Parish in focus: Panania
Region: Georges River
Assistant Minister at Holy Trinity, Panania, the Rev Matthew Snelson, laughs when he tells a story about last Christmas when the parish held a carols night in the church grounds. Six hundred people flooded onto the property, far more than the church had expected. Despite the BBQ working overtime, they were only able to feed 200. As a band played music on the back of a truck, local residents, some with beers in their hands, joined in the festivities. This year the church is applying to the local Council to close off the street to traffic.
The parish is located in a large bend of the Georges River from Picnic Point to Milperra with a local population of 25,000 people and growing. God has blessed the church with steady growth in recent years. The Christmas crowds are typical signs that the church is achieving growth through a focus on reaching out to their community. Despite the encroaching M5 motorway, the area still retains a village-feel, which reflects in the family-like atmosphere of the parish.
Ministry goals
With a part time children’s worker, a student worker at Anglican Youthworks College, and three full-time staff including a Youth minister and a new Assistant minister, the parish believes it now has the ministry team and size (with approximately 200 regular members) to foster more rapid growth in line with the Mission.
The key mission goals for the next five years include all church members being committed to daily Bible reading and prayer; to have at least 500 in church each week; to have at least 80 per cent of members trained in gospel ministry and in Bible study groups; 90 per cent or more involved in some sort of ministry, and to at least double numbers in children’s and youth ministry programs. The parish also aims to take on two more staff over the next five years.
Property
Despite the positive signs of growth at Holy Trinity, the future of the parish’s other site, St Matthew’s, Milperra, is uncertain. The church was formally closed as a branch church and ministry ceased at the church at the end of 2002 when services were combined at Holy Trinity following the resignation of the previous assistant minister and repeated efforts to increase the size of the congregation. This freed the staff up to concentrate their efforts at Holy Trinity where there had been obvious growth. Parish Council planned to lease the Milperra site to a national childcare agency, which would provide the parish with rental income and the opportunities for outreach to families at the centre.
However, the Standing Committee of the Synod has not agreed to the lease and proposed that discussions should continue with the Bishop and Archdeacon over the future ministry use of the site. The Rector, Rev Gary Nelson, said he is ‘disappointed’ at the Standing Committee’s recent decision but is ‘trying to be positive’. “We’ll just have to look again and think through the issues and how best to move forward,” he said.
Evangelism
A specific evangelistic group has become a thing of the past at Panania because every member is now encouraged to see that they have a role to play in outreach, service and day-to-day ministry. “Our initial growth was through people realising that yes, they had a part to play and so they [could] invite their friends,” Mr Nelson says.
“We don’t have many people that aren’t involved in something. It may only be something small, but we’ve tried to encourage people to see that every part adds to the whole, whether they’re cutting the lawns every two months or leading a group. Once you’ve taken hold of what the Bible’s about, it has to be part and parcel of your daily life. You can’t really be functioning as a Christian if you’re not concerned for reaching out to others.”
Third term each year is devoted to mission. This year the parish will run the evangelistic course Introducing God. Scripture is run in six local primary schools and three high schools and a weekly ESL class is followed by a tailored Bible study. In addition, the parish runs a stall at a monthly market to engage passerbys in conversation about Christianity.
In April the congregations were encouraged about an informal evangelistic event held on Good Friday evening that attracted a large number of people. It was the first time the church had held a service at that time, but the effort paid off. “They’re the kind of things we keep trying to think through – how can we better bring the gospel to our community,” Mr Nelson said. “We’re excited by what took place. We had people [who became] Christians on the evening.”
