May 20, 2025 • 39 mins
This week on The Pastor’s Heart, we’re live from the Reach Australia conference at Erina on the Central Coast of New South Wales.
It’s an inspiring gathering, with 1,300 church leaders from across Australia and beyond, including New Zealand, South Africa, America, and the United Kingdom, coming together for encouragement and equipping to better Reach Australia.
Paul Harrington has led the Trinity Network of Churches in Adelaide for 33 years, guiding it from a single congregation of 800 to a thriving network of 13 churches with over 2,600 members.
Sue Harrington is a Reach Australia board member, has been deeply involved in supporting pastors’ wives, families, and women in ministry and runs a consultancy business.
Together, we discuss the lessons learned along the way, the emotional and practical challenges of planting daughter churches, and the role of humility and servant-hearted leadership. We explore the cost and recovery after sending, the evolving nature of church leadership, and the often overlooked but critical support needed for ministry households.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hey, there, it is the pastor's heart and we are live
from the car park at ReachAustralia at Erina on the
central coast of New South Wales.
The big conference has just gotunderway.
In the auditorium behind usthere are300 leaders from across
Australia and other countriesacross two sites here on the
Central Coast.
I've met leaders from NewZealand, from South Africa, from
(00:32):
America and the United Kingdomand what a mood of excitement.
Paul and Sue Harrington arewith me.
We're going to talk lessonsalong the way from 30 years in
senior church leadership.
Paul leads the Trinity Networkof 13 churches in Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
He's done that for 33 years.
Yeah, been on staff since 1988.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
And a network of churches that has grown from 800
to 2,600 under Paul'sleadership.
Sue Harrington's with us aswell.
She's a board member of ReachAustralia and a particular role
in supporting pastors, wives,families and teaching women and
a longer bio as well.
So let's get to our topic oflessons on the way in 33 years
(01:13):
leading the network ministry ina moment, but first the pastor's
heart as a board member ofReach Australia.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
What a day, oh, what a day Full of thankfulness to
God, answers to many prayers,and just full of joy, because we
see so many people with thesame heartbeat, wanting to see
churches grow strong, be out,reaching out to those who don't
yet know Jesus, and see newchurches planted.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Paul Harrington, your vibe coming here to the central
coast again for Reach Australiayeah, look, I always feel like
when I get to this conferenceI'm with the tribe, you know,
and it's not only the nationaltribe, but an international.
Yeah, that's right.
It's like being home, you know,with people who have the same
heartbeat to reach our nation,the same sense of valuing the
(01:58):
scriptures at the heart of thatsame ministry philosophy.
So it's just a joy.
Wherever you turn, those arethe conversations that you're
having.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Yeah, it's great.
Lots of conversations I mean,you've been in the multi-site
strand and lots of peoplethinking about what I might do
to reach the nation with it.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah, so yesterday we gathered with that sort of
multi-site group, so they'repastors of churches but everyone
in the room and I think therewere 70 or 80 in the room all
asking what do we do next?
All different situations buteveryone thinking how do I take
the gospel further in my context?
Do I start a new congregation?
Do I plant a new church, starta new service?
(02:39):
How do we keep making disciplesand just seeing the gospel go
forward for our nation?
Speaker 1 (02:46):
So one of the things that struck me yesterday and you
were talking about some of theDNA at Church, at Trinity, and
you were talking about humilityand servant-hearted leadership
and I just want to give you oneof your lines and then ask you
to expand.
We tell new stuff.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
You'll be given respect and love as a leader at
trinity church and you won'thave to earn it, but you can
lose it absolutely, and whatwe've seen over the years is um
a trust in leaders for thecongregations, and they've
learned and they've been taughtthat that is a valuable role and
they appreciate that, so theywill be given leadership.
(03:24):
They don't have to and theyappreciate that, so they will be
given leadership.
They don't have to prove it.
They'll be given love, they'llbe given affection, they'll be
given respect.
People will listen.
However, you can lose it If youuse leadership as a platform
for your own ego.
If you are using people toachieve your own ends rather
than together.
We are on this mission,together, rallying people,
(03:45):
training people, loving peoplethen you can lose it.
And so, yeah, that is very muchwhat we say to people.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
When I heard you say you can lose it, I thought ah,
that's a line born of watching.
Do you know, Paul?
Yeah, and watching people loseit at times, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Look, our experience in the Trinity Network is that
pastors come in and they loveand serve their congregations
very well, so it's a rarity forpeople to lose it.
To be quite honest, in our sortof context and I'm surrounded
by godly gifted pastors who areservant-hearted, they're humble,
(04:22):
that is, they're serving thecauses of Christ, not their own.
So that's our uniformexperience.
We have had some situationsmaybe occasional or whatever
where people do their ego getsin the way or they enter into
sort of a sinful era which isreally self-centred in the end.
(04:43):
And then they do losecongregations.
People who love them want thevery best for them, but they can
trash that respect if they'renot careful.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Once you've lost that trust, it's just about
impossible to get it back.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
It is hard.
Look, I think congregations, atleast in our part of the world,
in our network, are veryforgiving.
They're very patient, they wantthe best for their pastors.
Our network are very forgiving.
They're very patient, they wantthe best for their pastors and
if the pastor takes a stance ofhumility in the face of error,
they will still rally behindthem.
But it's true, you have tobuild that trust.
It's like putting money in thebank.
(05:16):
Over years you can build thatbank balance and you can draw on
it and you know.
Therefore, you know take downdeposits as you go, but you
can't do that endlessly.
You know you've got to befaithful and persist.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
And it struck me, as you were talking about
encouraging the pastor to have aposture of thankfulness towards
the congregation, just notingthey pay our wages, absolutely,
absolutely, and what a privilegethat is um for the whole
pastor's household.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
So, you know, I've often said to kids isn't it
wonderful the way that thechurch has enabled us to be in
this house, or isn't itwonderful that, um, yeah, and
and to actually specifically,paul specifically thanks the
congregation at at points thathe's able to, um, you know, free
up his time so that he can dothis work.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I mean, even we think about this weekend or this week
here, that our little staffteam of six or seven of us.
We're here, we're set aside.
We have the privilege, paid forby Village Church, to come and
attend and grow, and not justgrow in our practice but grow in
our love for God, ourunderstanding of him.
That's a privilege.
That's a privilege.
(06:25):
It's a real privilege.
I'm very thankful for it.
Paul, as you were speakingyesterday and you've planted 13
churches and some of themmulti-generational.
You just spoke at one point ofwatching one of your pastors as
they planted a church and lost athird of their people to
(06:47):
someone else.
And then they're given, acouple of years later, a third
of their people to someone elseand then, a couple of years
later, a third of their peopleto someone else, and you just
say I don't think I can do it tothis guy again.
And I just resonated with thatline of I mean not that we've
done that three times, but justseeing the cost of investing in
(07:11):
people's lives and in them.
Do you?
Speaker 2 (07:13):
want to yeah sure.
So it's happened a few timesnow in our network.
Because we plant churches, thatplant churches.
So often people are in asituation where they might have
sent out multiple church plantsand the on paper.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Mechanically it looks very sensible, but the and you
made it look very sensible withall those graphs, that's right.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
You can see the logic of it and yet the human cost
associated with it, both of thecongregation.
Every time we send a new churchout, the congregation's left
behind.
There's a level of sadness.
I think Sue said this yesterdayand it'd be a shame if they
weren't sad.
You know that loss.
But for the pastor, I thinkthere's two things going on.
(07:58):
One is the loss of people andthe sense of you know sending
away people you love and you'veinvested in.
And then the other side of itis sort of going back to a point
where you're rebuilding overthe same space and that sense of
oh, we're back at this pointagain and we need to keep
growing from here.
And I think both those arequite strenuous in that planting
(08:19):
space, especially for thesending pastor.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, especially for the sending pastor.
Yeah, I mean and you did talkabout the sense of it feels to
the sending church as if itcosts me more than what the
receiving church thinks they got.
