Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Strucure, Mission and Caring for each other



A big thank you to all who participated in the feedback session regarding our Senior Leadership structure on Sunday night the 14th July. Your input was very helpful and gave church council some key questions/insights to work with. 

The 2 key questions church council is still resolving are:       

- how do we ensure the new congregation at Carbrook keeps growing in God’s mission?; and
- how do we build flexibility into the Leadership model to enable further expansion in God’s mission?;                                                                                           
...all the while being very realistic about what we can afford.

Along with this the call (identified by you through the feedback process) to develop our prayer life, be radically outward focussed, make disciples, strengthen the faith life group model, support/train leaders, ensure people are equipped to care, ensure new people are relationally connected, continue to develop our youth, young adult and children/families ministry, engage other ethnic groups, connect more strongly with families and students of Calvary Christian College etc means that the role of our Senior Leadership is to be “releasers and amplifiers” of the work of you the people of God.

From the moment we began engaging with this process, Church Council has sensed that God’s timing isn’t ours and the call to pray, wait and listen has been very real. This has also been affirmed by the feedback received from faith life groups and again last Sunday night. God is bringing all the pieces together, so please keep praying. Also please continue to feedback your thoughts. You can do this by emailing Aaron Comollatti at 555combo@gmail.com or me at graham.keech@luc.org.au.

Aaron is now the chairperson of church council. Ben Hutton has chaired the council for the last 2 ½ years, but with his wife Benita expecting their first child he chose to finish in the role of chair (he will continue on church council). Ben is a deep, prayerful thinker who has brought a quiet wisdom to the role and we are grateful for this gift. Please pray for Aaron as he brings leadership to us through chairing the church council.

After 25 years as Pastoral Care Coordinator and Pastoral Care Pastor, Liz Taylor has sensed the call of God to formally finish in this role. Liz has served in both volunteer and paid capacity over that time and has seen MANY changes to our church.

As a Ministry Leadership Team we spent time reflecting with Liz on her ministry. The word that embodies Liz is LOVE. Liz has a deep, deep, deep love for God – this is her driving passion. It is this love of and for God that is shown in her deep, deep love for people. All of us have experienced Liz’s genuine care. She has a capacity to empathize deeply with us and in doing so to hold us before God in an amazing way. We will miss her as part of our team and we will miss her leadership in this area as a whole church.

On Sunday the 28th July at our 8-30 am service, Springwood, we will take time to pray for and release Liz from this role. We will look at developing a team to help people who are not in faith life groups or IFFF’s be relationally connected with people who care. Also as part of the Senior Leadership discussions we are looking at how we continue to release and equip all of us to care well.

Saying that Liz has formally finished in the role of Pastoral Care Pastor DOES NOT mean she will stop caring and loving. This is part of who Liz is a follower of Jesus and a gift she brings as a member of the body. It is very important to remember that Pastoral Care is not a role or job; nor is it done by a particular person. Pastoral Care is what we all do as we love, serve and care for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ; and also what we do as we love, serve and care for those who don’t know Christ. This is happening across Logan Uniting in the most amazing, beautiful and powerful ways. Please remember that as you care for your neighbour and as they care for you – this is Church (we are church).

Yours in Christ


Graham Keech


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