I love living in The Hills. With a 2-year-old son who never runs out of energy and by all accounts seems to be solar powered, it’s amazing to have so many playgrounds walking distance from our home. Whilst spending yet another afternoon at the park, the question among fellow parents inevitably comes up;
PARENT: So what do you do for work?
ME: I’m a pastor at a church in Dural.
PARENT: Oh which one?
ME: The Centre?…
A look of confusion grows on their face. At this point, they either don’t know where our building is, or have this response;
PARENT: Oh, is that a church!? I thought it was a sports centre?
ME: Yeah, we’re actually a church who built a sports centre.
PARENT: Oh… wow!
ME: Yeah, we had the option when expanding to either build a big, pretty building with stain glass windows, or to build a space that invites people in from the community, so we built a sports centre. It means we’re not just using the building to worship in for a few hours on Sunday and then it just collects dust the rest of the week. So we made ourselves a local hub – a “centre” of the community open every day.
Typically by this point in the conversation one of our children is about to creatively maim themselves on a see-saw or swing, so we go our separate ways. But in case we never get the chance to meet at a local playground while our kids pretend to be crocodiles;
ME: Hey, my name’s Murray, I’m a pastor at The Centre Dural. What’s your story?
YOU: ?
If you ever wanna chat, I’d love to buy you a coffee at our church café [email protected]. You are welcome to come along and join in our services on Sunday at 10AM. You can contact us on 8989 0000 or on our website – thecentredural.org.au/church/
