At the heart of what we are seeking to do are a set of foundational values that are non-negotiable for us. This list is incomplete and our expression of these values is also incomplete. But we are on a journey and that journey is defined by these values:

The Lordship of Christ

Jesus is the head of the whole church and we are a part expression of that church in the Canberra region. Our chief aim is to honour him, serve him, worship him and represent him in everything we do.

The Bible

The Bible is the primary way we hear from God and a core element of the way we relate to God.

The Holy Spirit

The fruit and gifts of the Spirit as referred to in the Bible are all of equal importance as weapons and tools in the ministry of the kingdom to which we are called.

Prayer and Worship

Our desire is not so much to produce an intercessory stream within the church as much as it is for the whole church to be committed to prayer and worship as the only basis for all aspects of Christian living and ministry.

Mission

We have noted the bias God has toward people who are lost from him. It is everywhere in the Bible and it is the cry of his heart. Jesus consistently represented this bias.

This list is incomplete. There are other things that are important and they are expressed in other places. We have defined ourselves as hypocrites the moment we put these on a page that represents us.

Building the House

It is clear from one end of the Bible to the other that God’s basic desire is to dwell in the midst of the people he has created in his own image and likeness (Gen. 1-3; John 1; Rev. 21). It is also clear that God only inhabited the dwelling places he designed. In these days God’s chosen dwelling place is the church – believers in a certain location operating together in his name. The presence of God is always a missionary presence. No dwelling place of God exists for its own sake. It certainly does not exist for the sake of the people themselves. It only ever exists for the sake of the missionary purposes of God. This is summed up in the statement of Jesus when he cleaned up the temple in Jerusalem, “my house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations.” (Mark 11) The Jews had turned it into an exclusive club for one nation.

Four other core values which we aspire to and which we believe are like four unclimbed mountain summits of the Christian Church:

Holiness: love that embraces and attracts sinner

Christians have certainly sought holiness. All too often that search only produced a form of Old Testament legalism that created Pharisees instead of followers and drove people away from God rather than drawing them to him. This continues to be the case to this day. What is most distressing the fact that it is so UN-like Jesus. Jesus was not this way. It was holiness in Jesus that caused him to love sinners and His holiness was what impacted sinners. So we must not measure holiness by internal or intra-church criteria. To gauge our holiness we must reference the people in our communities and community spheres who are not part of a church. Our holiness will be defined by the way we love them, and the way they are attracted by our love.

Oneness: the relationship between the Father and the Son being modelled by the people of God to the community

As representatives of the triune God we must be representatives of the oneness of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Jesus said we would be known because of our oneness. The relationship between believers, without exception, is to reflect that relationship between the Father and the Son. It is not a scientific definition that the Word gives us. It is not a method. It is a reference point. It is not an event. It pays no homage to tight knit congregational groups or denominations.

Fullness: the full ministry of Jesus happening in the community

What we want to come to terms with are the words that speak about the church (e.g. in Ephesus) “…attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ…” We are destined to represent the full ministry of Christ – It refers to a greater outpouring of miracle power, indiscriminate love and unshakeable trust in God than was evidenced in the ministry of Jesus. It happens when apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers equip the saints so that they carry the responsibility for ministry. It happens when we speak the truth in love. It happens when every part is working in a strategic harmony. We have yet to see this and it is one of the non-negotiables of the church in a community or a community sphere. Once again it is not presented as a method or a particular kind of event or activity. It is represented as a character quality. It is the habitation of Jesus in the church.

Completion: preaching the gospel to every person

Paul the apostle was able to say that the gospel had been fully preached from Jerusalem to Illyricum (Romans 15). That represented twenty two of the nearly fifty Roman provinces. In Australia we have never achieved this in eight or nine generations of European settlement.

This is about completing the work that Jesus commanded, empowered and authorized us to do. Perhaps the reason it hasn’t happened is because the church has not been competent to deal with the enemy. It has not been holy, it has rarely been one and has not very competently represented Jesus Christ. What we fail to realize is that these three former spiritual values are weapons as much as they are adornment.

As soon as we take the great commission seriously we realize we need to have holy love that attracts sinners, we need to be one with our brothers and sisters in Christ and we need to have the authority to represent the power and grace of Jesus Christ and his ministry. While ever we settle for less we will not achieve the goal and then we have to manipulate the Word of God so that we can be comfortable in our disobedience.

We cannot face Jesus with joy till we face him with the words: “It is finished.”