Dapto Anglican Church

1.  Start date for building works is 8th February, 2010

The building of the new entrance and offices at the existing Moombara Street Auditorium will commence on Monday 8th February, 2010. The builders expect access will be available on Sundays but we will have to use side doors  or access to the auditorium during the week. The work will take 4-5 weeks.

2. Project Manager for Major Building Work

The Diocese has approved our nomination of Josh Heyman to be the Project Manager. He has been acting as our Quantity Surveyor. He will supervise the tendering process and the major building works over the next 11  months. Tendering commences over the next few weeks. Please pray that God will give us wisdom in appointing our major contractor and that He will strengthen Joshas the Project Manager.

3.   Extra $30,000 State Government Grant
Recently our local State Member, Lylea McMahon announced that Dapto Anglican Church would receive $30,000 towards the building of our new foyer and café. This is an encouragement for us to continue providing new  employment opportunities in the Illawarra.

Stephen Semenchuk
Senior Minister

Bulletin 24th January, 2010 (PDF 1mb)

For seven and a half years I’ve lived on Bong Bong Road.  Rarely has a day gone past that did not involve me waiting at the railway crossing.  My impatience is such that I would like to cut crossing over much closer to the actual train and wait for less minutes.  This is partly because I have never been involved in a train crash.  When a train hits a car, air bags and crumple zones provide very little extra protection.  Carnage is one word that usually describes a train wreck.

When Christian Leaders are caught out in a public way, transgressing the ways of Christ as a consistent, often hidden, pattern of living; it often feels like a spiritual train wreck.  Confidence is lost and many of us are disillusioned.   Paul’s letter to Titus reaffirms the importance of sound doctrine.  It balances this teaching with equally striking instruction about how sound doctrine is practiced and communicated.  Our Leaders must live blameless lives (repentant of sin).  Those who teach must practice the principals.

At Dapto Anglican we seek to encourage leaders who wrestle with their passions and seek to practise what is preached.  Christ’s death in our place gives us the opportunity for a fresh start each day, but we should never take that for granted.

Stephen Semenchuk
Senior Minister

Bulletin 17th January 2010 (PDF 1.5mb)

There are more TV channels than ever before, home theatre systems, instant communication available to anyone in the world, mobile phones with access to the internet and cars in every driveway and yet “boredom” has become a part of everyday life. Psychiatrists throughout the developed world are reporting that their patients most common symptoms are boredom and depression.

T.S. Elliot captured the horrible feeling of boredom when his character J. Alfred Prufrock spoke about “measuring out his whole life in coffee spoons”.

It seems that our technological culture has been too successful.  Our survival needs are so well cared for that we need to fill our life up with new diversions.  These diversions often fill our time but don’t give us meaning, purpose or fulfilment.  Its like we are running with nowhere special to go.

• Our lives need to be filled with a vision.
• A vision of God’s intention for our lives.
• A meaning that comes from serving the God of the universe.
• A purpose that stems from spreading the gospel of grace to an empty world.

Stephen Semenchuk
Senior Minister

Bulletin 10 Jan 2010 (PDF 2mb)

A recent survey published in the Sydney Morning Herald reported that 68% of all Australians believe in God.  Yet this “belief” is more about our life values than devotion.  It’s belief without belonging.

You don’t get people to believe by talking about faith.  In a similar way, if you want your child to make friends with the child down the street, you can talk about friendship till you are blue in the face and it gets nowhere.  What you can do is arrange a meeting where friendship may occur.

• The way to develop belief and build faith is to introduce people to Jesus.
• It is only when people get to know Jesus as Saviour and Lord will their ideas about God become life changing truth.
• Our goal must be to arrange lots of meetings where people get to hear about Jesus and see Him in action in the lives of Christians.

Stephen Semenchuk
Senior Minister

Bulletin 3rd January 2010 (PDF 545kb)