2nd September 2026

NVBC
7 days ago
4 min read

2nd September 2026

Welcome to Spring

from Travis

It's hard to miss the change of seasons as Spring begins across the Central Coast! The warmer days call to us to come outside, the earlier morning sun and warmer overnight temperatures make it easier to start our days, and the fresh life in our gardens motivates us to get out there and cultivate away.

As we emerge from our winter hibernation, many experience a natural uplift in energy and motivation. Suddenly we seem to have energy to spring clean indoors, get stuck into the garden or renew those exercise habits that might have slipped in the colder, darker months.

Over recent Springs, an annual spiritual rhythm of mine is to capture that natural energy and renewed motivation and direct it towards my spiritual life. Each year at the beginning of Spring, I now prayerfully consider with God how I might be led to do some spiritual spring cleaning in my life. Just as the beginning of a New Year is a great time for new commitments, I find Spring is a natural time for personal renewal together with God.

Two Springs ago, I encouraged and ask our church:

What would it look like to do a spiritual spring clean??

I still believe that is a very helpful and fruitful spiritual exercise. Below are the slides from that message that help suggest a few ways to prayerfully consider what needs "spring cleaning" in your life. What might you need to uproot, plant, prune or water in your life right now?

May God bless, grow, renew, restore and reveal the fruit in your life as you do!

Ministry Highlight: Connect Weekend!

What a weekend! Thank you to everyone who hosted an event for our connect weekend. Across the weekend we had 15 great events - you can check out some of the pictures below:

The stories keep coming back of how enjoyable and valuable it was to spend time building community and getting to know one another beyond what is possible on a Sunday. Our encouragement always is: you don't need to wait until the next church organised event to do so!! Invite people around or out together that you don't know well yet at any time.

Our Connect Groups are a great way of getting to know a smaller group of NVBCians well, and journey in faith and care together. If you are interested in finding out more or would like to join a group, chat to or email Johnny.

Global Week(end) of Prayer

This year we join the 24/7 Prayer Movement's Global Week of Prayer with a weekend (48hrs) of rostered prayer. We will host 24hrs of an onsite prayer room and encourage 24hrs of at home prayer across the weekend of 11-13th September.

Onsite Prayer Room Hours:

FRI 11th Sept, 9:00am - 7:00pm
SAT 12th Sept, 7:00am - 7:00pm
SUN 13th Sept, 7:00am - 9:00am

Operation Christmas Child

Throughout September, you'll see our Operation Christmas Child stall set up in the foyer. Buy a shoebox to fill yourself, or do it together as a family. What a great way to practice generosity together!

There are also handmade teddy bears and fabric bags for sale at the stall (thanks to Christine, Gillian and Lynna) that you can buy to put in your shoebox.

Bring back your full shoebox by 18th October - return them to the info desk on a Sunday, or to the office during the week (on Monday, Wednesday or Friday mornings)

And announcing...

The Narara Valley Baptist Crazy Ladies!

Fourteen crazy ladies have been immortalised by Barbara McCaig in fabric as a fun fundraiser for the Christmas Shoebox project!

The crazy gallery will be on display September 13th & 20th. See if you can guess who they are! And buy your own or someone else's (minimum price of $20).

Join us in Prayer this Week

Our partners at Baptist World Aid have called on Baptist churches to pray, as they respond to the impact of flash flooding and landslides in Nepal.

We invite you to take a moment to pray with us for Nepal this week.

"Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus" - 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

This Weekend

Mens Breakfast (5 Sep, 7:00am)

Come and join us for a B&E roll and a coffee, and get to know the other blokes at

NVBC

Sunday Services (9:30am & 5:00pm)

This Sunday, Travis will be preaching in our Daniel series, on Daniel chapter 3.

And after church there'll be coffee and donuts to celebrate the fathers, grandfathers and father-figures of NVBC.

Coming up

Kariong Joint Worship Service (13 Sep, 9:30am)

Our friends at Kariong Church are coming down the hill to worship with us and enjoy a BBQ lunch. Come along so we can get to know each other as we continue to discern together.