On Tuesday, 8 September, members and friends joined the Historic Sites Foundations Tour for the day, exploring early Community of Christ history on the Mornington Peninsula.
In Hastings, we visited the original porch of the former Hastings church and walked along Hastings Pier, where early missionaries arrived 148 years ago and began their mission work around the Westernport region. A small group of us were able to visit Woolley Beach, where some of the early baptisms took place.
For myself, these were familiar places I have visited many times before. However, this was the first time I encountered them through the lens of our church history and heard the stories of those who worshipped, served, and began building the church community many of our ancestors were raised in.
The tour later gathered at Frankston Community of Christ, where the congregation provided dinner and an evening of further storytelling. Local historians and church storytellers helped bring to life not only significant events, but the people's faith, joys, hardships, sacrifices and resilience.
A reflection that stayed with me from the day was just how far the influence of one individual life can ripple forward. The people whose stories we heard, along with the many whose names and stories may never have been recorded, formed relationships, created communities and responded to where they sensed God calling them in their own time. Today, many generations later, we continue to experience the impact of those choices through the established traditions, relationships and opportunities to serve that exist today.
This is my second week in serving as the Victorian Field Minister. That evening, I was left feeling excited to play a part, alongside others, in our own unfolding story in Victoria. There is strength to be drawn from the courage, faith and resilience of those who came before us, while remembering that our story is not finished.
As we sang together during the evening, “Now in this Moment” we were all reminded that there are still new relationships to be formed, communities to serve, lives to be touched and new expressions of church waiting to emerge.
We are, in many ways, the ancestors of generations yet to come. And as we faithfully preserve and share the stories we have inherited, my hope is that we also keep our eyes open to the stories being created among us today: stories that future generations may one day gather to remember.
I want to say a special thank you to everyone who made the day possible, including those involved with the Historic Sites Foundation, historians from the Hastings Historical Society, and our own storytellers. A particularly special thank you goes to Trudy, pastor of the Frankston congregation, and the Frankston members for their generous hospitality — preparing and serving dinner, setting up the space, sharing historical artefacts, and attending to many unseen tasks that made such a special gathering possible.
It was a day of remembering where we have come from, celebrating the people who helped shape our story, and looking with hope towards the story that is still being written.
Emma Ghazarian