I'll take that for me Well.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
So the people who are getting up and going they're
getting up and going, you know,like there's a lot of energy.
It's the new thing, it's theexciting frontier work.
It's strenuous, but you'rebreaking new ground.
The people who are left behind.
There's a sense of breathness.
You know the sense of uh, losswithout the sense of newness and
I I think that's a difficultspace.
(08:57):
So what we, what we found weneed to do, is when there's a
church that's sending, uh, we'veworked out that that sending
church needs to renew theircommitment to a mission.
You know the purpose thatthey're on about.
So there's sort of a churchplant group that gets up and
goes and a church staying groupthat gets up and reinvents
itself with that sense ofopportunity and potential.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, I mean I was talking to one church in our
network here in Sydney, onechurch leader and they've just
sent 80 people down the road toplant something.
I mean he's feeling that at themoment, but it's the first time
through the cycle for him.
What's your advice for him as ayoung minister?
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Yeah, absolutely so.
I remember the first time weplanted and I was saying this
yesterday we sent about 80people to a church plant and so
that left about 700, 730 peopleat the home church.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
You can't relate to my problems at all.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
There's this large group that's left behind.
But when we got there it waslike oh no, there's only 730 of
us.
You sort of think what is goingon here.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Get over yourself.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
I don't think it matters the size, but for a
young pastor, sending off faceup to that cost and think it's
normal.
So it's appropriate to feelthat loss and then to be
reflecting on how we lead intothe new space that we're in as a
home church.
So the the recapturing of thesense of the core vision that
(10:28):
we're on about to reach peoplefor christ.
Uh, we've now got space thatnew people can come into.
It's exactly why we did it andour experience of church
planting is we send off 80.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Normally within 12 to 18 months they've been replaced
you were telling me you feltlike the giving bounced back
faster than the numbers ofpeople bounced back.
Yes, explain that to me.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
So this is our experience.
When we plant, people get onboard with that planting.
The ones that go, they step upin their commitment financially
because they're totally sold outon the mission.
The work we then do with theMother Church and the sending
people realise that they need tostep up too because they're
sold out on that vision to reachnew people through planting.
(11:18):
They do that in two ways.
The people who remain they stepup in terms of ministry service
because they see there are nowgaps in the teams that need to
be replaced.
So people then emerge in thatway.
But also financially they seethe value of us reaching new
people with the gospel.
So the mother church peoplestep up financially and that
(11:42):
normally happens before the newpeople join the church, who then
might take 12 months to 18months to become members and
financial belonging.
So there's that.
But you get the locals, thenthat commission.
You know that mission to reachnew people means new people do
turn up there and we start toreplenish our numbers in that
(12:05):
sort of way with new gospel workon the home church front.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I mean, I take it for you as overseeing the network
as 13,.
You don't really feel the griefif they move from site X to
site Y, but it's the actual.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
You still get to see them, you still get to see them.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Well, that's right Right now.
That's true.
I think in the early days wewere in the mother church and so
we'd sent off.
I was essentially the seniorpastor of that church.
We sent off four times andthere was a pain.
I think you did feel that greatfour times.
Yeah, so I did.
I did that early on.
But these days, of course, whatwe do is we soon go around the
(12:41):
network.
We normally spend three to fourweeks in each church, and the
joy is we reconnect with oldfriends that we've known for
decades.
We're in this church, stillserving, still growing, and then
we meet a whole stack of newpeople that we've never met
before, and there's enormous joyin that too.
So you see a church pressingforward, old friends.
(13:03):
We always feel at home whereverwe are in the network, but
we're always meeting peoplewe've never met before.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Now church planting versus multi-site and the person
we're going to talk to WadeBurnett about this.
But what's your view about thedifferent person you're looking
for, sue, do you?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
want to weigh in on this.
I think if it is a church plantthat is not networked, then you
need somebody who's got muchmore entrepreneurial skills
Right.
They need to be able to startsort of create something from
you and they want to.
They want to.
But I think if you're part of anetwork or a multi-site and
(13:42):
Trinity would call ourselves achurch planting network with
multi-site aspects so a lot ofthings are done centrally
accounting and safe ministry andall those things that might
help.
Team players, people who lovebeing part of the Trinity
(14:02):
Network, have the TrinityNetwork DNA and, you know, just
want to see more of the same ina way.
But each but you want them tobe creative in their own spot in
a ministry sense.
So character for everyone, ofcourse.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Yeah, we're taking for granted character,
convictions and competency atthat point yeah, now attendance.
I was really interested.
You put up a graph ofattendance and there was a dip
in COVID, as one would expect.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Yes, but if I closed my eyes?
Speaker 1 (14:39):
to 2020 and 2021, it actually looked like that way a
straight line going up, and soyou've recovered from COVID.
Covid, well, and it's almost asif it looks on the graph, as
almost as if covid didn't happenis that?
Speaker 2 (14:47):
yeah, yeah, I think that's been our experience.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
See, I mean which, which I just wanted to push into
that because we've had all thisstuff from the uk about almost
a revival or a quiet revival andthat kind of thing.
And I just thought you'reyou're overseeing 13 churches
here.
You're keeping a pulse check onattendance.
What's your sense of are we?
Are you seeing somethingdifferent spiritually in the air
?
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I.
I do think here in australiawe've hit a different spot.
So when I, you know, was ayoung convert, uh, I was
encountering people who sayswe're talking 1980s, a long time
ago.
But, uh, encountering peoplewho'd had some talking 1980s a
long time ago, but encounteringpeople who'd had some church
background experience, and Ifelt like I almost, in
evangelism, needed to dismantlethose sort of preconceptions and
(15:32):
then replace it with withgospel.
You know, information these dayswe're encountering a lot of
people who have no previouschurch understanding.
So you're starting with a blankpiece of paper you know, like
to inform and to give that sortof insight into.
So my take right now inAdelaide is that there's a real
openness to the gospel and acomfort to engage with those
(15:57):
sort of ideas.
One of our churches has startedup a read Mark to Mark one to
one with people project and theywant everyone in the
congregation to want to readMark with somebody else.
And when the pastor told methat's what they're doing, I
thought this is pie in the sky,you know, getting a congregation
to do this and I've been proventotally wrong.
(16:18):
There's a whole lot of peoplewho have asked their friend, do
you want to read Mark's Gospelwith me and they've said, yes,
you know all ages, all stages.
I'm thinking that would neverhave happened, even a decade ago
.
But a willingness to stop andengage.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Yeah, that's what we're seeing Are you noticing a
gender difference there and areyou noticing a generational
difference?
I mean there's been talk about,is it gen z?
Is it the baby boomers?
Yeah, not the baby, but the onedown, yeah yeah, with that mark
one to one example.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
it's across the generations.
Interestingly enough, if I wastrying to pick generationally, I
think the you know the theblank slate people religiously
are definitely at the youngerend of things, probably that
sub-30, sub-35 group definitely,and yet the older group are
(17:11):
rethinking things.
I sat with an 82-year-old womanlast year who'd been converted
two years prior and she'd beenin an Anglican church all her
life and then a friend, whopretty well worked out that she
wasn't a Christian, said look,why don't I come to your church?
And then why didn't she come tomy church?
Speaker 1 (17:34):
And that's what happened so?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
she turned up at 80 years old thought, oh, I've
never sort of heard the Bibletaught like this.
Joined a Christianity Exploredgroup and the person running
that she explained to him thatshe had lots of questions about
Christianity, like theresurrection Jesus' resurrection
bodily from the dead.
But she'd been in a church andthe pastor had told her it was
fine for her not to believe,that that was okay.
(17:57):
And this guy runningChristianity Explored said to
her look, you don't have tobelieve Jesus rose from the dead
bodily, but you can't callyourself a Christian if you
don't.
And she thought that's right, Ican't.
And so she thought she betterbecome a Christian.
