Space for Change to Take Place

This is a bit of a re-ramble, as it's time to focus our vision again for the new facility in Kerikeri.

As our church website puts it:

Our decision to build is based on the belief that this can be a facility for the whole community.  The Kerikeri Union church congregation will, through regular worship and activities, provide heart and warmth for the building, but the vision is that it be the community's building.

When it came to decision time, when we saw the figures and how much had changed since we began five years ago, I know many felt it a daunting prospect: to spend all that money; to do something that cannot just be a reproduction of what we had before... For to be viable financially and in terms of being an effective mission operation in the local community, the new facility has to be utilised every day of the week. As the website says:

Our site at 144 Kerikeri Road beside the Heritage Bypass offers an exciting opportunity to build a church and community facility that will be both a hive of human activity and an oasis for reflection and spiritual uplift.

Can we do it? I believe we can, but I know we'll keep asking this question, because it is no automatic process “build the building and it will just happen”.

Peter MacKenzie, Executive Officer for our union parishes umbrella group, visited early this year and heard about our plans. He said that if it is to be a facility truly for the community, the community needs to share in its development. User groups and other community groups were consulted at the beginning of the project to assist with the brief for the design. Past user-groups are first on the contact list for joining us in the new building. But we can't just build and expect all to come. We need to convey a sense that it is their building not just ours.

We talked about this at a workshop in June last year where the quotation from Henri Nouwen alongside captured our attention. It is so easy to slip back into old habits, thinking that we are being hospitable because we say “everyone welcome”, and we do want people to come and join us (and be like us) and make our group bigger.

The vision for our facility doesn't preclude people coming and joining our church congregation or becoming part of the work we are doing as a church in our community. But that's not so much the focus as the likely flow-on effect. Like collateral benefit from us being people who are open and accepting and, before all else, offering a space for growth in personal and communal well-being.

“Building the kingdom” means, for us, providing the space in which kingdom values – lives shaped by the Master Jesus – will flourish.

“Go make disciples” means doing our bit to help God's spirit grow in people's hearts and minds. It's like we tend and care for the soil – a living, life-giving space – in which seeds can sprout and thrive.

I think of the new facility as community space where those who use it feel at home: space where people can be themselves, where things are happening, whether church-based or in other groups, that help people grow and develop in body, mind, and spirit.

It means a place which is common ground for all present, where the common good is at centre stage.

That is, not a church building that we let the community use, but a community building for which we act as kaitiaki. The church congregation will take responsibility to ensure the facility has a safe and welcoming spirit, as well as to maintain its physical environment and manage its shared use.

One other thing struck me as we made our formal decision on plans and the money. Our temporary accommodation has proved to be ideal to our current needs and for many who live in the vicinity it is very convenient. However the decision involved not just thinking about now, or the next few years. Here's how I've expressed my gratitude to the congregation for their future-directed, community-facing (and Christ-centred) decision:

Thank you especially to older members of the Kerikeri congregation, for whom the regular life of worship in the Ted Robinson Chapel is just ideal and could be seen as enough for your lifetime. The new facility is a vision that younger generations in the congregation are already very excited about. On behalf of the younger ones in your midst, thank you for being willing to be bold for the sake the future!

Shalom, Robyn

May 2013

Space for Change to Take Place

Hospitality means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines. It is not to lead our neighbour into a corner where there are no alternatives left, but to open a wide spectrum of options for choice and commitment.

Source: Reaching Out by Henri Nouwen