What's the new national leader of the Baptist Union of New Zealand thinking after his first week in the office? Find out in the first of a regular video update from Chris Chamberlain – see the abridged transcript below.
“Three main themes surfaced at the last annual gathering of New Zealand Baptists (our Hui in November) and I've been processing and wrestling with those themes, trying to work out how we make good use of them over the coming year.
Renewal, unity, global influence
The first theme was renewal. We talked about church revitalisation, how we can help one another in our local churches to be the best that we can be.
The second theme was unity. About 400 people from our churches gathered at the Hui and the topic of unity came to the surface quite quickly. This is great! We live in a world where polarisation is normal so by talking about unity we’re being counter-cultural, and I just love that.
The third theme was global influence. The Arotahi (NZBMS) presentations were extremely good. Our love for what we're doing with Arotahi in a global setting is really special.
The Acts 2 movement
A number of people from our churches went to a global gathering of Baptist World Alliance (BWA) members in July last year. There are about 52 million Baptists globally.
The BWA is behind what’s called the ‘Acts 2 movement’, a celebration of the 2000 years since Jesus died, was resurrected and the church really became alive. The Acts 2 movement is rolling out across the world and New Zealand Baptists are a part of it, it's coming our way soon.
New faces, new routines
In my first week I met lots of new faces, but I also met an old friend. It was a real thrill for me to hang out with the previous national leader Charles Hewlett and ask him for some advice. I really love Charles, he's been a mentor and a friend to me for many years.
I picked up my wife Julie from the airport at the end of the week. We're in the middle of moving from Christchurch to Auckland and working out our new lifestyle arrangement.
I also met with second year Pastoral Leadership students from Carey Baptist College. There were about 11 and I'm excited about these people who have heard the call of God, are serious about training and are lining up to be leaders in our movement. It's very inspiring.
I also joined in on the regular prayer that the staff at the Baptist National Support Centre have at nine o'clock most mornings. What do we pray for? We pray for you. We intercede for our movement of churches.
A hope-filled promise from The Book of Revelation
I’m spending a lot of time in Revelation 21:4 at the moment. There's been some grief in my life recently, and a lot of change, and the potential for things to slightly unravel is always present. Revelation 21 verse 4 is a hope-filled promise from God for you and for me.
“He will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more. Mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”
This is an amazing image that God gifts to us about what he thinks of us. So, in hard times and especially as we're wondering ‘can I keep going?’ (and I’ve thought that more than once) God promises to come alongside and he gives us that beautiful image of wiping the tear from every eye.
So I leave that with you. Until next time,
Chris
Find out more about the national leader role and Chris Chamberlain:
baptist.nz/our-team/national-leader
Photos supplied.