And so we're hearing storiesacross the age groups, even from
(18:18):
people who've got that sort ofbackground but really want you
know, substantial, gutsy, realBible and real Jesus.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Now planting a number of daughter churches.
They all began, and then theyall became teenagers at once.
What do you mean by that?
Where do you go first?
Speaker 3 (18:39):
Well, just like a teenager, they want more
independence, and so we.
So it was important torestructure so that you could
keep growing, and so, in the end, we made the mother church and
the planted churches all on thesame level and put a border on
(18:59):
top of that, which is all on thesame level and put a border on
top of that.
So just needing to keepchanging and moving so that
people didn't become more andmore disconnected from the
centre, because we wanted ourplanted churches to plant again
and to plant again.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Well, that would mean you'd, and so so at one level
you do think there is a motherchurch, and at another level you
think they're all at the samelevel.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
I think that's right.
So when we started planting, wereally weren't making it up.
As we went along, we didn'thave much idea what we were
doing at all, and so we traded alot on relationships, which is
a good thing to do.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
So we had strong relationships, confident
ministry modelling, but but Imean, there is something about
you, paul, in that.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
I mean I think I've known you 25 years and I've
always thought of you as afather figure, you know I've
been old before my time, and sowe're in that space and then
worked out, though, that wehadn't put any you know, clarity
arounding about the frameworkfor how we related, and the
ambiguity there was starting tocatch us out.
(20:04):
We kept hitting things we'dnever struck before and hadn't
worked out what the answers wereto.
So we spent a lot of timehaving to do all those new
situational decision-making, andso we got to a point where we
thought we need better clarity,and in fact we should have had
better clarity from the startand then worked it out later on.
We should have.
So we had to then bring backthat clarity into what we were
(20:28):
doing without restricting theability of those churches to
grow.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
So I mean, one of the things I think I've heard you
say is that we've had to movethrough several eras of
governance.
And I mean I think say is thatwe've had to move through
several eras of governance andit I mean I think it's quite
liberating from some of theothers doing multi-site to think
, oh, some of the issues we'rehaving are the same.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Yeah, they had yeah yeah, and that's I mean.
I'm often talking to people whoare looking at us and learning
from the things we did wrong.
Yeah, which is really good.
What else did we do wrong thatyou want to share?
Too many to number?
Well, one of the things we didwrong, which is really good.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
What else did we do wrong that you want to share Too
many to number?
Well, one of the things was notto have a mission at home as
well as a mission away, that wasa major factor.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Unpack that for us, yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
Just the importance of the left behinds not feeling
like we're the left behindsRight okay.
And also for the sent church torealise that they need to send
back stories, because if youever want the mother church to
send again, they've got to knowit's worth it.
And so, even though they've setthose people free to minister,
they need to be encouraged andso to be grateful.
(21:32):
So a sense of gratefulness, thesent church, we are grateful to
the sending church and we wantto tell them stories.
We want to tell them why it wasworthwhile, why did you say
that I'm doing?
Speaker 1 (21:42):
the day I went to capitol hill baptist, they were
actually hearing all thosereports from plants that you
know they'd done.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah, that's good, I know.
In our northern region we'vegot a church we planted in 2010
that's planted three times sincethose four churches.
Each year they get together fora big celebration and they just
tell stories you know what godhas been doing and it helps.
All of them know they're in ittogether and the mother church
(22:10):
in that context, the one plantedin 2010, all the people who go.
Yeah, that's why we did it.
It was, it came at a cost, butit's been really worthwhile now
let me push you around a bit.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Is multi-site biblical?
Somebody's going to say knoxrobinson view of church.
Yeah, what's your answer there?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
yeah, so the?
The answer is oh, there'sprobably a lot of ways to know
what is the knox robinson viewof church?
Yeah, so.
So knox robinson view of churchis that the essentially,
practically the local church isthe centre of all activity now
and the people of God are in theheavenly realms Ephesians 1,
gathering around the throne ofChrist, the heavenly and the
local.
(22:46):
So there is I mean, knoxRobinson was complex, but
essentially giving high-levelautonomy to the local church.
When you come to a multi-sitespace, then what you're talking
about is a series of churches,higher level autonomy to the
local church.
When you come to a multi-sitespace, then what you're talking
about is a series of churchesthat are connected together and
the question becomes around thelocal autonomy of a church, the
(23:08):
local leadership of a church.
Is that ceded to something likea denominational structure?
Does that take away from thelocal church?
They're the practical sort ofquestions I think that people
are asking and they've gottheological undergirdings.
What's your reply?
The reply is in our context,what we have is a board that
(23:31):
sits over the top of the networkthat delegates enormous local
autonomy to the local church,and the idea is that that
leadership team is making at thelocal church level, lots of
ministry decisions, and the taskof the board is to provide for
that local church as well aspossible to free them up to do
(23:52):
ministry.
So what we then have is aseries of local churches that
choose to be part of a networkbecause they see the value of
cooperating together for abigger kingdom outcome, and so I
think there's not a loss oflocal church identity but a
strength through collaborationand partnership with others to
(24:14):
achieve a wider set of goals,and I think that's very healthy.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
And quite biblical.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Yeah, and biblical as well.
Yeah.
Now, one of the questions youwere asked yesterday was wider
set of goals, and I think that'svery healthy and quite biblical
.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Yeah, and biblical as well, yeah, yeah one of the
questions you were askedyesterday was uh, I mean,
essentially you're operating nowas a network of churches, but
you were, I mean, even beforeyou started.
You were the strongest churchin adelaide, you know, um, uh,
but you're a healthy networkoperating in a sick diocese,
spiritually sick diocese.
What if one was operating in ahealthy diocese and the question
(24:45):
was, thinking, in Sydney, whereI am, what would your advice be
to such a person?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
So the context is very different.
I think I said yesterday, if wewere in Sydney with the same
sort of church, I doubt we wouldhave done what we've done in
Sydney, what we've done inAdelaide.
I think it is a very differentcontext.
However, there's someprinciples at the heart of it
that are worth thinking through,particularly in that area of
(25:16):
partnership.
Particularly in that area ofpartnership and also allowing
churches that are healthy tokeep multiplying in their space
and making sure that whateverstructure you're involved in,
whether it's, yeah, whateverdenominational you know
ecclesiology, you have there'scapacity to flex to enable that
to occur.
So my comment would be in lotsof spots there tends to be a
(25:40):
church siloing, a churchisolationism, which is healthy.
There's an ownership and alocal focus on ministry, but it
tends to militate againstpartnerships and the ability to
multiply into a wider space.
I mean, the searching force hasbeen important, isn't it?
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Collaboration he's the one.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Yeah.
So I catch up with Archiefairly often and I think you're
right Archie's view would be ina Sydney sort of context.
He's saying I'm not sure we'rereally good for kingdom purposes
playing ball on the sandpittogether and we don't have
probably the infrastructure todo it, the expectations do it,
the expectations around it andthe support to enable that to
(26:24):
occur.
And I think Archie's ontosomething it's worth thinking
through for the sake ofmultiplication of disciples,
kingdom growth, how we stretchinto that space better.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
I mean you talked yesterday about the rule books
in Sydney and the way westructure leadership is designed
for churches stretch into thatspace better.
You talked yesterday about therule books in Sydney and the way
we structure leadership isdesigned for churches of 211
people.
You're quite precise about that, and you used words like
cumbersomely protective, guardedand distributed.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
So when I got home, Sue told me I slipped into high
privilege.
So I'm really glad we're nowrecording this to the benefit of
lots of people.
So let me, let me speak intothat space, but you did it just
us.
No one's listening.
My comment is that I thinkthere's a great strength in
(27:17):
denominational frameworks thatsupport churches, but they.
The difficulty with largeframeworks and healthy
denominations like Sydney, uh,you know, and I have lots of
friends, uh, in the Sydney sortof context is that they probably
don't helpfully stretch fordifferent size churches and
(27:38):
different ministry sort ofcontext.
