Community and Connection

We are created for community.

The Year 12 Celebration week is a timely reminder of this very idea. God has created us to be together, in community, and it is these very connections that our year 12 students celebrated last week. In the final assembly this theme was repeated from students who spoke on behalf of their cohort. Friends, family and teachers are the things they will hold dear as they leave Emmaus and step into their futures. What a blessing it is to have these gifts celebrated in our school community.

All year long our students are involved in pastoral and community activities, not just at the end of the year. What really fills my heart with joy is when initiative and heart are acted upon to serve others. Last week I learnt of the gift baskets organised by two Year 12 students to help those with less. Isabella and Max are pictured below with the gifts they have organised for Shoebox of Love as part of Home Group 9 to give Christmas gifts for children with less.

I Peter 4: 7 – 9 reminds us of the significance of community, that is Christian community when he writes: Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms.

It takes courage to embrace this attitude, but it is Christ like and what we pray for each of our students as they leave us, as well as ourselves. We all have gifts to serve others and we are called to be faithful stewards of God’s grace. The question is, do we have the courage to believe it? Do we actually accept that we are made as we are, are in the place we are meant to be, with the context we have for the purpose of serving and being a steward of God’s grace? Big questions.

We need God’s grace to get ourselves and our students/children over the line. We need to put our faith into something bigger than ourselves. In the end this is what I pray for our departing Year 12 students – the courage to embrace God’s grace and the faith to do the next thing to forward God’s kingdom.

Andrea Grear
Head of Senior School