2023 Highlights at Trinity | Year-In-Review | Trinity Talks Podcast

Hello and good morning everybody.

I'm Elizabeth and thank you for joining me with Trinity Talks today and we are going

to be actually looking back at some of the highlights from the year that was of 2023

and we're also going to be looking forward into the future and seeing what we have in

store and what God has in store perhaps for Trinity here in 2024.

So I'm going to be joined with Rob and he's going to be remembering some of the exciting

things that happened here at Trinity.

But in the meantime, we're going to actually be thinking as well about one of the sermon

series called The Greatest Comeback and it was actually the trigger and something that

came on in, it was something that made me think about wanting to do a segment like this

in the first place.

So hello Rob.

Rob, I'm just saying that that was something that made me think about wanting to do a segment

like this because when we were talking about making a comeback or making the most out of

life and when we're down, how can we get enough energy and courage and strength to come back,

you said that one of the things to do is to look back on the faithfulness of God in the

past and to use that memory, I think you even used the term memory, as something to hold

on to, to give us strength and hope for the future.

And so I thought maybe if we look back on the past year here at Trinity, maybe that

can help us remember some of the ways that God was faithful to us as a church and then

give us hope into the future.

Yeah, I think it's a really, I'm really glad that you have set this up because actually

even in just preparing for today, forced me to look back, to go back and look at the year

that was.

And so often in my own personality, I'm always looking forward, I'm always looking forward,

what's next, what's next, what's next, but it was really helpful to look back because

it's true.

It's so evident how God was with us and that gives us great encouragement that God will

remain with us.

Even when things don't go to our plan, that's right to his plan.

And then when you see from point A to point B where you come, that he was in it all along.

Yes, this is really exciting.

So do you have a good memory, Rob?

Because I'm going to be asking you a lot of questions.

So I would say, maybe like most of us, I feel like I wish I had a better memory.

I think my short term memory is pretty good.

Usually I can cram a sermon into my head and then regurgitate it half an hour later.

But even thinking back to our kids growing up, there are so many things that Sally will

say, don't you remember when, da da da da da, and I'll be like, I don't remember that.

How could I have forgotten that?

It sounds so amazing.

So I wouldn't say I got the world's best memory.

Okay.

Well, we've got some pictures to help us along.

Okay, good.

Hopefully, hopefully we get those going.

But last year, so I guess 365 days ago, we actually had New Year's Day was our Sunday

and there was a special sermon that you did.

And I think you call it the secret sauce.

Yeah.

This is not the only McDonald's reference you made this year.

So this is interesting.

But I think we have a picture of that.

There we go.

You see that?

I love those faces, Jesse and Jordan there.

What was that all about?

Yeah.

I don't remember.

So we were trying to encourage people to get their 2023 off to a spicy start, you know,

and to spice up their spiritual life.

So we thought it'd be fun to do a version of that.

There's a YouTube show called Hot Ones and where the host sits down with people and they

have a conversation while they're eating really hot spicy chicken wings.

I said, oh, I can get my hands on some hot sauce and invite Jordan and Jesse.

But it turns out that actually Jordan and Jesse are like pros when it comes to hot sauce.

I didn't even know this.

And so they were like, Rob, these are not even hot sauces.

And they went home and they brought in their own ones and they really went to town.

But yeah, what was the point of that?

The point was to say, hey, heading into 2023, here's some ways to spice up your spiritual

life.

The point was to give God the first part of your day in prayer, to give God the first

part of your week in coming to worship with us at Trinity, to give God the first of the

month.

And we said that would be to give him like your first fruits giving, to give to Jesus

and his kingdom, and then to give him the first of the year.

And actually read that last year, we were just heading into the week of prayer, which

was a way that everybody could set aside that first week of the year to grow in their own

spiritual life.

So that's where we started 2023.

That's great.

And actually we have a week of prayer coming up in a couple of weeks.

So that's a great memory.

Just even think back on.

Now I do want to talk a little bit about some more sermon series, but not quite yet.

Because we have had a lot of new people join us this year.

And one way that we welcomed new people was through our newcomers luncheons.

And I'm sure you've met some new faces.

And I've met some new faces too.

And it's been really great way to have people just get to know the life of Trinity.

And you were talking about some new steps that we have coming up.

But what sort of stands out to you when you think about those newcomers luncheons that

we had?

Yeah.

You know, it's true.

We have had a lot of people join us.

In fact, when I was, I was looking back at that, that first video, the first sermon that

we did back in the beginning of 2023, and the camera showed a picture of the church.

And I couldn't help but be struck that just how many empty seats there were a year ago.

