Thursday, December 5, 2013

An example from the Community


After all the discussions over recent years, all the detailed planning, and all the sheer hard toil by a small bunch of dedicated community volunteers through the spring, we now have this astonishing, beautiful park space on the Paihia waterfront: ”Horotutu—Our Place”.

The feature lighting at night changes colour every few seconds. There’s a psychedelic piano for anyone to play, an illuminated diorama of the Bay of Islands, a stunning water and light feature and a telephone box library of books for free exchange. Other “placemaking” projects will be incorporated into this outstanding new amenity.

All this happened because ordinary people had a dream. They didn’t wait for the Council to get round to it. They didn’t look for paid workers to do it all. They took the initiative to do all this planning, negotiating, fund-raising and working to bring this gift to the town themselves.

We who celebrate Christmas with some sense of what it is really about, might well reflect on what has been done in this great little park. If Christmas is about giving, this new “place” expresses the essence of our faith: dedicated, generous, even sacrificial sharing of time, talents and treasure. Those who created Horotutu are an example to us.

Maybe some of the members of our church didn’t help much for this park project. But there are plenty of opportunities for us to explore what we can do to make the world a better place. That’s the spirit of Christmas.


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