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" I don’t mean to say that |
As Church of God we are called to "Be" before we "Do" anything.
Therefore our vision is Being in 3 dimensions: Up, In and Out.
The continual growth in these 3 directions together is our aspiration.
Think of this vision as a tree supplied by three deep roots.
being Christ-like, being together, and being out.
Using the imagery of being human we are taking about
the Heart, the Body, and the Hand.
we find our "Identity" in the UP direction,
and our "context" in the IN direction,
and our "orientation" in the OUT direction.
This vision is the goal. We journey together toward it,
and keep growing in it, rather than reaching its end.
Everyday we are more like Christ, yet still more to come.
Everyday we are more together as a community, yet still more to come.
Everyday we are toward the surrounding community and the world, yet still more to come.
This inexhaustible goal keeps us humble, dependant on God's grace only
and saves us from complacency that leads to stagnation.
There is more to "Be" everyday, it is a life-long journey with God, each other and the world around us.
we are happy to see marks of growth among us along this journey,
and we look forward to meeting new people while we are on the road.
Therefore our vision is Being in 3 dimensions: Up, In and Out.
The continual growth in these 3 directions together is our aspiration.
Think of this vision as a tree supplied by three deep roots.
being Christ-like, being together, and being out.
Using the imagery of being human we are taking about
the Heart, the Body, and the Hand.
we find our "Identity" in the UP direction,
and our "context" in the IN direction,
and our "orientation" in the OUT direction.
This vision is the goal. We journey together toward it,
and keep growing in it, rather than reaching its end.
Everyday we are more like Christ, yet still more to come.
Everyday we are more together as a community, yet still more to come.
Everyday we are toward the surrounding community and the world, yet still more to come.
This inexhaustible goal keeps us humble, dependant on God's grace only
and saves us from complacency that leads to stagnation.
There is more to "Be" everyday, it is a life-long journey with God, each other and the world around us.
we are happy to see marks of growth among us along this journey,
and we look forward to meeting new people while we are on the road.
"CHRISTIAN"
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† Being Christian is the dimension where we find our "Identity" as individuals and as a community. We believe that Jesus Christ is Lord of all of our life and not only in the church building, we seek to live His Lordship in everyday of our ordinary life. † We believe Jesus Christ is not only the Son of God, who came to our world and became one of us to bring us back to God, but also he calls us to be like Him. Everything that He did was for us and as us. Christ, for us, is a call to be, and a vocation to respond to. † This is why our worship gathering is at the heart of our church community. We worship God our Father in heaven, in His Son, by His Holy Spirit, and through the word of God (the Bible) and sacrament. † We worship God as a response to His initiative love for us. in our worship we encounter Him thus we transform to be more and more like His Son Jesus Christ, from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3:18). † In order to grow in this Christ-like direction we take seriously our personal devotional life, reading the Bible reflectively, our prayer life and serving each other. We are able to encounter God through these disciplines and we change to be more like Jesus Christ. † We do all of this, not only out of duty but also out of the joy of relational Love for God, in response to His love for us. |
We are committed to continue rooting ourselves in Christ, growing in knowing Him and being like him.
"COMMUNITY"
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† We worship God who is -according to the Christian faith- a community in Himself: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, yet one God. Therefore Christian life is a community project, and living within community becomes the only "context" for us to live and be truly a church of this God. We need each other if we are to follow and reflect our God who is TRINITY.
† Although God, by His amazing love called us personally for a relationship with him, the aim of this redeeming call is to "give lonely people a family" (Psalm 68:6), and to gather into one the dispersed children of God (John 11:52 ). God has called us in His Son to live in a fellowship that built on love, unity and serving each other. There is a special glory in this fellowship as well as responsibility. There is no true community without humbleness and seeking first the well-being of others. † We are not a community of identicals but we accept our diversity and celebrate it. Each member in our Christian community has value, uniqueness, and gifts that reflect God's image to us in a unique way. † In spite of our unity we are not a closed, exclusive community but our openness to each other is the concrete foundation for our receptivity to other people in other communities. We are aware that we are living in a world with less and less community-life. |
We are called by God to be a prophetic community that lives in a way that calls the wider community to a communal life. We are committed to this way of life together.
"MISSIONAL"
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† We are very grateful to God for He loves us. Only such divine love can liberate us from our own
self-centred life, because of God's love for us we are able to love others. † We are aware that we always need to sit under the cascading fountain of the Father's unfailing love, flowing to us through the Son by the Spirit. We sit there, getting drenched in love, until love flows out from us to everyone in our broken world, and to the creation. † As a Christian community we are a servant community at heart, existing not for ourselves but for serving others. We are called to get our hands dirty, like our God (Gen 2: 7-9, 21-22), engaging in all that God has created and is redeeming. † We believe that God has a purpose for the people he created, and His creation. He is leading the whole history to this purpose that to save and redeem all that he created, and to bring His kingdom, the kingdom of love, peace and justice fully to us. He is making everything new (Revelation 21:5), new earth and new heaven where He will dwell with His people (Revelation 21: 3) to be himself their King and shepherd. † We have confident hope of God's ultimate victory to fulfil His eternal purpose. It is our honour and privilege to be partners in His great mission until the day when Christ will come again to fully fulfil everything. |
In obedience to the Holy Spirit we are driven to engage in God’s mission, and to grow in our "orientation" towards
the surrounding community (Old Windsor) and the world, and to be more sensitive and accessible towards them.