gospel reading is such an encouragement for where we are as a parish at the moment: Jesus appears to his friends, he proves he really is alive. No, he says, it really is me. Give me a fish finger and I’ll show you! Just when you thought it was over, God has something to say. In the death and resurrection of Jesus, God had what seemed hard and revealed that God had it in hand all along.

I am the kind of person who likes a lot of change in life. I like ideas and new things and adventures. I feel like a squirrel, always with an eye out for the next shiny acorn adventure. But if I was one of those first disciples though I’m not sure I could have coped with the 180 turns they had to do as Jesus revealed himself to be alive after all.

So when there’s big change afoot, it’s really important also to stop and be grateful for where we have seen the presence of God at work among us, and to be thankful for what we have, which is what we get to do today.

I just wanted to share some of the fun and joy we’ve had this year. I love looking back through photos and celebrating what’s been happening. Whether you’ve been with us for ages or just a little while I hope you’re encouraged by this too.

I had to nail myself down to just a selection of photos to share which represent some of the life of our family of faith over the last 12 months, and I’ve done so through the lens of UP, IN and OUT.

[Rebecca talked some of the photos of the year that had been, including:

UP: sharing in worship together with Bishop Justin visiting; learning what it means to worship intergenerationally; celebrating together to mark moments of faith together as dedicated Natalie and Joshua Harper, and baptised Kane. We’ve learned and prayed together in lots of different ways, like our Church Camp, or Maundy Thursday dinner, or in the new Sunday Sanctuary service.

IN: being the family of God. We’ve continued our relationship with JNOC youth group and seen the benefits of the discipleship and leadership of young people. Laura Stone still helps to lead, as now does Edie on a Friday night. We’ve come together to have lots of fun, such as Christmas games, to work hard to make this place welcoming for our community; we’ve wrapped around each other when things have got tough, as we saw with Ray’s funeral just in the last few weeks.

OUT: letting people know they are so loved in the name of Jesus. Caring for creation and building links with the marae; making uniforms accessible for those who need them with huge numbers coming through; continuing to wrap around the Batchelor St flats every Wednesdays and with our termly all-in meals. Continuing to host veggie co-op and seeing massive growth and deepening in relationships with people who wouldn’t normally be in church through this ministry. People actually want to be prayed for, who will ask God for miracles of their own.

Above all, Richard and I continue to be so grateful for every member of our church whanau. We have a great culture: a network of support, so generous, with a willingness to give things a go, to get stuck in in our community.

Because I am such a squirrel who loves new adventures, I’m NGL, it feels odd to be here for a third AGM, and to be honest, to feel slightly frustrated, despite all the good stuff. There’s lots of great stuff going on, and plenty to celebrate, but Jesus, where’s revival? Where is our deeply embedded small group discipleship? Where’s our church plant in Woodridge? Where’s our beautiful new campus cafe with the composting toilets and the goat on the grass roof?

This gospel reading is really good at bringing us back to what’s important. It’s not about me. Or about you. It’s always about Jesus, real, alive, with us. It’s God’s plan all along. We see those absolute tenets of our faith in today’s reading, in the words of the resurrected Jesus himself:

Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46 He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47 and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

When we stick to the essence of what we are about, which is Jesus, we cannot go wrong. We have resurrection hope that Jesus is in the room. So there’s an encouragement today for us to persist. Keep going. Don’t lose heart or hope. We see Jesus showing the disciples that: ‘Possibility beyond the probable is the nature of religious hope.’ (Stephen Cooper).

So let’s look ahead at some of the things we’re looking forward to with that hope, and just to help remind us of our values as a community I’m going to use these as themes for our year ahead:

WE ARE PEOPLE WHO WORSHIP

We are feeling a really strong encouragement to commit ourselves as individuals and as a body to far deeper prayer. I heard a great quote the other day which is “the hinge of history is a bended knee.” God longs to be in deeper relationship with us and he does this through prayer. We won’t regret it, and we will see change as a result. We are invited to kneel before the Father and ask our God who loves us for what we need to do the work he asks for us - he doesn’t expect us to do it on our own.

Thy Kingdom Come, the Anglican Church’s global call to prayer is coming up soon as we lead up to Pentecost, so let’s take that opportunity to embed some great new individual and corporate prayer habits.

WE ARE DISCIPLES ON MISSION

It is the call of Jesus to go and share what we know - what Jesus said in today’s reading - with the world because people so desperately needs to hear that God loves them and through Jesus has set them free. This is the call of all of us - and one of the primary ways we learn to do this, and to care for each other as we do, is through small groups. Many of us did Lent groups which were a great start for this; we’ll be cranking off small groups again in the next week or two to meet fortnightly - please do take up the invitation to join a group if you haven’t already.

And we have already begun to advertise Alpha and have people sign up, which is fabulous. Please begin praying, if you haven’t already, that God will show you who to invite along, and then pray for courage to ask that person! Please also prayerfully consider if you could be on team for this.

INTERGENERATIONAL

We’ve continued on our journey of working out what it means to worship together as one family, and we’ve still got plenty to learn. We are feeling a particular call at the moment about what it means to support families who are multi-generational - so perhaps grandparents who are nurturing the faith of grandchildren, and also for families whose children have particular learning needs. What does it mean for us to be a welcoming space for them? What does supporting faith at home look like?

SEEKING CONNECTION WITH EACH OTHER AND COMMUNITY

Team team who visit Batchelor St Flats are considering what invitations from God might be next in order to meet the needs of residents there and deepen connection. Please do come along to shared meals across the year - the residents really appreciate these and it’s a great part of being disciples on mission. Next one will be a midwinter meal.

The same goes for Veggie Co-op - how can we grow and strengthen this team and make the most of the beautiful opportunities God gives us.

GENEROUS AND RESPONSIBLE WITH RESOURCES

We continue to go deeper on our journey as an Eco Church and will look forward again to some creation care activities in September. There are also some opportunities coming up within the Diocese to advocate to government for the environment, which we’ll share in due course.

And of course, we’re looking forward to getting traction with our property development project, which we’ll talk more about in the property report later.

Phew!

There’s a lot there eh but a lot of it is keeping on course with what we believe God has already called us to.

So to wrap up. Perhaps you’ve noticed today there are many mini-Jesus hiding all around our church. Richard bought these on a whim and they’ve been hiding around our house too in all sorts of odd places. But they’re appropriate for today and today’s gospel reading as Jesus appears again to his friends. One of my favourite church songs growing up, an old banger, was a classic 90s ballad: “I believe in Jesus”, with the line: “I believe you are here now, standing in our midst.” With Jesus in their midst, the disciples in our reading moved from fear behind locked doors, to wonder and worship at who Jesus is, to taking amazing risks for Jesus and the good news. Let’s be like that too as we carry on with the adventure we’re given. With Jesus in our midst we have nothing to fear and everything to gain. And so, as we look ahead to Pentecost, let me finish with Paul’s blessing to the Romans:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that you may overflow with hope in the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15.13)

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