And just how that we've come 365 days later.

And we have two services on a Sunday morning and there's just a lot more people in those

seats.

So it's like so very exciting.

The newcomers lunches have been these things we've done every three or four months to get

all the new faces together and just talk to them a little bit about who we are at Trinity

and how they can get a bit more involved.

Yeah, truth be told, I'm not crazy about the name newcomers lunch.

So I think maybe 2024 gets a bit of a rebrand.

Maybe we give it some new snazzy name.

But the idea is definitely the same that we want to be connecting with our newest members,

our newest visitors, and giving them the chance to find out more about life at Trinity.

That's great.

And actually, when I was thinking back on those newcomers luncheons, I was thinking about

doing something with our online family.

So I would love to start a online connections meeting that happens around the same time

as those luncheons or whatever new name we get to welcome everyone who is joining us

online, whether they're at home or they're just checking us even later in the week.

Yeah, no, that's a really, really good idea.

Because I've just been speaking about the actual people in this physical building, but

lots of people have joined us online over the last year or two.

I was just trying to look through.

And I think that since May, there's been 200 new people who have come to at least one Sunday

service and about 100, over 100 people who have come to more than one Sunday service

for the very first time.

So that's like really, really amazing.

That's just seven months.

It is so just and if you're listening and you're one of those people, welcome.

And we're just glad you've connected with Trinity.

And another way that some of our newcomers or even people who were new to the faith or

interested in the faith or learning about God or had questions was through a course

that we ran in the spring called Alpha.

Yeah, Alpha.

And I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about that.

Yes, so I mean, Alpha is a very well known program, many churches run it, but it's basically

just a really effective way to introduce people to some of the basics of the Christian faith.

And it's done in this like super hospitable and welcoming environment.

A typical night on Alpha, you come to the church or you come to somebody's home, depends

on where it's being offered.

There's a nice meal that is shared.

You get a chance to talk with people around the table.

You watch a video.

It's a very engaging video.

These are really well produced videos that spur on great conversation about things like,

who is Jesus?

How do I pray?

Why should I read the Bible?

How do I make the most of the rest of my life?

Really kind of basic, but really important questions that we should all be asking.

We had like 30 or 40 people take Alpha in the fall in September.

And I think it was such a great success that we're sure that in 2024 we want to offer not

once but twice.

So we're, oh no, I was wrong.

I said that we offered it in the fall.

We actually, we offered it in the spring, but now going into 2024, we want to offer

it again this spring after Easter and then a second time be offering it in September

or October or something like that in the fall.

Because there's actually a lot of people waiting around, I think right now to take Alpha and

we need to be offering it more often.

That's exciting.

That's exciting to do that.

And then the last way that I was thinking was that we reached people out in our community

was through some community events.

So that's when we opened our doors here at Trinity or opened our yard to those people

in and around streetsville, Mississauga, the community, whether they're Christian or whether

they're non-churched people, doesn't matter.

We say we welcome everyone and we welcomed them through some really fun community events.

But I would like to think that 2023, we probably had the most community events and the biggest

community events.

So I wonder if we have some pictures there.

I see some of dog day.

Dog day was a fun one, which was, oh, there you are.

What was your favorite community event that we had?

Oh, a lot of dog.

I did enjoy dog day.

And on our first dog day, our dog came in first place.

But on this most recent dog day, she was defeated by a newcomer.

And so it's now not my favorite anymore because my very competitive person.

OK, how did she feel about that?

I don't think she handled the loss well.

She's still licking her wounds, still licking her wounds.

But you know what?

I was thinking of those community events and I agree with you.

There was something about 2023.

I got to say there was something about Grace Gwynvon, who led these events in our community.

She had a great vision for her.

She had tons of ideas.

She did a great job getting the word out, the great job motivating and enlisting all

sorts of volunteers.

I mean, a lot of this we need to give credit to Grace because she did a great amount of

work.

But yeah, it was like so exciting.

It felt like we broke records in every one of those events, like whether it was the Trunk

or Treat event or whether it was the Kids Christmas event or whether it was even like

we had the Christmas carol singing.

Now that wasn't like a community event in some of the same ways, but there were people

from the community that did actually come and our youth were there and members of our

church and the place was packed.

And we've never had so many people been interested and willing to participate in these kind of

bigger gatherings.

So yeah, I mean, 2024, I mean, please Lord, let there be more of it.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

I would say Easter was my favorite.

The Easter egg hunt, just getting out.

I like moving around the neighborhood.

It was a lot of fun.

In terms of new people, though, we didn't just have new people join the congregation.

We had myself included some new staff join the team, which has been for me a big change

in my life.