They and it's often difficultfor a denomination to be agile
enough and flexible enough tostretch into new sort of
ministry.
Now, in the city context, youknow, I think anglicans, they've
got lots of greenfieldsprojects.
They've also got brownfields,you know, projects as well.
(27:58):
So there's a lot of thathappening, I think, in a good
way.
I think the question that, say,someone like archie would ask is
whether we've set up structuresthat do actually help that
appropriate collaboration.
So you come to a rich australiaconference.
That's what it's all about.
You know, we're learning fromeach other, we're in this space.
Uh, denominational structuresaren't generally set up, I think
(28:22):
, to achieve that sort ofoutcome and need reviewing.
The thing is, I know in aSydney context that's happening
all the time, but it's difficultto get there and I think that
the rule book often is set up toprotect against failure and it
guards it really well, notnecessarily to provide lots of
(28:44):
incentive to try things that arecreative.
Yeah, that's right and thatthat'd be my broad comment.
But let me say you know, havingheard my wife, I am speaking
really wisely from a long wayaway.
You know it's, it's easy to youknow, sort of jump into that
pond and have a and then get ona plane and go home.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
So grab your briefcase.
Managing conflict.
I mean you've talked aboutconflict with your archbishop.
You've talked about um.
I mean I imagine there'sconflict with peers and then
conflict with people below you.
Give me some wisdom there.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
The thing I've learnt over the years and I think I'm
still learning it is that whenI'm in conflict with someone,
I'm trying to work out is it acore gospel conflict or is it a
disagreement about a directionalpurpose, trying to have that
high-level distinction on whatwe're talking about.
I'll always fight about thegospel with somebody.
(29:48):
I say fight.
I'm prepared to engage anddisagree in that sort of space
because I think it's soimportant.
So I mentioned an archbishopthat I went and saw because he
publicly said he didn't believein the bodily resurrection of
Jesus from the dead and I wasdeeply concerned about that and
(30:09):
felt I needed to show up inperson and talk to him about
that.
Talk to him about repenting,that's right.
Lots of situations.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
And resigning.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
But over the years what I've worked at in Christian
circles is people can have verystrong opinions about not very
important things and at thatpoint I think my approach has
been to say I see, you find thisimportant, but we are not going
to fight about it, it's notworth a fight, and I've tended
to try and diffuse a lot of thatsort of thing.
And when I've not been able todiffuse it, I go to a place like
(30:43):
2 Timothy 2, you know, whereTimothy's encouraged to
patiently deal with those hedisagrees with you know who
disagree with him and try to bepatient in working through what
the Bible says, what we agree on, the areas that we have
disagreement on, whether they'resecondaries or tertiaries, just
to try and do that sort ofpatient work with people and to
(31:04):
try and diffuse situations so wecan talk about those things.
It's been the same witharchbishops, been the same with
peers, same with staff that I'veworked with and allowing for
the fact that we can come todifferent conclusions on things
and that's absolutely fine insome areas and then working out
(31:26):
where are the areas that I havea little more fixedness in my
thinking about, where we need togo and working that through.
So, yeah, it's interesting.
Speaker 3 (31:36):
The things that are harder are where it's keen
gospel people that there'sconflict with if it's Paul's had
a lot of flack over the yearsfrom people who probably don't
actually believe the gospel andthat you can wear.
It's not pleasant but you canwear and it's and the opposite
is great joy when there ispeople that are coming alongside
(31:58):
and saying look, yes, you areplanting in the same area, but
we want more people to come toknow Jesus.
Yeah, and they're notthreatened, and that brings
great joy and pleasure.
So, there's the conflict, youknow.
Someone is saying how dare youplant here?
But then there's the other keengospel person who says we want
10 more churches in this areabecause we are praying for the
(32:19):
whole area and we can't do itall.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
So I think for me, the really hard point in
conflict is when there arepeople who are very close, where
we have a level of falling out.
That's the time when I losesleep, that's the time where I
am concerned, that's the timeI'm trying to make sure we don't
.
So the closer they are, youknow, the closer in leadership,
(32:43):
that's you know where I, that'swhere I find it hard.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
The other thing I think is good advice that Paul
gives people and we both sort ofchat to people.
You want to give a certainairspace and a certain heart
space to a conflict and not letit take over the whole of
everything.
Because you know the squeakywheel idea there's somebody
that's unhappy and you feel likeeverybody's against something,
but there will always be a few,and just giving it loving,
(33:12):
caring, enough attention, butnot letting that take over the
whole.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Yeah, one of the things that just struck me about
your presentation was howlittle you've invested in
property over the whole.
Yeah, one of the things thatjust struck me about, uh, your
presentation was how littleyou've invested in property over
the years and um, and that theproperty investment, whether
it's the building project,whatever, is going to slow
momentum, at least in the shortterm you know, do you want to
unpack that for us?
Speaker 2 (33:35):
yeah.
So we have a, an you knowestablished property in the city
, but of the 14 churches that'sthe only one that has an
un-fellows.
Do the others still show us?
Well, I think they do.
Sometimes you have those who'vegone out into the church
planning world saying I mean, Igot sick of the driving things
to the site.
Packing up.
(33:57):
I just thought I am over thisand I think there are people in
the church planting worldlooking back at the city and
saying you guys don't know howgood it is.
So that experience varies a bit.
But when we started planting itjust seemed more sensible to
try and find flexible spaces tomove into and we've just kept
(34:18):
doing that.
So we have 13 in rentedfacilities and that comes with a
certain risk, that is, if welose property because there's
some sort of conflict or changeof policy.
That could be incrediblyproblematic, especially if it
happens all at once.
And yet it's given us anagility and flexibility to move
(34:39):
into spaces and to getappropriate facilities.
The other thing is we'recontinuing to find that people
come to us especiallynon-Christian, they're going to
give you their property.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Well, that's true.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
That is true, but I'm thinking individuals who turn
up at buildings and actuallyfeel more at home in a building
that's not a church building, ahright, and so, evangelistically
, there's some benefits to that.
Buildings and actually feelmore at home in a building
that's not a church building,and I so, evangelistically,
there's some benefits to that.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Yet I for us I mean we spoke to glenn scrivener the
other week and he said and I asa on the younger end of the baby
boomers, I kind of recoiledagainst the idea.
But he said there's definitelya thing with the gen z of
wanting the rootedness oftraditional and and they're not
(35:26):
going to get that in the schoolhall, no, where someone like me
who's just thought I have afalse gospel and all that
trapping.
I don't want that.
No, yeah.
But he that Jim does wantsomething about the universe.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
It's a bit of both, and I remember that we were in a
Gothic church building in thecity with our evening
congregation and running out ofspace, and I said we ought to
move to something that's biggerand smaller.
But a lot of the people a fewyears ago in that meeting time
were saying no, we like it hereReally, and that is the boomer
(36:02):
difference, I think for sure.
And so there is that factor ofbeing able to adapt.
The other thing about churchyou know about school halls
meeting for church is we'veworked out they're not designed
for church.
Yeah, designed for basketball,that's right.
So the acoustics so there arelots of downsides.
Design for basketball, that'sright.
So the acoustics so there arelots of downsides.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Sweaty socks smell, you know, like there's a lot of
put off and I just thought I'mnot going to be able to get the
young professionals that I'mseeking to reach to this place
that stinks of denka rub, yeah,yeah and and so we've.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
We do know that, even if we're renting, the facility
we rent has an impact on how weespecially for unbelievers, how
we make it a space that theywant to come to.
It's not the gospel, but it'shelpful to get to the gospel.
Last words, Sue Harrington.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
Oh, it's just a joy and a privilege to be involved
in this work, and we have agreat God who wants people to be
saved.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
It's something for us .
Me it's wanting to see more andmore gospel work happening.
That's why it's so good to behere at Reach Australia and be
surrounded by people who havethat same heartbeat to take the
gospel out, so it's been a greatweek.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
Thanks for talking to us on the Pastor's Heart.
