Wise words with...

‘Living in Community’

‘I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.’ 1 Corinthians 1:10 (NIV)

On Monday of this past week, I had the privilege of presenting the NCS staff devotion. This was our first day where we were able to welcome back all of our students from K-12. It was a great delight to know that our NCS ‘community’ was back together again after a three week absence due to school holidays. I chose to focus my devotion on this topic of ‘community’.

Since that time, I have reflected further as to what it means to be a ‘community’. There are numerous dictionary definitions of this word and I thought that I would share just two of these with you now. The ‘Oxford Languages’ Dictionary defines ‘community’ as follows:

• a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common
• the condition of sharing or having certain attitudes and interests in common

I believe that these definitions do have relevance to our Nowra Christian School community. In a physical sense, we do all gather together at the site where our school is located. However, our NCS community is much more than just a collection of buildings, located in Old Southern Road. What makes us a strong community is that we do share ‘certain attitudes and interests in common’, as was highlighted in the definitions above. I would now like to spend a little more time exploring the precise nature of what these shared ‘attitudes and interests’ might be.

One helpful place to look as we seek for the ‘attitudes and interests’ that we have in common is at our School Purpose Statement. It says, ‘Nowra Christian School partners with families in equipping students for life through the provision of quality, Christ-centred education, founded on Biblical values.’ The use of the word ‘partners’ immediately emphasises this sense of shared purpose that exists between NCS and all of our valued families. If we explore a little deeper, we will discover our three core values. These are ‘care, community and character’. I trust that everyone who belongs to the Nowra Christian School family – students, parents/carers and staff – will exhibit these values as we share life together on a daily basis. Finally I would wish to draw your attention to our ‘Choose Respect’ poster. These are on display throughout every section of our school and this poster acts as an ever-present reminder that we belong to a Christian school, that we place great value on the teaching and learning process and that we operate within community, treating others with care and consideration.

Ultimately, we can sum up all of the information above by stating that these qualities define our school ‘culture’. Put simply, ‘this is how we do things here’. It represents the air that we breathe and the water that we swim in.

As you would be aware, the last few weeks have been exceedingly challenging ones for our state, especially for the millions of people located in the Greater Sydney area who have been plunged into ‘lockdown’ as a consequence of the re-emergence of COVID-19. It has also led to some significant changes for Nowra Christian School as we have, once again, become subject to various restrictions that limit access to the school buildings and programs for our parents and carers. 

However, it is at challenging times such as these that we have the opportunity to demonstrate our resilience as a Christian school community. This is when we need to hold fast to our three core values and to demonstrate respectful relationships with every member of our school community.  And this is what I have seen being demonstrated during this first week of Term 3. On behalf of our staff team, I would wish to thank all students, parents and carers for the understanding way in which you have worked in partnership with us as we have made the necessary changes to our school routines that are designed to keep everyone safe and secure. In conclusion, what I have witnessed has been a most encouraging demonstration of respectful ‘community’ in action!