But why did we gain so many new staff?

What was that all about?

Yeah.

So I love getting up, coming to work every single day here at Trinity because of the

staff and because of the people we get to work with.

I don't know if everybody feels that way, but I definitely feel that way.

And yes.

So why was there so many new folks?

Well, first of all, Trinity was the recipient of a grant from the diocese, a five year declining

grant that allowed us to bring on some new people specifically around engaging our online

audience and also about helping those who were viewing online and those who were visiting

the church move more into membership, which actually is a word we're moving away from

right now, I guess.

But the idea is how do we help people take steps deeper into the life of the church?

So yourself, Elizabeth Archer, our online engagement director, Dale Burch became our

production assistant.

Sally Erkmans, my wife, took on the role of our community connections director, kind of

newcomers are here from Sally every Sunday when they visit.

On top of that, we had a student, an Ericann Olaye from McMaster Divinity School, who came

here as a student, but ended up sticking around and taking on the portfolio of our care coordinator

role, which is amazing.

And Ericann is doing a great job getting up to speed with that.

Then with, well, when you guys moved out of town, we needed a new youth pastor because

Elliot had been filling that role.

And Zion Rachman has been the perfect fit for that role.

Zion is a kind of longtime member of our camp program and camp staff, and so many of the

kids already knew him and loved him.

And Zion's done a great job growing and being creative with our youth ministry.

So he's been on board.

We've asked Jordan Goddard to provide some leadership for our young adults ministry.

We've had people like Jamie Stratis kind of come and help through a grant.

We had all of course, all those staff at the camp, our summer camp.

I mean, yes, it has been a very busy place with staff coming.

And God is sending us some really talented people for such a time as this.

That's great.

Yeah.

But I think I would be amiss to not mention this in our segment is the cemetery had a

lot of actions here.

Our cemetery committee has been working very hard for the last few years.

So not just 2023, but 20 probably started in, I think it was just after COVID or maybe

even during COVID to restore and beautify and make our cemetery a place that people

want to go to.

But thanks to a lot of donors, we had a lot of contributions and a lot of work went into

creating a memorial garden named after longtime practitioners, Sam and Hazel McCallion.

And there was an amazing dedication event.

I remember that day was quite hot.

It was June the 1st.

Do you remember that day, Rob?

I do remember that day.

And yes, we should say that was a significant event that happened in 2023 was the passing

of Hazel McCallion.

And Hazel, you're right.

Hazel was a leader in the community and a longstanding member of this church.

There was a big funeral for her in Mississauga here, kind of a civic funeral.

And then we had more of a family, quieter family funeral was still very big here at

the church later on.

And so yes, this garden, I love this garden is though named after both Sam and Hazel because

it acknowledges the impact that both of them had on the life of streetsville and the life

of Mississauga.

It was a beautiful day, beautiful dedication.

Heather Smith has to be commended for all her hard work in bringing that memorial garden

to fruition.

There's so many people on her committee.

I know that I know on that particular day, Jane Vogel was very involved.

So it was yeah, it was a beautiful event.

It really was.

If you haven't had a chance to go out to the garden, then you should definitely go take

a look.

Yeah, that's a great place.

One of my favorite staff meetings that we had was out in the garden.

And I think that's what it was intended to be used for.

Yeah, I enjoyed sitting out there drinking Starbucks, having a staff meeting.

That's right.

That's right.

And another thing that we have to mention, I know we're just a little bit short on time.

I'm trying to cram a whole year into 30 minutes was our new partnership that we had with World

Vision because we've always been, we've always contributed.

We've always given to World Vision, but we began a brand new project and partnership

with World Vision this year and it was called Chosen.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah.

We had 60, I must say 50, 60, 70 families in this church who said, yes, I would like

to partner with a family in Nueva Frontera in Honduras.

There's a lovely picture of so yeah, we it's a little different than traditional child

sponsorship rather than you choosing the child.

The child actually has the opportunity to choose you.

They're empowered and they are given the, oh, I don't know, they're just given the dignity

of saying, I want to choose this person to be my sponsor.

And we were there in Honduras when we saw these children coming forward and selecting

a picture of Trinity Parishioners saying, this is going to be my sponsor who's going

to support me and my family.

And it was lovely because I remember the pastor was praying for these kids one at a time as

they came forward.

So you had a sense that actually God was in this.

God was making a connection between a child in Honduras and a family here at Trinity.

And it was very special.

I was so proud of our congregation.

I remember it was the May long weekend that we did that big kickoff.

I was worried, is anyone going to come to church?

We had a great response, very generous response.

