|
To
continue the work of
Jesus,
by
the power of the Holy Spirit,
to
win the lost,
to
build them to maturity in Christ
,
and
to send them into
kingdom service.
We
believe that the purpose or mission of the church is
encapsulated in the Great Commission ..go
and make disciples of all nations, baptising them into the Name
of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and
teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. Mat
28:19-20.) The
goal of the church is not to be a comfortable “club". Rather, our goal is to help each other grow in our faith
relationship with God – to become fully fledged disciples –
and to make know the message of the Bible to those who as yet do
not believe, so that they too can become disciples of Jesus
. Our
goal is to move people who are not in a saving relationship with Jesus
Christ
, to faith, and on to maturity in Christ
.
How
should we be doing this?
In
Acts 2:42-47 we get a snap shot of the early church: We find the following things were taking
place: teaching, prayer, fellowship, service, worship and evangelism. We
see all six of these factors as being integral to the
life of the church.
When
we talk about the “ministry” of the church, it is good
remember that ministry
means to serve. The focus of our service is to fulfil the great commission,
motivated by our love for God and love for our neighbour.
To
that end we try to meet the spiritual, social and physical needs
of people both within and outside the church. We try to make the spiritual needs of people our primary
focus, but we realise that a persons total needs are very
interrelated.
For
a church to be a church, its members must be able to experience
real Christian fellowship, which energises them for the tasks
the Lord sets before them. Biblical fellowship has little to do with cups of coffee and polite
conversation. Rather it is a rugged, tenacious, committed togetherness. It
means common life, practical sharing, community, joint
action, intimate relationship, committed friendship, that flows
from a common faith, which binds us together in Christ
.Part of being a
Christian is that we belong to the body of Christ
, the church, and that we actually "belong to one
another" (Rom 12:5)
As
a church we give expression to our desire to be a community of
God's people, committed to fulfilling the great commission, by
seeking to establish a balance between all six of the key areas
of ministry which are mentioned in Acts 2:42-47.There are many facets to the ministry that flow from that
desire. There is
obviously also a great deal of overlap between these areas. For example, a worship service focuses on worship, yet
also has a strong teaching element in it, and a fellowship
dimension.
Back to About us menu
|
