Every church is born out of a dream. Not a strategy, a dream: a picture of something so good, so worth giving your life to, that ordinary people will leave comfort behind to chase it. Here is ours.
We dream of a church in the south-east of Melbourne, in the City of Casey, where the good news of Jesus is so real, so alive, so plainly at work in ordinary lives, that people cannot help but notice. Where a weary migrant father, a homesick student far from family, a second-generation kid worn out by everyone’s expectations, and a neighbour who has never opened a Bible all find the same thing: a Saviour who loved them before they did anything to deserve it, and a family that will not let them walk alone.
We dream of a people who are not merely religious, but truly alive: anchored in Christ, filled with His Spirit, grounded in His Word, on fire with love for God and for the lost.
These five are not tasks to complete or a test to pass. They are one life, seen from five sides: the portrait of what God produces when the gospel takes root. Picture a tree. Its roots go down into the love of God, its trunk stands firm in Christ, its life flows up through the Spirit, it is shaped and fed by the Word, and it bears fruit with seeds in it: new trees. A healthy tree does not just grow; it reproduces. Neither does a healthy disciple.
“We love because He first loved us… You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.”
We do not love God to be loved. We love because we already are.
“It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.”
Not I, but Christ.
“Be filled with the Spirit… you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.”
Stop striving. Stay joined. Let Him bear the fruit.
“Blessed is the one… whose delight is in the law of the Lord, meditating on it day and night.”
We open the Book to meet the One the Book is about.
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations… entrust it to faithful people who will teach others also.”
One beggar telling another where to find bread.
“You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”Acts 1:8
Mission is never human ambition; it is the overflow of a Spirit-filled people. And notice the widening circles: home, then region, then the whole world. That is our map too.
Everything we dream of is God’s work, or it is nothing. We cannot manufacture a single new birth, argue anyone into the kingdom, or engineer revival with better programs. Only God can open a blind eye, soften a hard heart, raise a dead soul to life. So the most important work of this church is not done on a stage or a street. It is done on our knees.
Prayer is not the warm-up before the real work. Prayer is the engine. Pray with us
Perhaps part of you is stirred, and part of you is thinking: but I am just an ordinary person. Good. That is exactly who God builds His mission from. Here is our invitation: not to admire this dream from a distance, but to step into it.
Do not do this alone. Come close, be known, let people in. If you are not yet in a small group, that is your first step.
Small groupsSink your roots deeper. Open the Bible with others, take the next course, the next study, the next step.
Courses in the CLIC appLet someone walk with you. A disciple never graduates; we are being formed for a lifetime.
Ask about a coachPass it on. Find one person you can help follow Jesus. You received freely; give freely.
Talk to a pastorMay God be pleased, in our day, to make us a God-loving, Christ-centred, Spirit-filled, Word-grounded, disciple-making church: for the saving of souls, the making of disciples, and the planting of His church, to the ends of the earth.