And I want to let you know, coming up in 2024, we're going to revisit the whole chosen program

again and give some of our newer members the opportunity to jump on board and to be chosen

themselves and support the kids in Honduras.

I love that.

I remember a great sermon from Mike Messenger.

He came and talked to us and he talked to us about the power of choice.

And even I remember him connecting this with Jesus giving the power of choice.

Do you want to be healed?

And just allowing person to take autonomy over that choice.

It has some agency in it.

It was just so meaningful and was a great way to think about things.

I want to talk now and just sort of switch gears a little bit.

The obvious big thing that happened here at Trinity, if you were with us throughout the

year was that we went from one to two services.

And you already mentioned that, which means that not only did we get the chance to open

the doors to more people, we also got the chance to open the doors to more volunteers,

which I guess I like to think about is joining the mission of the church.

So that was exciting.

But let's talk about some of the sermon series.

Because when you think back on it, there's a lot that we cover.

It's true.

The weird thing about looking back is like, oh yeah, preached like 50 plus sermons over

the last year.

And you're like, wow, yeah, we did cover all that ground.

It's crazy.

So we go back on the very first sermon series that we did was Hello, My Name is God.

And that was a lot of fun.

I remember the great sermon bumper that we had, people introducing themselves.

And we learned what God said about himself.

We were not just learning about what people say about him, but we want to learn about

what he said.

It was basically just an extended Bible study on Exodus 34 versus like, what was it, like

six to nine or something like that.

And where this is the first place in the Bible where we kind of get a description of God's

character.

And this is the amazing thing about that little piece of scripture is it's the most quoted

piece of scripture in the Bible by the Bible.

So it's constantly brought back up again and again and throughout the whole piece of scripture,

very important piece of scripture, but one that's relatively unknown to people.

And of course, in that piece is where God reveals not only his character, but his name,

Yahweh.

And so that was a great series.

I enjoyed that a lot.

Do you remember what the next sermon series was called?

Was that the...

Started with two of the same letter vowels every day.

Oh yeah, the exiles.

The exiles.

That's right.

Sorry.

I was, I had too much confidence in your memory.

So this is the sermon series that we walked through throughout the season of Lent, I believe.

Yeah.

What a name, everyday exiles.

Very, I mean, the theme of exile, so crucial and important and prominent in the biblical

story.

Yeah.

Again, it's one of those things that a lot of us don't think about, right?

We think about the Exodus a lot, you know, that's part, that's kind of built into us,

but exile, what is that all about?

So it was really good to pay attention to that motif throughout scripture because actually

a lot of us experience exile in our own lives, a sense of homelessness, of not knowing where

we fit, not knowing where we belong.

And on top of that, our church, churches these days always are finding themselves in a place

of exile where we live in a culture and a society that really we don't fit in anymore.

Whereas in times of Christendom, the church and the state were kind of knitted together.

And now it's like, where do we fit?

Where's home for us as a church?

Right.

I think I remember you saying we live in the culture, but not of the culture.

Yep.

Yep.

Absolutely.

We lived around Easter, but then we came up to a sermon series that was called the Greatest

Comeback and we had that great Rocky comeback.

The Great Comeback.

The Great Comeback, sorry.

But that was, you use the resurrection story, which I think was right after Easter as a

great anchor point.

Springboard.

A springboard for thinking about our own great comebacks and using that hope that we get

in the of Jesus' resurrection for our own selves.

That's right.

Because in Romans 11 it says, the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us.

And if that is true, then God should be bringing us back to life, should be bringing relationships

back to life, churches back to life, careers back to life.

So what does it mean for us to experience the same kind of comeback in our life that

this spirit brought forth in Jesus' own dead body?

Okay.

So our next sermon series was called Renovation of the Heart.

Yes.

Fixer Upper.

I wish I had a clip and I don't know if our tech team has it ready for us because it's

hard to find, but we had this really funny YouTube short, which is something we actually

got started doing this year as well.

It was getting some really short clips out there for, I guess people that don't have

the same attention span.

So YouTube shorts are great to get some attention.

Was that the one we were blowing up the house?

It was the lectures.

So if you haven't subscribed to YouTube, make sure you do.

We get some really fun content out there.

But that was, thank God for Libby and Scott for being such troopers during that because

we feel like we all journeyed with them in their home renovation.

That's right.

But what was that all about?

Yeah.

So we, you know, Dallas Willard wrote this great book called Renovation of the Heart.

And that's the thing, when you renovate a building, we all see the exterior, we see

the exterior work, the beautiful finishes and touches.

But of course, underneath, there's a lot of work that gets done.

We rip it down to the studs.

