Identifying our mission area

Looking Out 17.7.22

Like many others, I was looking forward to a game of golf last Friday. The sun was out and there was no rain! I had my clubs ready, my golf shoes next to my golf bag and all the other paraphernalia needed for a game in the various pockets of the golf bag. What I couldn’t control was the amount of rain that fell in the days before Friday causing the management of the club to close the course for the seventh consecutive day.

There are some parallels to the above (sad) story with the place our church finds itself in today. In response to the newly identified mission field we have identified in the local area around the church, there is a desire to get out and get going. We have completed nigh-on two years of discussion and conversation with various parties, in particular West Epping Uniting Church, but also Marsden Road Uniting Church, with agreement in principle on what the future of mission and ministry should be.

A joint meeting of the Church Councils from Carlingford and West Epping met on 18 June and agreed on a new, combined vision statement and agreement to complete the Congregational profiles, reflecting the mission and ministry model agreed, as a matter of some urgency. This has happened and the profiles have been sent to the Presbytery Pastoral Relations Committee who has endorsed them for forwarded them to Synod.

Rather than rain, we have had some questions regarding process, directed back to us. These are not game-breakers, but they have the potential to slow the process that was initiated on 18 June.

The two Church Councils have discerned a way forward. Please be praying that the Synod committee will accept our responses to the questions raised, see the wisdom and discernment expressed in the Congregational Profiles and endorse them as presented. Achieving this result will enable the process of moving towards calling new ministers to proceed.

NRM