Mark Gordon’s journey to church planting began during his time at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in the US. The plan was always to come back to New Zealand for pastoral ministry, “but probably around halfway through our time there I got more of passion to plant a church rather than come home to apply to pastoral roles…”
While serving as a pastor and elder at a church in the US his call to return to New Zealand to plant was affirmed. “The church commissioned me to come and plant a church in New Zealand. So when we arrived back in Lower Hutt we were financially and spiritually supported by two US churches.”
The Gordons moved to Naenae and made Heretaunga Community Church (then called Heretaunga Christian Centre) their home. A close connection with NZ boxing legend Billy Graham led the Gordons to get involved with a ministry started by Graham—an outreach called 'Naenae for Christ’ that met every 2-3 months.
Graham was keen to hand it over to Mark and his wife Tania, but they still felt the pull towards church planting. Naenae for Christ became a drop in centre in the Lower Hutt suburb and every Sunday afternoon they’d open up the local community hall—with table tennis, second hand clothing, and a BBQ—finished off with a church service at the end.
Planting Naenae for Christ Community Church was a slower process that prioritised building trust and relationships over speedy growth. Mark says it’s not always easy to build a team of people willing to step out into something unknown.
“Starting the church was a bit slower than I thought. Because there was a hesitancy to the idea of church planting—no one really understood it—so I did struggle to get a bit of a team.”
It took two years and finally a small team of 15-16 people came together.
Mark says it was important that they were supported and sent to plant from a New Zealand church—and as they had been fellowshipping with Heretaunga that became a natural connection. “I knew Miles Davison (then the pastor at Heretaunga) well and the support from the church was essential.”
Offering oversight and advice was crucial—as Naenae for Christ Community Church needed time to establish independent leadership.
“When we started we didn’t have elders, so we were under the Heretaunga elders until we were able to establish local elders. While we always had a leadership team within the planting group we didn’t appoint elders until about six years in.”
A Place to Gather
Finding a suitable church building or a place to gather is a significant logistical issue for many church plants as they are starting out. Mark says they saw God at work in providing a location for the small church to begin services.
As the Gordons settled in Naenae, Mark initially approached nearby Naenae Gospel Chapel to see if they wanted to start a new work. They were an older congregation with a more traditional style of worship, and said ‘no’. However, Mark was keen to sow the seed in case something shifted in the future—and it did.
The Naenae for Christ team moved forward with their plans to plant, and began looking for a building. They were beginning to raise funds to buy just around the corner when Naenae Gospel Chapel reached out:
“They’d heard about the plant and they felt it was the right timing for them to close down, so they gave us the keys… we spent 3-4 months giving the building some much-needed TLC and we started our first service in February 2013.”
Mark Gordon welcomes the crowd gathered to celebrate Naenae For Christ Community Church's first Sunday service. The 100-strong crowd included a number of people from supporting church Heretaunga Christian Centre.
Another local church was closing down and several members came from there to join the team, and slowly the numbers grew. “We were never just 15 people each Sunday, as a new church you always get visitors—some would stay, some would go. In the early days we were consistently at about 40 people each Sunday.”
More than a decade later the church regularly sees 100-110 people coming each Sunday to worship together. “It’s a healthy, growing congregation. There’s a few things we don’t do well—but a few things we do OK.
Ministry for the Local Community
Mark says he has grown a lot over the 13 years, as he has seen the way God has been at work.
“When I graduated seminary we stayed and did a one year internship at a church in the USA—at that time I wrote out a bit of a plan for what you should involve in a church plant. I’ve since screwed that up and thrown that away!”
He says contextualisation has played an important role in shaping different aspects of ministry, and he says that has provided clarity in the way they approach ministry in their context.
“We were involved in a church plant years ago and there was a conviction that we wanted to fellowship as family—so children stayed in, with no Sunday School. To live out that same conviction here in Naenae simply wouldn’t work! There’s a sense in which your environment should shape your preferences. We’re not talking about ignoring biblical commands but rather having freedom when it comes to matters of preference.”
Today, Naenae for Christ Community Church continues to have a heart for the community that God has placed them in.
“We’re quite a diverse congregation ethnically—but we still don’t have a high representation of the local community in our church family. We’re well-regarded in the wider community but we’re praying for more people to come to know and follow Jesus.”
This heart to reach out with the gospel helps keep them focused on what God has called them to do, and who God has called them to be, says Mark.
“We have BBQs in the Summer, and our people sit with members of our wider community. We talk with them and share the gospel. The environment has challenged us to represent Christ well in our community and not in another community—so that means we do things that fit the community… We’ve got a Sikh Temple and Hindu Temple down the road, and both of these feed the community, so we never ‘just’ feed—we feed with the gospel because we’re different.
“This Winter the church is hosting a mid-week meal for the community, and our hope is to develop it into a mid-week service. We’ll start with food and maybe one song and a testimony, and maybe ask if anyone has a question. We have a vision where people from the community can come and sing, and hear, and ask questions and eventually we want to have a community church service.”
People of the Word
Mark says he has learned the importance of leaders keeping biblical principles before the church. “It’s quite easy to become inward looking—issues arise and the church goes through seasons of tiredness—it would be easy to become something we’re not called to become. We’ve needed to maintain the intentionality of being outward-oriented as well as inward—we’re called to love our people and we’re called to love our unbelieving neighbours.
“A lot of people come because they hear it’s a church that takes seriously the Word of God, and we’ve had transfer growth from other churches—people who have been hungry to hear the Word taught so they’ve come to us.
“We have four key principles up on our wall in the church, that have been there from day one. The first one is that we’re a church of the Word—we gauge who we are by God’s revelation. The second one is ‘called to simplicity’—not being simple minded, but to obey Scripture simply and keep it to a few things that are important. Then lastly: inward looking, and outward looking.”
For Mark, a commitment to preaching the Word and equipping the church has been a clear focus.
“There are many good things I could have spent time doing, but I believe it is important to teach people well from the Word and equip them for ministry. And by his grace God has been faithful in allowing the church to grow.”
If you're keen to connect with Mark and learn more about Naenae for Christ Community Church check out: www.nfccc.nz