We have to start kind of on the inside.

And so that's what we were encouraging people to do in their own lives is to do the hard

work of renovating our hearts, our minds, our attitudes, our thoughts.

And then that shows up on the outside of our lives.

And it just so happens, God and Libby were renovating their house at the same time.

So we were able to do all these kind of fun segments with them.

Yeah, that was fun.

So again, you can actually check out our services and sermons on YouTube.

So if you missed it, if you're new, yeah, make sure you go check it out because those

were some fun segments.

But our next sermon series that took us through the summer was Jesus is the question, not

Jesus is the answer.

Because how many questions?

I can't remember exactly.

But Jesus asked a lot of questions.

Yeah, that's right.

We stated that number back in the summer and I can't remember exactly, but it was in the

hundreds.

Yes, that's right.

So yes, Jesus asked a lot of questions and you were only able to spotlight a few.

That's right.

But my question for you, Rob, is what question would you ask Jesus?

Because I know we asked some people here at church, but I don't know if you ever told

us what you would ask Jesus if you were face to face with him right now and got a one question

here.

Yeah.

So good question.

The thing is, it's kind of like if we ask Jesus a question, he's more likely to answer

us with a question than give us an answer.

But you know, you know, in the Bible, there's a same question gets asked again and again

of God is like, how long, oh God, how long, how long until we see this world made right?

How long until we see peace?

How long until your kingdom comes?

Or Jesus, when will you finally kind of bring the kingdom in its fullness?

Like there's a sense of like, I mean, look at the news, you look at the world and there

is, I don't know, I feel that question inside me.

When will this world of ours be made right again?

It's a promise Jesus gives us.

And a lot of people have over the centuries have called out that question.

How long, oh God, how long?

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

So I know we're going to be moving along here, but our next series was on happiness.

So this, I know we did a few different sermons and services throughout where we were getting

ready for our two services, but we did one that was called what makes us happy.

Yes.

What makes us happy?

Yeah.

We decided that actually what makes us happy isn't a what at all.

It's a who.

And it's always relationships that are the most important things in our lives that correlate

with people's happiness.

We looked at this Harvard study of happiness and of course there's lots of the scriptures

as well that speak to how important having healthy and reconciled relationships leads

to happiness.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's great.

And our last two sermon series that we did, I'm just going to mention them.

They were called Live in the Dream and then Advent Conspiracy, probably the most fresh

in everyone's minds if you've been joining us throughout this year.

Because I do want to give us a few minutes here, Rob, to talk a little bit about what

we can look forward to.

We can look back all we want, but when we look forward to 2024 here at Trinity, is there

anything you can tell us about what we may have in store?

I know you mentioned some in your sermon already today.

That's where my heart is right now, is really trying to find a better.

We have lots of new faces at Trinity.

How do we get away from this idea of becoming a member, becoming an Anglican, and talk just

more about the sense of how can people join us in our following of Jesus together?

Just a more inclusive understanding of, come follow Jesus with us here at Trinity.

So I'm excited because we're going to be talking about a new course about following the way.

We're going to be launching some other programs, courses, teachings on certain practices that

Jesus emulated in his own life that we want to practice too, that we can follow in him.

So yeah, you can dial back and you can watch the sermon.

You can hear a lot more about it.

But I'm excited about that.

I'm also, you know, personally, I'm trying to get my doctor of ministry thing done.

I should be graduating this May.

So I'm looking forward to that in the new year.

As well, I want to say we're having this teaching series that's starting next week.

I'm actually really excited about this because we're talking about how Jesus like is almost

a pyromaniac.

Jesus would go around saying really like inflammatory thing, pushing people's buttons, challenging

people, confronting people, disturbing people.

And you know, I know that doesn't sound like, you know, great, I'm going to come to church

and get all challenged and disturbed.

But it's very interesting because that is how a society Jesus that we don't often talk

a lot about.

And we're going to talk about it this January and into February a bit.

So anyways, that'll be fun.

That will be fun.

You're calling it playing with fire.

Yep.

All right.

No real fire though, I don't think.

But before we leave, could you leave us in Trinity with a prayer for the new year?

Absolutely.

And actually, I wanted to read a bit from Psalm 90 because this is a prayer that Moses

was praying as he reflected back on his life and reflected into the future.

So let's pray.

Teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Revive us in the morning with your unfailing love that we may sing for joy and be glad

all our days.

May the favor of the Lord rest on us.

Establish the work of our hands for us.

Yes, establish the work of our hands.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, thank you very much.

Thank you.

We've got another service to get to.

We do.

All right.

So thanks a lot and take care, everybody.

Thank you.