Our vision is what we are aiming for, our mission summarises the kind of things we will do to help us achieve this, and our values are things that are important to us on the journey.
Our mission helps us focus on action or ‘doing’. Our values and vision helps us focus on becoming or ‘being’. Both are important and vitally connected. At it’s essence, this is very simple, and can be summarised by Jesus’ command to love God and love others.
We acknowledge that living our values, at the very core, is totally dependent upon the power of the Holy Spirit living in us, not on human effort. God’s aim for us is that we would become like Christ. We believe that transformation is an ‘inside-out’ process, where God works in us by His Mercy and Grace, as we submit to the lifelong process of discipleship in a living community of faith. And part of the evidence for this personal transformation, will be shared Life, engaging others on this journey.
Vision
Our aspiration is to be a community of faith who share Life in transparent, generous and accountable relationships; fully engaged with the challenge of being apprentices of Jesus and inviting others on the journey. As we move towards our vision, we will increasingly see transformed lives and communities, by His Grace and through His strength.
Foundations
Our foundation is on applying, as we walk out spiritual life in community, the truth as revealed in Scripture. Our foucus is on reality, recognising that we cannot work this out by ourselves, buy faith through His Grace.
Values
As we ‘work’ and journey together, our aspiration is that the hallmark of His work in our lives is shown by:
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love
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faith
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truth
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reality
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authenticity and integrity
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grace & mercy
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accountability
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worship
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discipleship
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team working
While this list is not in order, by far the most important value here is love. Firstly, by receiving Christ’s love by faith, we are equipped to love as Christ loved. This will be demonstrated by showing mercy and grace towards each other. Also, Christ’s love is counter-cultural. His love brings challenge and rebuke where appropriate. “Speaking the truth in love, we in all things grow up into Him.”
Reality is also an important value to us – not to hide but to engage with what is really going on, in our own lives and around us. To be honest, open and transparent with each other. Not deceiving ourselves, accepting our weakness and sinfulness, while at the same time having faith in the indwelling Holy Spirit to bring life, hope, healing and transformation to us and through us – treasures in jars of clay.
This is living authentic and transparent lives, where I can “dare to be the sinner that I am” (Bonhoeffer, Life Together). We will seek to walk in integrity, seeking to be single and true, to say what we mean, not embellishing or seeking to impress or manipulate: meekness and humility summarises this. He has show you O man what is good…
We acknowledge that we are needy recipients of God’s great mercy and amazing grace, and therefore are equipped to show mercy and grace to others.
Our desire is to express a lifestyle of extravagant worship: a life laid down in service. And at the same time, we will seek to creatively worship God in various gatherings and meetings, seeing public worship as an opportunity for spiritual transformation.
We will seek to share Life, looking for opportunities to encourage and spur one another on, sharing current and living stores of what the Lord is doing in our lives on a day to day basis – a living testimony to His Grace and Power.
We acknowledge that Jesus is the discipler and we are the disciples. We will encourage members of the community to engage in a serious, intentional discipleship relationship. We will engage in accountable relationships, and encourage others to do likewise.
We believe in team working and team leadership. No one man or woman has all the skill, experience of revelation to lead on their own. Therefore we will build ministry teams at every opportunity, seeking to identify and release gifting wherever we can.
Mission
Our mission is to engage others in loving acts of service to meet their needs. Our focus is on the Hilltown and also in the wider communities in which we live and work. We will serve in humility and love allowing others to see and experience the Life of Christ in our lives.
In this context mission is a journey we share with others where the outcomes are not predetermined and true relationships are built.
Our mission is primarily but not exclusively, to the most marginalised and disadvantaged in society, supporting, enabling and equipping them to begin their own journey of transformation, respecting each persons dignity and humanity, seeking to release people so they can flourish and be who they were created to be.
We seek to work in partnership with others, in particular working with established groups who are already serving the community, believing we can be more effective when we work together.
In whatever context we ‘work’ or serve, we will seek to use every opportunity for sharing Life, learning and applying ourselves to being apprentices or disciples of Jesus. We also seek to encourage people to take individual responsibility for their own spiritual journey, while at the same time supporting each other – bearing one an others burdens.
We seek to grow our capacity as a community to fulfil this mission.
What does God want?
Rather than pray vaguely, or wonder what God wants for us to become and to do, in 2004, we engaged in a process to develop the kind of prayer we think God would have us pray. A ‘crafted prayer’ where we could pray with confidence, as we believe that this is God’s will for us.
The whole community was involved in this process, people spent time alone praying, reflecting, considering key scriptures and prophetic words that we believe God had already given us as a community. We also prayed collectively, and had extensive dialogue on what might be in this ‘crafted prayer.’
The result, we believe, is inspired by God and inspirational to us. In essence it contains our vision, our values and our mission, which is why we have included it in this document.