In recent days there has been a lot of talk in churches around community engagement and community development. Often when we think about community engagement, we immediately start talking about food hampers, feeding programs, visitation, Mainly Music type programs and perhaps even street evangelism. This is slightly different in an international context, where perhaps the focus is on orphanages, freshwater programs, education and relief from natural disasters. Whilst all these things are valuable and have their place, questions need to be asked about how much they engage the broader community (whatever our context) and certainly whether they are developing it.
A misconception when we think about community development is that we are talking about the development of our own Christian Community. However, when we talk about community development, we are not primarily referring to the building up of our particular expression behind our walls. Rather, we are referring to what it means for the Church (the people of God in the world) to partner with God and others in the developing of God’s world for and towards His Kingdom.
This unit seeks to expand our understanding of what God is doing in our world and how we can partner with God and others. All this is grounded in a philosophy of community development that allows us to value those whom we are working with as co-labourers. We will also explore practical tools for this kind of engagement.