We’re planning to move our church away from the University campus when we find a suitable place. There is a group of 5 reps from am and pm church ( Jeff, Yoke, Colin and Greg and myself), who are meeting with the elders from a nearby church to see if we can combine and work together. There are another 6 who are also involved in the process (Patrick, Carl, David, Charmian, Susan, Hsiang). It’s exciting and terrifying at the same time!
When we take up residence in the local community, it raises questions about how we do church. Just one issue (and this is only one of a multitude), is what place is there for network ministry in the local parish context? This is the question I want to consider.
First let me clarify what is often meant by these words and then show you the supposed issue. A network church is a church based on a particular language group, or ethnic background, or occupation. The commonality that ties them together other than the gospel, is not a geographical locality. For example, Christians in the Media is a network church, Chinese Christian Church is a network church. We have been a network church (Asian Australian)!
So what’s the issue? Well, in the Anglican church, a minister is given responsibility for a parish. This is a geographical area. There are schools and hospitals, sporting clubs and people that mightn’t fit the mould of the network. There will be people seeking to have their children baptized, who never otherwise go to church. Similarly there will be people wanting to get married at the local Anglican church. All this seems to compete with the job of building the network, and taking away valuable ministry hours and resources from the church that is trying to be a network church. So what’s the answer?
The realization that we came to at the end of last year on both task forces is that we wanted to do both. We wanted to be in the local community, reaching out to families with young kids, with a location easy to find and visible in the area. We also wanted to continue to do what we’ve been doing- “Asian Australian” ministry. We decided to approach the bishop and archdeacon of our area and see if there was an Anglican church that we could link up with in the local area. As it turned out, there is a church that is very keen to have us join them. How will we go?
Well, firstly if others can do it, then why can’t we? Christians in the Media, the Koreans, the Greeks, all who have left the uni, are doing it, and it is working well. They have all moved into Anglican buildings, and are looking after the local area, as well as reaching out to their network group.
Secondly, we shouldn’t get too hung up over distinctions. Every church in the diocese has people coming from outside their local area. Arguably every church is a network church (and not just a local church), it’s just that some churches choose to brand themselves as such. Thanks to modern transport and the telephone, we don’t relate to each other only at the local level. When people move away from the local area, and as long as it isn’t too far away, they will often travel past other churches and sometimes travel long distances, in order to get to the church they feel they are best able to minister at.
Thirdly, people coming to church who don’t fit our mould should never be seen as a hindrance to ministry. Instead, every person we meet is an opportunity for Christian service. In fact if they join us, they become part of our bigger network! We can take the network thinking too far!. The network needs to be a help rather than a rigid inflexible ministry dogma. In fact, I’ve come to realize that branding the network into the name of the church is not always helpful, for it narrows and cuts people off.
So how will it work? That’s the question. How will “network” and “local” work together, and even enrich each other for the sake of the kingdom? It will begin by realising that local is a network. But there are other networks, and there always will be! In our church- there is the Asian Australian network, the uni network, the Med network, the friends of “x” network, the people-living-in-the-south network… there are many networks!. Different networks have different strengths and so different contributions to make to the whole. The rest of the answer is the same as for any other ministry groups working side by side- by proclaiming the truth in love, by encouraging, training, and correcting, by people using their gifts to serve the common good, by people inviting their friends to church or small group, and so on.
A couple of qualifications. In all this, people need to live reasonably close. How close, I’m not sure yet, but the closer you settle, the longer you will stay! As well as this, the area we choose to move into needs to be similar to the network we are trying to reach- so the Greeks moved to Arncliffe, which is not far from Brighton, the Greek capital of Sydney. The Koreans moved to Strathfield (lots of Koreans around Strathfield). Christians in the Media are at Annandale, which is close to UTS and Fairfax. We need to choose an area that is not too far away from where we are now (so Eastern Suburbs), and that has people like us (which is Asian Australian). We believe the location we are moving to is compatible – there are young people moving into the area, the area has lots of Asian Australians, and as well, it is a growing area. It will be a little bit further to drive for some people (in fact most people), but we think it will be worth the drive to have all the benefits.
Please pray about our move. It is scary. We need to trust God. We will let you know when we can, more details of the move (we want to be sure before we tell you). We want to particularly reassure our people who travel from outside the area that we are keeping them at the forefront of our plans, and hope they will be enthused and excited with this new step in bringing God’s message to people around about us.
Andrew Moore