Moving Around on the Mid-Island

When you look at the list of churches on our website, you’ll see that our list of churches on Vancouver Island is divided between ‘North Island’ and ‘South Island’. Paying no attention to those distinctions, a group of Fellowship Pacific churches from the ‘mid-Island’ decided to break some new ground and bring their staff teams together for a day of prayer, encouragement, instruction and communion. Parksville Fellowship played the kind hosts and early arrivers were greeted by Pastor Paul Hawkes with his sleeves rolled up, wearing a (manly) apron and getting the mid-morning snack and much needed coffee in order. 

The genesis of the event, which will hopefully resurface, came from conversations between Pastor Darin Philips [Lead Pastor of Oceanview Community in Ladysmith] and Krista Penner [Team Lead: Leadership Development at the Fellowship Pacific Ministry Centre]. The instructional sessions were delivered in tandem by Krista and Regional Director, David Horita who took the opportunity to remind all in attendance of his honest Vancouver Island upbringing. Their two very engaging sessions were entitled: Culture, values and your team dynamic; and, Your personal leadership paradigm. 

More than 25 were in attendance, some having travelled for more than half an hour!  Most of the day’s attenders were staff team members from one of five churches:

●      Oceanview Community, Ladysmith

●      The Meeting Place, Nanaimo

●      Parksville Fellowship Baptist Church

●      Courtenay Fellowship Baptist Church

●      Campbell River Baptist Church

 The morning began with an introductory prayer mingle and a challenge from James 5:7-11 encouraging us to be patient when things look discouraging. The day was wrapped up with a celebration of communion. Time was also dedicated to the reiteration of Fellowship Pacific’s Mission, Vision and Values, including a reminder to continue to strategically pray for the goals of our 2022 Mandate to be realized:

●      30% increase in congregations

●      2,500 identified leaders in training

●      Every church instituting an intentional discipleship plan

●      People coming to Christ in every church every year

 The lowlight of the day was a game that was played midday designed to expose team members to the confusion that results when objectives are not clearly understood or communicated. If any other ‘area’ of our region is interested in putting a day like this together, please be sure to mention your interest to Krista and talk it up with whatever congregations are within easy driving distance...

- By Dan Cody, Team Lead, Church Management Solutions