Thanks Pleasure, thanks all.
And Sue Harrington and Paul ofcourse, leads the Trinity
Network of 13 churches rightacross Adelaide in South
Australia, and Sue Harrington awhole range of things, but
particularly board member on theReach Australia Network.
My name's Dominic Steele.
You've been with us on thePastors Heart and we'll look
forward to your company nextTuesday afternoon.
Hey, there, it is the pastor's heart and we are live
from the car park at ReachAustralia at Erina on the
central coast of New South Wales.
The big conference has just gotunderway.
In the auditorium behind usthere are300 leaders from across
Australia and other countriesacross two sites here on the
Central Coast.
I've met leaders from NewZealand, from South Africa, from
(00:32):
America and the United Kingdomand what a mood of excitement.
Paul and Sue Harrington arewith me.
We're going to talk lessonsalong the way from 30 years in
senior church leadership.
Paul leads the Trinity Networkof 13 churches in Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
He's done that for 33 years.
Yeah, been on staff since 1988.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
And a network of churches that has grown from 800
to 2,600 under Paul'sleadership.
Sue Harrington's with us aswell.
She's a board member of ReachAustralia and a particular role
in supporting pastors, wives,families and teaching women and
a longer bio as well.
So let's get to our topic oflessons on the way in 33 years
(01:13):
leading the network ministry ina moment, but first the pastor's
heart as a board member ofReach Australia.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
What a day, oh, what a day Full of thankfulness to
God, answers to many prayers,and just full of joy, because we
see so many people with thesame heartbeat, wanting to see
churches grow strong, be out,reaching out to those who don't
yet know Jesus, and see newchurches planted.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Paul Harrington, your vibe coming here to the central
coast again for Reach Australiayeah, look, I always feel like
when I get to this conferenceI'm with the tribe, you know,
and it's not only the nationaltribe, but an international.
Yeah, that's right.
It's like being home, you know,with people who have the same
heartbeat to reach our nation,the same sense of valuing the
(01:58):
scriptures at the heart of thatsame ministry philosophy.
So it's just a joy.
Wherever you turn, those arethe conversations that you're
having.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Yeah, it's great.
Lots of conversations I mean,you've been in the multi-site
strand and lots of peoplethinking about what I might do
to reach the nation with it.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah, so yesterday we gathered with that sort of
multi-site group, so they'repastors of churches but everyone
in the room and I think therewere 70 or 80 in the room all
asking what do we do next?
All different situations buteveryone thinking how do I take
the gospel further in my context?
Do I start a new congregation?
Do I plant a new church, starta new service?
(02:39):
How do we keep making disciplesand just seeing the gospel go
forward for our nation?
Speaker 1 (02:46):
So one of the things that struck me yesterday and you
were talking about some of theDNA at Church, at Trinity, and
you were talking about humilityand servant-hearted leadership
and I just want to give you oneof your lines and then ask you
to expand.
We tell new stuff.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
You'll be given respect and love as a leader at
trinity church and you won'thave to earn it, but you can
lose it absolutely, and whatwe've seen over the years is um
a trust in leaders for thecongregations, and they've
learned and they've been taughtthat that is a valuable role and
they appreciate that, so theywill be given leadership.
(03:24):
They don't have to and theyappreciate that, so they will be
given leadership.
They don't have to prove it.
They'll be given love, they'llbe given affection, they'll be
given respect.
People will listen.
However, you can lose it If youuse leadership as a platform
for your own ego.
If you are using people toachieve your own ends rather
than together.
We are on this mission,together, rallying people,
(03:45):
training people, loving peoplethen you can lose it.
And so, yeah, that is very muchwhat we say to people.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
When I heard you say you can lose it, I thought ah,
that's a line born of watching.
Do you know, Paul?
Yeah, and watching people loseit at times, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Look, our experience in the Trinity Network is that
pastors come in and they loveand serve their congregations
very well, so it's a rarity forpeople to lose it.
To be quite honest, in our sortof context and I'm surrounded
by godly gifted pastors who areservant-hearted, they're humble,
(04:22):
that is, they're serving thecauses of Christ, not their own.
So that's our uniformexperience.
We have had some situationsmaybe occasional or whatever
where people do their ego getsin the way or they enter into
sort of a sinful era which isreally self-centred in the end.
(04:43):
And then they do losecongregations.
People who love them want thevery best for them, but they can
trash that respect if they'renot careful.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Once you've lost that trust, it's just about
impossible to get it back.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
It is hard.
Look, I think congregations, atleast in our part of the world,
in our network, are veryforgiving.
They're very patient, they wantthe best for their pastors.
Our network are very forgiving.
They're very patient, they wantthe best for their pastors and
if the pastor takes a stance ofhumility in the face of error,
they will still rally behindthem.
But it's true, you have tobuild that trust.
It's like putting money in thebank.
(05:16):
Over years you can build thatbank balance and you can draw on
it and you know.
Therefore, you know take downdeposits as you go, but you
can't do that endlessly.
You know you've got to befaithful and persist.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
And it struck me, as you were talking about
encouraging the pastor to have aposture of thankfulness towards
the congregation, just notingthey pay our wages, absolutely,
absolutely, and what a privilegethat is um for the whole
pastor's household.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
So, you know, I've often said to kids isn't it
wonderful the way that thechurch has enabled us to be in
this house, or isn't itwonderful that, um, yeah, and
and to actually specifically,paul specifically thanks the
congregation at at points thathe's able to, um, you know, free
up his time so that he can dothis work.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I mean, even we think about this weekend or this week
here, that our little staffteam of six or seven of us.
We're here, we're set aside.
We have the privilege, paid forby Village Church, to come and
attend and grow, and not justgrow in our practice but grow in
our love for God, ourunderstanding of him.
That's a privilege.
That's a privilege.
(06:25):
It's a real privilege.
I'm very thankful for it.
Paul, as you were speakingyesterday and you've planted 13
churches and some of themmulti-generational.
You just spoke at one point ofwatching one of your pastors as
they planted a church and lost athird of their people to
(06:47):
someone else.
And then they're given, acouple of years later, a third
of their people to someone elseand then, a couple of years
later, a third of their peopleto someone else, and you just
say I don't think I can do it tothis guy again.
And I just resonated with thatline of I mean not that we've
done that three times, but justseeing the cost of investing in
(07:11):
people's lives and in them.
Do you?
Speaker 2 (07:13):
want to yeah sure.
So it's happened a few timesnow in our network.
Because we plant churches, thatplant churches.
So often people are in asituation where they might have
sent out multiple church plantsand the on paper.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Mechanically it looks very sensible, but the and you
made it look very sensible withall those graphs, that's right.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
You can see the logic of it and yet the human cost
associated with it, both of thecongregation.
Every time we send a new churchout, the congregation's left
behind.
There's a level of sadness.
I think Sue said this yesterdayand it'd be a shame if they
weren't sad.
You know that loss.
But for the pastor, I thinkthere's two things going on.
(07:58):
One is the loss of people andthe sense of you know sending
away people you love and you'veinvested in.
And then the other side of itis sort of going back to a point
where you're rebuilding overthe same space and that sense of
oh, we're back at this pointagain and we need to keep
growing from here.
And I think both those arequite strenuous in that planting
(08:19):
space, especially for thesending pastor.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, especially for the sending pastor.
Yeah, I mean and you did talkabout the sense of it feels to
the sending church as if itcosts me more than what the
receiving church thinks they got.
I'll take that for me Well.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
So the people who are getting up and going they're
getting up and going, you know,like there's a lot of energy.
It's the new thing, it's theexciting frontier work.
It's strenuous, but you'rebreaking new ground.
The people who are left behind.
There's a sense of breathness.
You know the sense of uh, losswithout the sense of newness and
I I think that's a difficultspace.
