After seven years of successfully building a healthy congregation at St John's Anglican Church in Cooks Hill, the Reverend Stewart Perry is moving his family to Robina on the Gold Coast to minister to a growing community.
"It's something we've been trying to convince ourselves there's a rational explanation for and we can't find one! The only thing we can come up with is that's where God wants us to be - on the Gold Coast,"
"It might sound a bit crazy, 'God wants you to be on the Gold Coast, how cool', but we never imagined ourselves being there."
"We always thought we'd be in Newcastle until our children finished school and we're quite comfortable here, but I think that's when we started to realise that in my ministry role, and in what I'm called to do in the community, I'm not actually called to be comfortable. I'm called to stretch myself and encourage others to stretch themselves, so I think it's now time for me to encourage the people of the Robina, Gold Coast area to stretch themselves in a new way."
Over the last decade or so, both Rev Perry and Rev Garry Dodd have worked hard to build what had become a small congregation to a large and diverse one.
"About 13 years ago before Garry (Dodd) the former rector came in, there were only 30 or 40 people in the church,"
"It was mostly a traditional congregation but now we've got three congregations - still got our traditional congregation but it's now about 70 to 80 most weeks, and we've got two quite contemporary expressions of church happening as well,"
"So it's a very, very different style of church to what it used to be. That, in itself, has been a challenge - to try and be there as people try new things. Somethings don't work but others do and some things are just fun to try once or twice. But some things last and trying to work out with the people of St John's what is important to invest in has been one of the challenges but to their credit they've faced bravely, which is a real joy."
What will St John's next rector have to look forward to?
"St John's is a busy place to work, but an exciting busy. We have three services on Sunday - 9am traditional Anglican service, 10.45am is a little bit more casual with more modern music and at 5pm it's quite a relaxed service with great music and informality,"
"There's about 200 people that get together across those three services but about 500 people altogether who don't come every week."
"In the middle on a Sunday we do 100 baptisms a year, so we can do two or three each Sunday."
"We did two yesterday and indeed it's the first time in the seven years that I've been here that I've had two children with the same first name at the same time so we baptised two Alexanders yesterday."
Has Rev Perry ever made the mistake of getting the names wrong?
"By God's grace, no, I've never done it but I have a little cheat sheet in front of me with their names really, really clearly marked so that I don't do that!"
"We do 70 weddings year here and some Saturdays we do three weddings in a row. It can be a bit of a blur '... what's the name of this couple, the names are in front of you, don't get this wrong Stewart!,"
"My parents tell me a story that when they were married my mother actually called my father Ronald instead of Robert in their wedding vows so I know getting the name right is very important!"
In their respective time as Rectors at St John's, Garry Dodd and Stewart Perry have overseen a lot of change within the church and tried to grow a younger demographic of parishioner that must have sometimes met with a bit of resistance from older members.
"They are a community that does have some vision, and there are young families in the community, but like a lot of Anglican churches if we just focus on doing things the way they've always been done all we'll be left with is a group of older people who are just worried about keeping things the same until they leave our mortal world. That's not the sort of church I want to lead."
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