Church
Church.Its not a building, its the people of God.
For the last few years Artarmon Community Church has been meeting in the local primary school. Its a great venue because there's heaps of room to have the main meeting in the school hall and to have the kids running around crazily on the other side of the property without disturbing the parents.
Unfortunately, the school decided it no longer wanted us there, and so the last few months have involved searching for a new place to meet.
This has been quite a struggle, but ive also found it a joy for a couple of reasons...
Firstly, im just excited to be apart of that process in church life. As part of the ministry team there ive have the priviledge to be involved in parts of the decision making regarding what would work best for kids church, and that has just been a really joyful experience for me, having never been apart of something like that before! Its exciting to get a glimpse into the behind the scenes of ministry and be challenged to think about the needs of the church and how to best meet them.
Secondly, its just been such a joy to see how people arent really too concerned about it all. Now dont get me wrong, they obviously have been worried about whether we will actually have somewhere to meet from July onwards, but their trust in God has been so aparent and i think it has ultimately really brought home the fact that church isnt anything to do with where you meet, but the people who are gathered and why. The body of Christ meeting to grow in relationship with Him and honor and praise Him. I have been encouraged by that thought ever since starting work at Atarmon, not only cos it met in a school, but also cos its such a smaller church than my home church, Christ Church St Ives. The community feel at this church is so strong its just so great! And that has shone through as we've searched for our new location, because these people care about encouraging each other in relationship with Christ, and they know they will do that regardless of where they are! Praise God!
And praise God still, for we have now found a new location to meet!! We move there on the 6th of July. Please pray for the move, and thank our gracious God for providing us with this new church building!
I shall leave you with another pic from the weekend away, one depicting our gracious God's beautiful creation!