(08:57):
So what we, what we found weneed to do, is when there's a
church that's sending, uh, we'veworked out that that sending
church needs to renew theircommitment to a mission.
You know the purpose thatthey're on about.
So there's sort of a churchplant group that gets up and
goes and a church staying groupthat gets up and reinvents
itself with that sense ofopportunity and potential.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, I mean I was talking to one church in our
network here in Sydney, onechurch leader and they've just
sent 80 people down the road toplant something.
I mean he's feeling that at themoment, but it's the first time
through the cycle for him.
What's your advice for him as ayoung minister?
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Yeah, absolutely so.
I remember the first time weplanted and I was saying this
yesterday we sent about 80people to a church plant and so
that left about 700, 730 peopleat the home church.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
You can't relate to my problems at all.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
There's this large group that's left behind.
But when we got there it waslike oh no, there's only 730 of
us.
You sort of think what is goingon here.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Get over yourself.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
I don't think it matters the size, but for a
young pastor, sending off faceup to that cost and think it's
normal.
So it's appropriate to feelthat loss and then to be
reflecting on how we lead intothe new space that we're in as a
home church.
So the the recapturing of thesense of the core vision that
(10:28):
we're on about to reach peoplefor christ.
Uh, we've now got space thatnew people can come into.
It's exactly why we did it andour experience of church
planting is we send off 80.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Normally within 12 to 18 months they've been replaced
you were telling me you feltlike the giving bounced back
faster than the numbers ofpeople bounced back.
Yes, explain that to me.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
So this is our experience.
When we plant, people get onboard with that planting.
The ones that go, they step upin their commitment financially
because they're totally sold outon the mission.
The work we then do with theMother Church and the sending
people realise that they need tostep up too because they're
sold out on that vision to reachnew people through planting.
(11:18):
They do that in two ways.
The people who remain they stepup in terms of ministry service
because they see there are nowgaps in the teams that need to
be replaced.
So people then emerge in thatway.
But also financially they seethe value of us reaching new
people with the gospel.
So the mother church peoplestep up financially and that
(11:42):
normally happens before the newpeople join the church, who then
might take 12 months to 18months to become members and
financial belonging.
So there's that.
But you get the locals, thenthat commission.
You know that mission to reachnew people means new people do
turn up there and we start toreplenish our numbers in that
(12:05):
sort of way with new gospel workon the home church front.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I mean, I take it for you as overseeing the network
as 13,.
You don't really feel the griefif they move from site X to
site Y, but it's the actual.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
You still get to see them, you still get to see them.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Well, that's right Right now.
That's true.
I think in the early days wewere in the mother church and so
we'd sent off.
I was essentially the seniorpastor of that church.
We sent off four times andthere was a pain.
I think you did feel that greatfour times.
Yeah, so I did.
I did that early on.
But these days, of course, whatwe do is we soon go around the
(12:41):
network.
We normally spend three to fourweeks in each church, and the
joy is we reconnect with oldfriends that we've known for
decades.
We're in this church, stillserving, still growing, and then
we meet a whole stack of newpeople that we've never met
before, and there's enormous joyin that too.
So you see a church pressingforward, old friends.
(13:03):
We always feel at home whereverwe are in the network, but
we're always meeting peoplewe've never met before.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Now church planting versus multi-site and the person
we're going to talk to WadeBurnett about this.
But what's your view about thedifferent person you're looking
for, sue, do you?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
want to weigh in on this.
I think if it is a church plantthat is not networked, then you
need somebody who's got muchmore entrepreneurial skills
Right.
They need to be able to startsort of create something from
you and they want to.
They want to.
But I think if you're part of anetwork or a multi-site and
(13:42):
Trinity would call ourselves achurch planting network with
multi-site aspects so a lot ofthings are done centrally
accounting and safe ministry andall those things that might
help.
Team players, people who lovebeing part of the Trinity
(14:02):
Network, have the TrinityNetwork DNA and, you know, just
want to see more of the same ina way.
But each but you want them tobe creative in their own spot in
a ministry sense.
So character for everyone, ofcourse.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Yeah, we're taking for granted character,
convictions and competency atthat point yeah, now attendance.
I was really interested.
You put up a graph ofattendance and there was a dip
in COVID, as one would expect.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Yes, but if I closed my eyes?
Speaker 1 (14:39):
to 2020 and 2021, it actually looked like that way a
straight line going up, and soyou've recovered from COVID.
Covid, well, and it's almost asif it looks on the graph, as
almost as if covid didn't happenis that?
Speaker 2 (14:47):
yeah, yeah, I think that's been our experience.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
See, I mean which, which I just wanted to push into
that because we've had all thisstuff from the uk about almost
a revival or a quiet revival andthat kind of thing.
And I just thought you'reyou're overseeing 13 churches
here.
You're keeping a pulse check onattendance.
What's your sense of are we?
Are you seeing somethingdifferent spiritually in the air
?
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I.
I do think here in australiawe've hit a different spot.
So when I, you know, was ayoung convert, uh, I was
encountering people who sayswe're talking 1980s, a long time
ago.
But, uh, encountering peoplewho'd had some talking 1980s a
long time ago, but encounteringpeople who'd had some church
background experience, and Ifelt like I almost, in
evangelism, needed to dismantlethose sort of preconceptions and
(15:32):
then replace it with withgospel.
You know, information these dayswe're encountering a lot of
people who have no previouschurch understanding.
So you're starting with a blankpiece of paper you know, like
to inform and to give that sortof insight into.
So my take right now inAdelaide is that there's a real
openness to the gospel and acomfort to engage with those
(15:57):
sort of ideas.
One of our churches has startedup a read Mark to Mark one to
one with people project and theywant everyone in the
congregation to want to readMark with somebody else.
And when the pastor told methat's what they're doing, I
thought this is pie in the sky,you know, getting a congregation
to do this and I've been proventotally wrong.
(16:18):
There's a whole lot of peoplewho have asked their friend, do
you want to read Mark's Gospelwith me and they've said, yes,
you know all ages, all stages.
I'm thinking that would neverhave happened, even a decade ago
.
But a willingness to stop andengage.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Yeah, that's what we're seeing Are you noticing a
gender difference there and areyou noticing a generational
difference?
I mean there's been talk about,is it gen z?
Is it the baby boomers?
Yeah, not the baby, but the onedown, yeah yeah, with that mark
one to one example.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
it's across the generations.
Interestingly enough, if I wastrying to pick generationally, I
think the you know the theblank slate people religiously
are definitely at the youngerend of things, probably that
sub-30, sub-35 group definitely,and yet the older group are
(17:11):
rethinking things.
I sat with an 82-year-old womanlast year who'd been converted
two years prior and she'd beenin an Anglican church all her
life and then a friend, whopretty well worked out that she
wasn't a Christian, said look,why don't I come to your church?
And then why didn't she come tomy church?
Speaker 1 (17:34):
And that's what happened so?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
she turned up at 80 years old thought, oh, I've
never sort of heard the Bibletaught like this.
Joined a Christianity Exploredgroup and the person running
that she explained to him thatshe had lots of questions about
Christianity, like theresurrection Jesus' resurrection
bodily from the dead.
But she'd been in a church andthe pastor had told her it was
fine for her not to believe,that that was okay.
(17:57):
And this guy runningChristianity Explored said to
her look, you don't have tobelieve Jesus rose from the dead
bodily, but you can't callyourself a Christian if you
don't.
And she thought that's right, Ican't.
And so she thought she betterbecome a Christian.
And so we're hearing storiesacross the age groups, even from
(18:18):
people who've got that sort ofbackground but really want you
know, substantial, gutsy, realBible and real Jesus.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Now planting a number of daughter churches.
They all began, and then theyall became teenagers at once.
What do you mean by that?
Where do you go first?
Speaker 3 (18:39):
Well, just like a teenager, they want more
independence, and so we.
So it was important torestructure so that you could
keep growing, and so, in the end, we made the mother church and
the planted churches all on thesame level and put a border on
(18:59):
top of that, which is all on thesame level and put a border on
top of that.
