Diakonia UCA

I was born in 1954, the eldest of 6 children and I lived in Murrayville in the Victorian Mallee for the first 15 years of my life. Looking back on my childhood, I always had a deep yearning for meaning, but at that time had no way of knowing or expressing what that was as we had little contact with the church. This experience has given me an appreciation of how God is present with people well before they understand the gospel of Jesus Christ and I marvel at God because of it.

In 1970 our family moved to Adelaide for my sister to receive renal dialysis. One of my new friends at Findon High School had a strong faith in Christ and I immediately knew that this was what I had been looking for. However, it took me a long time before I was ready to make a firm commitment to God’s way in my life. My friend gave me a ‘Living Bible’ for my 17th birthday and I devoured it. Every word seemed to speak to me. Thus, began a strong conviction of the transforming power of the Scriptures.

In 1978, by this time married to Rodney, and 3 years into my teaching career, we moved to Port Augusta. A group in the UC there had been influenced by a move of the Holy Spirit that had started in Elcho Island and I was drawn into that group. In the spring of that year I purposefully decided to follow Christ as best I could for the rest of my life – the best decision I have made. This experience and the subsequent slow but sure, inner transformation and healing I experienced as I lived my decision out in my everyday life, has given me a longing that all should be given this opportunity to experience the new and abundant life that Christ offers us. My own experience also humbled me to realise how messy and slow healing can be!

Perhaps because I grew up largely outside the church, I have always been concerned for those outside the church or on the fringes of it. All my reading of Scriptures had shown me how Christ had given priority to those who struggle, treating them with more gentleness and understanding but always with respect and dignity. My observation early in my Christian life was that those people were largely absent from our churches, and often blamed for their plight. I had a sense of ‘common humanity’ with them. I didn’t know it, but God was preparing me for a ministry in the UC diaconate.

In 1994 I moved with my husband and our four children to Mount Barker. Soon after I started visiting Mobilong Prison with a retired man from our church, the late Eric Paschke. I also visited many of the prisoners’ families with Eric and became friends with several of them. Again, I had a strong sense of our ‘common humanity’; God was showing me the importance of focusing on our personhood and not let people be identified by their problems.

In 1998 the Minister and Elders (by this stage I was an Elder) of Mt Barker UC were looking for ways to meet with those outside the church. They initiated a coffee morning which a number of the people I had been visiting attended, along with a couple of people who had been recently released from prison. Soon some of them had invited their friends.

After a year of two, that group were lamenting the fact that when they were homeless and broke there was nowhere for them to go. Hungry No More (HNM) was started with a free community meal in Feb 2001. From the start our priority was to have a ministry ‘with’ rather than a ministry ‘to’ those who came.

I was slow to hear God’s call to ministry which I now know started in 1994 and continued through chance encounters, reading of Scripture, strong convictions while studying a Theology degree, learning of the UC diaconate and reading the brochure, then finally culminating in a phone call to Uniting College in 2007. Fortunately for me, the people at Mount Barker UC had also been sensing my call and I started my ordained ministry as a Deacon there in September 2009 and I have recently retired after 10 years.

It has been my great privilege to minister and worship with that wonderful group of people who opened their church and hearts to those who struggle with life as well as each other. The people who have accessed the HNM program (which has now expanded to include a church service, emergency housing room, and a training café) opened their hearts to us too and together we have come to understand the reality of Christ’s presence in all our brokenness as well as our strengths.

I thank God, and all those I have encountered in ministry for the amazing privilege I have had to minister in the UCA as a Deacon. I look forward to what God may have for me in retirement.