GENER ATIONS Breaking Down Walls Nathan Want 4 Gathering or Dividing? E. Waldron Barnett 6 Ministry As A Family Geoff & Ros Cox 14 Diverse, Yet Still One Church Tim Walter 16 A Blank Page Sue Allison 18 Anchors In A Time Of Change Ann Fair 20 Care For The Spiritual Nature Of The Child Vivienne Mountain 22 AUTUMN 2017 Contributors Nathan Want Ann Fair Nathan ‘Dubsy’ Want is one of Australia’s emerging Ann is the Families Pastor at Door of Hope Christian voices in youth culture. For the past decade he has Church in Launceston, serving parents in the community been working with young people in primary schools, as part of the Generation Team who seek to grow hope secondary schools, and local churches, speaking into through Jesus Christ in the next generation. Previously their world and giving students and leaders skills and a primary school teacher, Ann and her husband Andrew resources to navigate life well. have four adult children and three young grandchildren. E. Waldron Barnett Tim Walter Beth has served in ministry with Baptist, Anglican, Tim was born in country Victoria. He was heavily Uniting church, Scripture Union, and World Vision involved in camping ministry and studied teaching. He communities and currently teaches children & families was called into ministry in his early 20s and has a track ministry and mission at Stirling Theological college, is record of building ministries from the ground up over the completing a New Testament PhD thesis on the con- past 20 years. Tim is a recognised children’s and family structs of maturity in Paul, and leads the staff team at practitioner with a focus on leadership teams. Tim’s wife the VCCE, providing intergenerational resourcing and Evette and three children now live in Ballarat where Tim professional development. She loves coffee, running, is the Associate pastor at one2one Church of Christ. and veggies. Sue Allison Brendan Petty Some people may say that Sue Allison is old but as Brendan Petty is the children’s minister at Doncaster she’s the one writing this she’d just say that she has Church of Christ, where he also leads worship and at lots of years of experience in working with youth and DYG (Doncaster Youth Group). He enjoys tinkering kids in small churches, big churches, and within schools with the way we do worship, reading books such as and camps. At Easter 2016 she took on the position of Allen & Ross’ Intergenerational Christian Formation, Generations Pastor at Red Church. Her heart is that the and exploring Lucy Moore’s Messy Church, which he rising generation grow a strong and resilient Christian hopes to implement at Donny later this year. faith that impacts the world in which they live. Vivienne Mountain Geoff & Ros Cox Vivienne is a lecturer at the University of Divinity in the Geoff and Ros have been married for 14 years and are area of children and families ministry and has a private parents to Emma (10), Sophie (7), and Claire (6). They practice in counselling and supervision. She lives with have had years of involvement in mission with children her husband and two small dogs in a Bayside suburb of and families and, as a family, have served for 7 years Melbourne, is an active member to her church, enjoys as part of the McCrae Scripture Union Family Mission theatre, music, art, and lively interaction with her large team. They belong to Bundoora Presbyterian Church. family. Vivienne has published three books, contrib- uted chapters to five others, has published numerous peer-reviewed journal articles, and holds numerous qualifications. A | 1st Floor 582 Heidelberg Rd, Fairfield VIC 3078 P | 03 9488 8800 W | churchesofchrist.org.au/ Youth Vision Vic/Tas is the The Youth Vision team consists youthvision generational ministry arm of of Kat Deith, Scott Mageean, E | [email protected] Churches of Christ in Victoria and Mitchell Salmon. 2 | and Tasmania (CCVT). From the Editor YVQ Annual 2017 Where do you sit in your Sunday service? I mean physically, where in the Imagine A Fairer World room do you put your bum? Autumn 2017 YVQ Annual is an art journal | When I was little, I sat with my mum and dad on the right hand side of the for young and emerging artists third pew from the front in the centre-right bank of pews in the church hall. to be published in November Every week. 2017. If you are a young and Issue 15 emerging writer or artist, you are As I got older, I transitioned from sitting with mum and dad in our regular invited to make a submission to | spot to sitting with the youth group in rows 2 to 6 of the left-most bank of YVQ Annual for a chance to pews (the ones nearest the band). These days when I sit in the Sunday morn- have your work featured in this YVQ ing service, I still sit in the youth seats in staunch defiance of my gradual year’s anthology of essays, short shift out of that age bracket. And, I realised without realising it, mum and dad stories, poetry, and visual art. have themselves shifted away from third-row-from-the-front to sit with their friends in the right-most bank of pews. Published works will explore the topic prompt “Imagine a There’s probably a lot to unpack in that little anecdote as to the way our fairer world” through art, writing, physical placements and choices reflect the deeper spiritual and discipleship and poetry, with a particular realities of our churches, and that doesn’t even touch on the large proportion eye on God’s imagination of Sunday church time—I might even wager a majority of time over my for a shalom‑centred world in life—spent outside the 10am service in age-aimed programs and in leader- which everyone, and particularly ship roles, which is a connected story, but another story. people on the margins, are loved, included, and advocated for. But I’m not here to do that unpacking. I just wanted to reflect that, when the topic of our third-row-from-the-front spot in church came up in conversation Submissions open September 1 the other night, mum said that she had chosen that spot intentionally, and to October 31 2017. For more deliberately stuck with it the entire time my brothers and I were growing up. information, visit churchesofchrist. She could have sat us at the back of the hall, where many young families org.au/yvqannual. often sit to avoid distracting other worshippers and for ease of escape in the event of belligerent child, but mum wanted us to be engaged with what was happening in the service, and chose a seat to maximise that possibility (based Letters to on the advice of theorists and writers in a vein similar to those in this edi- tion of YVQ). A physical action reflecting a discipleship reality that it wasn’t the Editor enough to soak a child in the hall space, but that young disciples need to be an engaged part of the life of the church. Something in this edition of YVQ stick with you, start you thinking, In this edition of YVQ, we welcome a collection of wonderful thinkers and or make you want to explore doers in the area of generational or family-oriented ministry and mission; the topic further? practitioners and scholars and educators and troublemakers who often aren’t themselves so keen on sitting quietly in the pews on a Sunday and would rather Address your letters to our search out something loud and mobile and fun to do with young disciples. editor and contributors to [email protected]. As we continue to explore how churches and ministries can do better at dis- Messages that move the cipling people of all ages together, it is our hope that this collection of voices conversation forward may be can go some way to stimulating thought, experimentation, trying new and included in future editions of untested things, and encountering the richness of an intergenerational com- YVQ, with a response from the munity of active disciples. original contributor. And may all our practices be as intentional as sitting three rows from the front. —Mitchell Salmon | 3 Breaking Down Walls Writer Nathan Want It was November in 2009 and I was sitting a café wait- This happens because we’ve made our own ministry area ing to meet my new boss. At the time, I was the Youth that we lead more important than anything else in church Pastor at Careforce Church (now known as Discovery life, or we don’t have a relationship with key ministry Church) and while I was on annual leave I was informed leaders in kids or young adults, or we have good inten- of a restructure that had happened in our kids, youth, tions to work in collaboration with kids, youth, or young and young adult ministry. This restructure was to gen- adults but we just don’t know where to start or we don’t erate greater alignment between all these ministries and have enough time to add another thing to the list of to create a seamless discipleship pathway from zero to things we need to do. thirty years old. So in my first week it was arranged for me to meet with Peter Lusk, who had taken on the role But what if we pushed aside what we know? Let go of of Generations Pastor and talk about how this would be our own agendas? Worked together, hand in hand, shoul- outworked and expressed in the youth ministry.