So just needing to keepchanging and moving so that
people didn't become more andmore disconnected from the
centre, because we wanted ourplanted churches to plant again
and to plant again.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Well, that would mean you'd, and so so at one level
you do think there is a motherchurch, and at another level you
think they're all at the samelevel.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
I think that's right.
So when we started planting, wereally weren't making it up.
As we went along, we didn'thave much idea what we were
doing at all, and so we traded alot on relationships, which is
a good thing to do.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
So we had strong relationships, confident
ministry modelling, but but Imean, there is something about
you, paul, in that.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
I mean I think I've known you 25 years and I've
always thought of you as afather figure, you know I've
been old before my time, and sowe're in that space and then
worked out, though, that wehadn't put any you know, clarity
arounding about the frameworkfor how we related, and the
ambiguity there was starting tocatch us out.
(20:04):
We kept hitting things we'dnever struck before and hadn't
worked out what the answers wereto.
So we spent a lot of timehaving to do all those new
situational decision-making, andso we got to a point where we
thought we need better clarity,and in fact we should have had
better clarity from the startand then worked it out later on.
We should have.
So we had to then bring backthat clarity into what we were
(20:28):
doing without restricting theability of those churches to
grow.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
So I mean, one of the things I think I've heard you
say is that we've had to movethrough several eras of
governance.
And I mean I think say is thatwe've had to move through
several eras of governance andit I mean I think it's quite
liberating from some of theothers doing multi-site to think
, oh, some of the issues we'rehaving are the same.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Yeah, they had yeah yeah, and that's I mean.
I'm often talking to people whoare looking at us and learning
from the things we did wrong.
Yeah, which is really good.
What else did we do wrong thatyou want to share?
Too many to number?
Well, one of the things we didwrong, which is really good.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
What else did we do wrong that you want to share Too
many to number?
Well, one of the things was notto have a mission at home as
well as a mission away, that wasa major factor.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Unpack that for us, yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
Just the importance of the left behinds not feeling
like we're the left behindsRight okay.
And also for the sent church torealise that they need to send
back stories, because if youever want the mother church to
send again, they've got to knowit's worth it.
And so, even though they've setthose people free to minister,
they need to be encouraged andso to be grateful.
(21:32):
So a sense of gratefulness, thesent church, we are grateful to
the sending church and we wantto tell them stories.
We want to tell them why it wasworthwhile, why did you say
that I'm doing?
Speaker 1 (21:42):
the day I went to capitol hill baptist, they were
actually hearing all thosereports from plants that you
know they'd done.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah, that's good, I know.
In our northern region we'vegot a church we planted in 2010
that's planted three times sincethose four churches.
Each year they get together fora big celebration and they just
tell stories you know what godhas been doing and it helps.
All of them know they're in ittogether and the mother church
(22:10):
in that context, the one plantedin 2010, all the people who go.
Yeah, that's why we did it.
It was, it came at a cost, butit's been really worthwhile now
let me push you around a bit.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Is multi-site biblical?
Somebody's going to say knoxrobinson view of church.
Yeah, what's your answer there?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
yeah, so the?
The answer is oh, there'sprobably a lot of ways to know
what is the knox robinson viewof church?
Yeah, so.
So knox robinson view of churchis that the essentially,
practically the local church isthe centre of all activity now
and the people of God are in theheavenly realms Ephesians 1,
gathering around the throne ofChrist, the heavenly and the
local.
(22:46):
So there is I mean, knoxRobinson was complex, but
essentially giving high-levelautonomy to the local church.
When you come to a multi-sitespace, then what you're talking
about is a series of churches,higher level autonomy to the
local church.
When you come to a multi-sitespace, then what you're talking
about is a series of churchesthat are connected together and
the question becomes around thelocal autonomy of a church, the
(23:08):
local leadership of a church.
Is that ceded to something likea denominational structure?
Does that take away from thelocal church?
They're the practical sort ofquestions I think that people
are asking and they've gottheological undergirdings.
What's your reply?
The reply is in our context,what we have is a board that
(23:31):
sits over the top of the networkthat delegates enormous local
autonomy to the local church,and the idea is that that
leadership team is making at thelocal church level, lots of
ministry decisions, and the taskof the board is to provide for
that local church as well aspossible to free them up to do
(23:52):
ministry.
So what we then have is aseries of local churches that
choose to be part of a networkbecause they see the value of
cooperating together for abigger kingdom outcome, and so I
think there's not a loss oflocal church identity but a
strength through collaborationand partnership with others to
(24:14):
achieve a wider set of goals,and I think that's very healthy.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
And quite biblical.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Yeah, and biblical as well.
Yeah.
Now, one of the questions youwere asked yesterday was wider
set of goals, and I think that'svery healthy and quite biblical
.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Yeah, and biblical as well, yeah, yeah one of the
questions you were askedyesterday was uh, I mean,
essentially you're operating nowas a network of churches, but
you were, I mean, even beforeyou started.
You were the strongest churchin adelaide, you know, um, uh,
but you're a healthy networkoperating in a sick diocese,
spiritually sick diocese.
What if one was operating in ahealthy diocese and the question
(24:45):
was, thinking, in Sydney, whereI am, what would your advice be
to such a person?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
So the context is very different.
I think I said yesterday, if wewere in Sydney with the same
sort of church, I doubt we wouldhave done what we've done in
Sydney, what we've done inAdelaide.
I think it is a very differentcontext.
However, there's someprinciples at the heart of it
that are worth thinking through,particularly in that area of
(25:16):
partnership.
Particularly in that area ofpartnership and also allowing
churches that are healthy tokeep multiplying in their space
and making sure that whateverstructure you're involved in,
whether it's, yeah, whateverdenominational you know
ecclesiology, you have there'scapacity to flex to enable that
to occur.
So my comment would be in lotsof spots there tends to be a
(25:40):
church siloing, a churchisolationism, which is healthy.
There's an ownership and alocal focus on ministry, but it
tends to militate againstpartnerships and the ability to
multiply into a wider space.
I mean, the searching force hasbeen important, isn't it?
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Collaboration he's the one.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
Yeah.
So I catch up with Archiefairly often and I think you're
right Archie's view would be ina Sydney sort of context.
He's saying I'm not sure we'rereally good for kingdom purposes
playing ball on the sandpittogether and we don't have
probably the infrastructure todo it, the expectations do it,
the expectations around it andthe support to enable that to
(26:24):
occur.
And I think Archie's ontosomething it's worth thinking
through for the sake ofmultiplication of disciples,
kingdom growth, how we stretchinto that space better.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
I mean you talked yesterday about the rule books
in Sydney and the way westructure leadership is designed
for churches stretch into thatspace better.
You talked yesterday about therule books in Sydney and the way
we structure leadership isdesigned for churches of 211
people.
You're quite precise about that, and you used words like
cumbersomely protective, guardedand distributed.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
So when I got home, Sue told me I slipped into high
privilege.
So I'm really glad we're nowrecording this to the benefit of
lots of people.
So let me, let me speak intothat space, but you did it just
us.
No one's listening.
My comment is that I thinkthere's a great strength in
(27:17):
denominational frameworks thatsupport churches, but they.
The difficulty with largeframeworks and healthy
denominations like Sydney, uh,you know, and I have lots of
friends, uh, in the Sydney sortof context is that they probably
don't helpfully stretch fordifferent size churches and
(27:38):
different ministry sort ofcontext.
They and it's often difficultfor a denomination to be agile
enough and flexible enough tostretch into new sort of
ministry.
Now, in the city context, youknow, I think anglicans, they've
got lots of greenfieldsprojects.
They've also got brownfields,you know, projects as well.
(27:58):
So there's a lot of thathappening, I think, in a good
way.
I think the question that, say,someone like archie would ask is
whether we've set up structuresthat do actually help that
appropriate collaboration.
