James Eggers is young, enthusiastic and has a huge heart for his church and for his community. He serves one day a week as the Community Liaison officer for Northwest New Life Church in Upper Riccarton, Christchurch.
This church with a membership of around 750 recently moved into their first ‘home sanctuary’ after nearly 20 years of worshipping in hired facilities some distance away. James says this has made a positive difference to the effectiveness of their community outreach.
“We started trying to serve this community years ago, knowing that this was where we were going to be, but we were inviting people to a church that was 10 minutes away. Now we’re physically present and visible in the community; we walk down these streets to church and we can have prayer meetings for this community right in the heart of it.”
In 2006 the executive pastor Paul Cargill came back from visiting the Dream Center in Los Angeles inspired with the ‘Adopt-A-Block’ vision and a programme called ‘Community Care’ was born. With James at the helm and donning bright yellow T-shirts, a volunteer team from the church began by picking up rubbish in the park and doing prayerwalking. They also knocked on doors, offering assistance with lawns, window-washing or even clearing out the back section.
“We initially started with the square block around our church”, recalls James, “but we have since figured where most of the people are and we head in those directions, e.g. the Countdown parking lot where we pick up rubbish every Saturday”.
The ‘Community Care’ team periodically do larger scale events, such as
wash a house or have a Community Day, like the one held recently in Hanson’s Reserve. “The Council gave us a few hundred dollars and we got the sausages and food donated. We had about 100 people turn up. We had a BBQ, played cricket, basketball, Frisbee – a great time was had by all. What was really neat was seeing neighbours hooking up with each other and exchanging phone numbers, people of the same ethnicity meeting each other for the first time and realising they only live a block apart.”
But it’s the regular, humble picking up of rubbish that has really made the church visible in the community. “We are out to have a good time – we’ve got music going, we’re smiling and happy, we can change the atmosphere of the whole street. People love seeing smiley, happy young people out on the street, it really makes them feel good about where they live. People toot their horns and wave, elderly men come over to greet us and talk to us. We’ve had opportunities to pray for people right out there on the street. Out on the street it’s not threatening, they don’t have to come into church to talk to someone.”
A big winner is the church’s community youth centre, ‘The Furnace’, which has surged in numbers. None of the 100 or so kids on the roll were Christians when they started coming, but several are now. “We play a lot of outdoor games like basketball, and we have Xbox. But the focus for the leaders is on building relationships and introducing God at the level where they are at.”
Remarkably, the team’s vision of seeing the community proactively turn to the church for assistance is coming to pass. The War Veteran’s Home asked for help in cleaning windows prior to their Anzac Day service; the kindergarten down the road has twice asked for help and the team has painted fences and worked in the gardens; the local primary school has asked for help with a working bee; and individuals and families are calling asking for food and help.
The church’s efforts have not gone unnoticed by the local authorities either. Gary Moore, mayor of Christchurch, sent a letter thanking the church and they were also given an award by the Keep Christchurch Beautiful Foundation.
The church did surveys last year and asked the community ‘What would you like us to be doing?’ James recounts that the stand-out response can be summarised as “Just be there for us, people need a hand.”
“What is clear is that many in the community draw comfort from the fact that we are there and they can turn to us when they need us, even though they never attend services. We are a beacon of light in a dark world – all we can do is love people, plant seeds and trust God to do the watering.”
Visit James’ Community Care blog: www.myspace.com/community_care
