October 2026 Newsletter
Our mission is to love God and love our neighbours. May our lives bear the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, kindness and more.
As we continue our journey through the season of Ordinary Time towards Advent at the end of next month, I would like to invite us as a community to reflect upon the nature of who we are. Our mission as a congregation is:
“Loving God and loving our neighbours."
I believe we can never reflect upon this statement too much! Are we allowing this mission to shape who we are as individuals and as a community? If so, what evidence is there for those around us to notice? As those seeking to follow the Way of Love described by Jesus, how are we known within our own congregation, our community and the world around us?
There is a special passage in the New Testament of the Bible in Galatians 5 that talks about lives that evidence the fruit of the Spirit - lives that reflect the teachings of Jesus. This fruit is described as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These are the attributes that a community seeking to love God and their neighbours will display. These are the attributes I hope to bear in my life as I am led by the Spirit, seeking to love God and my neighbours. These are the attributes that I hope are integral to the nature of who we are today as a community of faith.
What can we be doing to encourage one another to grow and bear this kind of fruit? Surely as we reflect upon this list, we see values and characteristics that the world around us needs. I am certain that as we embody this fruit, the enacting of our mission of loving God and loving our neighbour will naturally flow through us.
May our words and actions evidence the fruit of the Divine Spirit and be filled with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
These are the attributes that will bring unity, hope and peace to our world. They are the characteristics of life in its fullness and the characteristics of those seeking to love God and their neighbours. May this be the reflection of who we are during this season of Ordinary Time and beyond.
Let’s seek to make this world a better place by choosing love as our centre and by allowing this to bear such fruit in our lives.
What fruit do you bear?