So you come to a rich australiaconference.
That's what it's all about.
You know, we're learning fromeach other, we're in this space.
Uh, denominational structuresaren't generally set up, I think
(28:22):
, to achieve that sort ofoutcome and need reviewing.
The thing is, I know in aSydney context that's happening
all the time, but it's difficultto get there and I think that
the rule book often is set up toprotect against failure and it
guards it really well, notnecessarily to provide lots of
(28:44):
incentive to try things that arecreative.
Yeah, that's right and thatthat'd be my broad comment.
But let me say you know, havingheard my wife, I am speaking
really wisely from a long wayaway.
You know it's, it's easy to youknow, sort of jump into that
pond and have a and then get ona plane and go home.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
So grab your briefcase.
Managing conflict.
I mean you've talked aboutconflict with your archbishop.
You've talked about um.
I mean I imagine there'sconflict with peers and then
conflict with people below you.
Give me some wisdom there.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
The thing I've learnt over the years and I think I'm
still learning it is that whenI'm in conflict with someone,
I'm trying to work out is it acore gospel conflict or is it a
disagreement about a directionalpurpose, trying to have that
high-level distinction on whatwe're talking about.
I'll always fight about thegospel with somebody.
(29:48):
I say fight.
I'm prepared to engage anddisagree in that sort of space
because I think it's soimportant.
So I mentioned an archbishopthat I went and saw because he
publicly said he didn't believein the bodily resurrection of
Jesus from the dead and I wasdeeply concerned about that and
(30:09):
felt I needed to show up inperson and talk to him about
that.
Talk to him about repenting,that's right.
Lots of situations.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
And resigning.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
But over the years what I've worked at in Christian
circles is people can have verystrong opinions about not very
important things and at thatpoint I think my approach has
been to say I see, you find thisimportant, but we are not going
to fight about it, it's notworth a fight, and I've tended
to try and diffuse a lot of thatsort of thing.
And when I've not been able todiffuse it, I go to a place like
(30:43):
2 Timothy 2, you know, whereTimothy's encouraged to
patiently deal with those hedisagrees with you know who
disagree with him and try to bepatient in working through what
the Bible says, what we agree on, the areas that we have
disagreement on, whether they'resecondaries or tertiaries, just
to try and do that sort ofpatient work with people and to
(31:04):
try and diffuse situations so wecan talk about those things.
It's been the same witharchbishops, been the same with
peers, same with staff that I'veworked with and allowing for
the fact that we can come todifferent conclusions on things
and that's absolutely fine insome areas and then working out
(31:26):
where are the areas that I havea little more fixedness in my
thinking about, where we need togo and working that through.
So, yeah, it's interesting.
Speaker 3 (31:36):
The things that are harder are where it's keen
gospel people that there'sconflict with if it's Paul's had
a lot of flack over the yearsfrom people who probably don't
actually believe the gospel andthat you can wear.
It's not pleasant but you canwear and it's and the opposite
is great joy when there ispeople that are coming alongside
(31:58):
and saying look, yes, you areplanting in the same area, but
we want more people to come toknow Jesus.
Yeah, and they're notthreatened, and that brings
great joy and pleasure.
So, there's the conflict, youknow.
Someone is saying how dare youplant here?
But then there's the other keengospel person who says we want
10 more churches in this areabecause we are praying for the
(32:19):
whole area and we can't do itall.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
So I think for me, the really hard point in
conflict is when there arepeople who are very close, where
we have a level of falling out.
That's the time when I losesleep, that's the time where I
am concerned, that's the timeI'm trying to make sure we don't
.
So the closer they are, youknow, the closer in leadership,
(32:43):
that's you know where I, that'swhere I find it hard.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
The other thing I think is good advice that Paul
gives people and we both sort ofchat to people.
You want to give a certainairspace and a certain heart
space to a conflict and not letit take over the whole of
everything.
Because you know the squeakywheel idea there's somebody
that's unhappy and you feel likeeverybody's against something,
but there will always be a few,and just giving it loving,
(33:12):
caring, enough attention, butnot letting that take over the
whole.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Yeah, one of the things that just struck me about
your presentation was howlittle you've invested in
property over the whole.
Yeah, one of the things thatjust struck me about, uh, your
presentation was how littleyou've invested in property over
the years and um, and that theproperty investment, whether
it's the building project,whatever, is going to slow
momentum, at least in the shortterm you know, do you want to
unpack that for us?
Speaker 2 (33:35):
yeah.
So we have a, an you knowestablished property in the city
, but of the 14 churches that'sthe only one that has an
un-fellows.
Do the others still show us?
Well, I think they do.
Sometimes you have those who'vegone out into the church
planning world saying I mean, Igot sick of the driving things
to the site.
Packing up.
(33:57):
I just thought I am over thisand I think there are people in
the church planting worldlooking back at the city and
saying you guys don't know howgood it is.
So that experience varies a bit.
But when we started planting itjust seemed more sensible to
try and find flexible spaces tomove into and we've just kept
(34:18):
doing that.
So we have 13 in rentedfacilities and that comes with a
certain risk, that is, if welose property because there's
some sort of conflict or changeof policy.
That could be incrediblyproblematic, especially if it
happens all at once.
And yet it's given us anagility and flexibility to move
(34:39):
into spaces and to getappropriate facilities.
The other thing is we'recontinuing to find that people
come to us especiallynon-Christian, they're going to
give you their property.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Well, that's true.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
That is true, but I'm thinking individuals who turn
up at buildings and actuallyfeel more at home in a building
that's not a church building, ahright, and so, evangelistically
, there's some benefits to that.
Buildings and actually feelmore at home in a building
that's not a church building,and I so, evangelistically,
there's some benefits to that.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Yet I for us I mean we spoke to glenn scrivener the
other week and he said and I asa on the younger end of the baby
boomers, I kind of recoiledagainst the idea.
But he said there's definitelya thing with the gen z of
wanting the rootedness oftraditional and and they're not
(35:26):
going to get that in the schoolhall, no, where someone like me
who's just thought I have afalse gospel and all that
trapping.
I don't want that.
No, yeah.
But he that Jim does wantsomething about the universe.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
It's a bit of both, and I remember that we were in a
Gothic church building in thecity with our evening
congregation and running out ofspace, and I said we ought to
move to something that's biggerand smaller.
But a lot of the people a fewyears ago in that meeting time
were saying no, we like it hereReally, and that is the boomer
(36:02):
difference, I think for sure.
And so there is that factor ofbeing able to adapt.
The other thing about churchyou know about school halls
meeting for church is we'veworked out they're not designed
for church.
Yeah, designed for basketball,that's right.
So the acoustics so there arelots of downsides.
Design for basketball, that'sright.
So the acoustics so there arelots of downsides.
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Sweaty socks smell, you know, like there's a lot of
put off and I just thought I'mnot going to be able to get the
young professionals that I'mseeking to reach to this place
that stinks of denka rub, yeah,yeah and and so we've.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
We do know that, even if we're renting, the facility
we rent has an impact on how weespecially for unbelievers, how
we make it a space that theywant to come to.
It's not the gospel, but it'shelpful to get to the gospel.
Last words, Sue Harrington.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
Oh, it's just a joy and a privilege to be involved
in this work, and we have agreat God who wants people to be
saved.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
It's something for us .
Me it's wanting to see more andmore gospel work happening.
That's why it's so good to behere at Reach Australia and be
surrounded by people who havethat same heartbeat to take the
gospel out, so it's been a greatweek.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
Thanks for talking to us on the Pastor's Heart.
Thanks Pleasure, thanks all.
And Sue Harrington and Paul ofcourse, leads the Trinity
Network of 13 churches rightacross Adelaide in South
Australia, and Sue Harrington awhole range of things, but
particularly board member on theReach Australia Network.
My name's Dominic Steele.
You've been with us on thePastors Heart and we'll look
forward to your company nextTuesday afternoon.
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