OCEANIA CHURCH PLANTING STORIES

CHURCH PLANTING IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Hi, I am Nigel. This is my wife Sandy. Together we’ve been church planting in Busselton, Western Australia with our five children. We’ve been going for five or six years and it’s been going quite well. Initially it was slow but then there’s been an increase in the last two years.

[Nigel & Sandy from Hope Busselton, Western Australia]

Our attendance has reached 40 adults and 10 or 15 children. It’s been really good. All of the people who attend Hope Busselton are generally Caucasians. We have some Aboriginals visit our service from time to time as well.

Nigel and Sandy Video Interview

Making impact in local school

In the local community, Nigel is chaplain at the local Christian school called Corner Stone.

Through this, we’ve been able to get to know a lot of families. We’ve had our kids in the school and they’ve been doing things such as praying at lunch time and inviting their friends. The youth group was started about a year and a half ago. It started with one group last year which has now split into two groups.

• One group is the school group and is called Arise.
  
• The other one is those who are past school age, the working group and it’s called Wave.
  

Both are going really well.

Church Planting in Esperance, WA

I have a sense that as the years progress, God will use us more and more in starting new churches or new care groups in other towns. This all began from Esperance, we had a contact there; he already had a small care group. As we met and talked more, he liked the vision of Hope. He prayed about coming on board and has done so and they’ve started having a Sunday get together as well. Currently, they have up to 25 people.

Church Planting in Dandaregan, WA

We also had one of our own, Emma who has been with us for four or five years, move to the north of Perth with her fiancé. The couple has also started another Western Australia care group in Dandaregan. So we are very excited. In the future, I will be playing music with some friends and families throughout various country towns, hoping we will make more contacts to plant more churches throughout the Western Australia.

Reaching Rural Australians

I tell you about church planting. I want to say that you should all go out there and start a church or start a care group, just give it a go.

You need to persevere; for us, it was very slow going in the beginning. Rural Australia is hard ground but I believe that is slowly changing. If you persevere and if you really pray and really believe in God, you will see the fruit come over time, as we are seeing now. Rural Australia has such a need for strong and biblical churches. A lot of places in country Australia don’t even have biblical churches set up or churches that are moving in the Holy Spirit. They are very dry areas. So we can go in there and bring life to these dry areas.

The calling for country towns

One of the most important things I’ve been learning church planting is to understand the call that you have on your life, to understand the things that God would have you personally do.

We need to be operating according to that call, and as you bear fruit in those things, and then it will help to multiply your efforts for others. So for me, after not playing music for a long time, I’ve finally taken it back up and I am enjoying it.

After getting a taste of getting out to other towns, I hope to do more and more of that. Recently we’ve been involved in gathering other churches together in fasting and prayer and in unity to see our town being reached for God. It’s something that God’s called me to and it’s borne much fruit.

Moving in the Spirit: Elijah Week

One thing I really want to encourage you is step up like Elijah. We are doing what we’re calling ‘Elijah Week’ where are going into the psychic fair with the combine churches.

We are praying and fasting and we’re going to believe for signs and wonders and miracles and we’re going to believe God for salvations.

We’ve been doing that for a few years now. So when something’s on your heart, just step out. We’ve seen that grow over the last few years, it’s got bigger and better and we also have a healing evangelist lady come down and run meetings on that same weekend.

Serving God as a family

We’re going to believe God for a real move in Busselton over the next few weeks. And I just want to say, you can do it.

We’ve got five kids and there are seven of us altogether. We didn’t feel like we were that much. We’re just plain ordinary people but we know that God’s big and in His strength and as long as we work as a team

Our family really works together. Even our children are involved in church planting. We can help fulfill the Great Commission in our lifetime in country Australia and in the cities and all over the world. Amen.

Nigel and Sandy Witter
Hope Busselton, Western Australia

PLANTING A NEW CENTRE IN ADELAIDE, AUSTRALIA

My name is Eddie. I guess you can call me Hope Adelaide City Centre’s church planter. We are at Gilles Street in Adelaide and we are the first seed church from Hope Adelaide Payneham. The decision to plant a church was probably the most important decision I had to make in my time serving the Lord. I knew that if I made the decision, it would have to be a wholehearted and a committed one. It wasn’t going to be a decision which I could back out of should things get too hard or if it didn’t turn out the way we expected.

[Dr Eddice & Dr Janice Fong Hope Adelaide City Centre, South Australia]

Dr Eddie Fong Video Interview

Preparing for church planting

So I made sure I was as spiritually prepared as I could be before I made the decision. I can share that part of the process involves asking God to fill us with faith, to ask God to assure us of our identity, to assure us of His purpose and our purpose for Him. I meditated hard on these things because I anticipated that when we start planting a church, the devil will throw a whole heap of challenges that will test my faith and my trust in God. Uncertainty will also be at my doorstep and that would be a difficult road to travel if I was not prepared. I needed the knowledge of his purpose for 'church' to be down-packed.

Seeking the presence of God

We planted Hope Adelaide City Centre about a year and five months ago; it’s been great.

I made sure God was present at every service so that no matter how few or how many people are at church, it will still be a fantastic service. Fantastic because God was there and people’s hearts are being touched and being released and being filled with faith. And also because we can experience and testify of God’s goodness and God’s grace in our lives.

To have God present, I had to ensure that my spirit was victorious even before opening the doors for setup. I had to work through my thoughts and spirit so that I was not fazed or discouraged even with setbacks or impending difficulties on the Sundays.

Growing step by step

We average around 35 people at the moment. The number varies from 40 plus on a good day, to twenty on a bad day. However I’ve been prepared to see numbers fluctuate. Our aim is of course to get to 50.


Loving the family of God

As I seek God about my role here, I believe God impressed on my heart that one of the most important things that I had to do was love the people.

Love God and love people: the two major commandments that God had given to us. And so, I pour my heart out to love people as they are, accept them and influence them towards God. It has really borne much fruit. People here, I believe, feel loved. They feel like they have a leader who is prepared to do life with them, a leader who is prepared to walk the walk and not just talk and talk. In a sense, everything falls back onto that, if I don’t know what else to do, I just make sure I love them, and not just on Sundays. So throughout the week, I have to love them and try to meet their needs holistically.

Spiritual support from mother church

So far, it’s been just great here and the help we’ve received from our mother church in Payneham has been crucial, especially from Pastor Brendan and Pastor Helen, Paul Joswig and Andy in the core team. The worship leaders from the Payneham church have also been paramount in carrying us through the first year with a respectable quality of worship music. They have willingly supported us and helped us ..and this is so essential for a seed church to get a solid start to life.

[Pastor Brendan & Helen Kirby Hope Payneham City Centre, South Australia]

I am so thankful because praise and worship is an area which will obviously take a long time to build up. But praise God, believe it or not, we now have four keyboardists here. We’ve got one drummer and some keen prospects in training. We have now one dedicated worship leader. We’ve got three bass guitarists as well but we’re still waiting upon God for guitarists.

A challenge for church planting

Is church planting for you? Well, I would encourage you at the very least be part of a team.

If you don’t feel like you can lead in planting a church, then just be support staff in a planting team. Every team, every person that’s sent out to plant a church needs your support and they need your help. You’re a vital part in church planting, fulfilling God’s purpose and his plans for his church.

So do be part of a church planting team. It’s fruitful, it’s rewarding, it’s challenging but that’s when we grow. So, get to it.

Dr Eddie & Dr Janice Fong
Hope Adelaide, City Centre