Vision and Values
Our Vision
We don’t want to invent the wheel (or the triangle).
As a church family we orientate our life together around UP, IN and OUT. It shapes everything we do.
UP - relationship with God (worship and prayer)
IN - relationship with family of faith (fellowship, Growth Groups, wholeness ministry)
OUT - relationship with the world (mission, Bless Greystones, sharing our faith).
Our Values
Any community, organisation, business or group can have a vision but rarely is that vision possible unless the culture - and the values of that culture - are in place and being outworked.
At St Gabriel’s, while we definitely have a sense of where God is leading us in the future, we also want to make sure that we strive for certain values that underpin everything we are and do.
Hospitality
Jesus regularly practised hospitality. It was at the very core of his ministry. His hospitality saw him being the host and the one hosted.
A church family that hosts will welcome and serve with generosity, openness and love. The focus is on the outsider – seeking to meet and care for their needs and desires but also a willingness to be shaped and changed by them. Hospitality requires generosity - giving away to bless the other.
A church family that is hosted will be willing to go beyond its ‘walls’ to be welcomed by others. The focus is humility and going to others with open hands and hearts.
Everyone involved
Jesus involved everyone and invited them to come and follow Him.
A church family where everyone is involved strives to see every person of our church family as valued and valuable – we are therefore less without them. Every person has a role to play – even if that role is to come and just be.
Everyone has a role (however big or small) in the worship, ministry and mission of the church (1 Cor. 14:26 and Eph. 4. 11 – 13). Everyone involved also values our role as a ‘beautiful resistance’ in every sphere of life where God calls us – with everyone person of the church family seeking God’s Kingdom would come and his will be done wherever them may be.
Whole life/ wholeness
Jesus cared for and brought healing to every aspect of people’s lives.
A church family that values whole life and wholeness believes that God’s Spirit wants to transform every aspect of a person’s life and that Jesus gives us life and life to the full (John 10:10). Nothing is beyond the reach of God’s Spirit who longs to bring his ‘shalom’ peace to every person.