Heather Munn reflects on the global refugee crisis, drought, hunger and a community that has reached the end of its season: Today the last family moved away from the Christian intentional community we lived in, which has folded. Well, the last family for awhile; but the other two families that …
You may remember that the Kihilla/Wandering Community hosted the Australian River Gathering last year. Heather and Chinua have announced the date and venue for this year’s Gathering in North America.
Dates: 9th – 12th June
Venue:
Diamond Arrow
15742 N Bloomfield Road
Nevada City, CA 95959
You can read more info and register for the North American River Gathering online at:
The Surrender Conference is coming up on 24th-26th March 2017. The full program is available online.
Here is a list of speakers with experience living in intentional communities:
You can buy tickets and register online.
Embodying The Way – SURRENDER 17 from SURRENDER Australia on Vimeo.
The words “farewell” come with a lump in our throat and tears in our eyes. Christ is and has been at the heart of this journey, and through Him we will always stay connected to His followers. Looking back I realise this was one of those chapters where I have felt very spiritually alive and connected to the story of the Bible. It was intense but I would not have wanted to miss it. The relationships that formed over this time are strong, honest and deep. Like family. – Hannah
Hannah and Tonn experienced an emotional roller-coaster last year. After enthusiastically recruiting members for their community in the Blue Mountains, they faced the trauma of having their community residence placed under new management less than two months later. In her latest blog post Hannah reflects on some of the lessons learnt and the pain of saying good-bye: “A Beautiful Pain“
Cup from Above help people in remarkable ways through their Community Café. To increase their capacity to help people in crisis they are inviting you to help fund some dedicated Café Chaplains. They receive no government funding and are looking for people to make weekly pledges towards their 2017 chaplaincy budget.
More details here: http://cupfromabove.com.au/cafe-chaplain/
Rachael and Jonathan Lopez are establishing a new monastic community this year in partnership with Spotswood Anglican Church, Melbourne. Jonathan and Rachael recently returned from London where they were living as community members at the Community of St Anselm from 2015-2016; a community established by the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby. They …
Justin Duckworth offers some wisdom on the challenging but essential relationship between young, radical innovators and established Church leaders:
Justin and Jenny Duckworth have also written about their early days of community living. Their book Against the Tide, Towards the Kingdom is part-memoir and part-handbook on community life. Available online from The Wandering Bookseller.
Cornerstone Communities began in the 1970s as an experiment in rural discipleship and mission. A small group of young zealous Christians headed out to the remote Australian country town of Bourke, living and working on a cotton farm. So began decades of unique discipleship and mission in rural and regional Australia. While many young …
“I want Christians to argue more and fight less. To take it a step further, I’d even say that fighting less depends on our willingness to argue more and better.” – Trevin Wax
We learn early on in community life the importance of managing conflict. Some people are afraid of conflict, but avoiding it usually leads to more conflict in the future. We need to pro-actively create safe spaces for clean arguments.
You can read more of Trevin’s case for healthy arguing in this blog post on the Gospel Coalition website:
https://blogs.thegospelcoalition.org/trevinwax/2017/02/27/i-wish-christians-would-argue-more/
But how do you go about convincing someone when there’s a known, articulated disagreement? You assume you don’t really understand what they’re saying. You ask them about their point of view, their idea, their world, and so on, until they stop you and start asking questions themselves. – David Moore, Ministry Principles
