We achieve this vision by preaching the Good News about Jesus and His kingdom to everyone, and equipping believers to be on mission with God. We offer bible teaching and training, discipleship groups, leadership seminars, educational field trips and any other programs that will promote the cultivation of the spirit of Jesus, cooperation and unity among those who profess the Lord Jesus Christ, regardless of their specific denominational confession. We are a spiritual family offering Christian love and guidance to every member of our community.
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What are the church's focus areas?
We want to welcome, guide and support individuals and families from abroad, short and long term missionaries, expatriates living in Greece and local Greeks who want to join our community of Christians. At the heart of the Christian faith is the message that “God is love.” We are focused to grow a community of Christians willing to learn and build a strong understanding of the Bible. We want to show God's love to those around us through authentic relationships, service and accountability. How we practice biblical community is a product of our understanding of the Gospel.
As a church, we keep in mind three simple (yet challenging) focus areas:
As a church, we keep in mind three simple (yet challenging) focus areas:
- Focusing UPWARD to love God: We look to God, who made us and who has a unique plan for every Christ follower. The main purpose of our lives is to have a personal relationship with God, our Creator. Looking upward is to love God, to worship and to serve Him.
- Focusing INWARD to love ourselves and others: Looking inward involves community and relationship with my fellow members of the Christian family. In community we encourage, learn from, and serve one another. We encourage everyone to be part of our spiritual family to experience biblical Christian relationships.
- Focusing OUTWARD to serve the world: We look outward to family, friends, neighbors and to a world that desperately needs to hear and experience the transforming power of God’s grace, love and forgiveness. This means living out the hope of the Christian faith wherever we go in our daily lives.
Our Biblical Foundation
At our foundation is Bible based teaching. Lived out through our vision and mission, members of the St. Andrew’s International Church family focus on keeping Christ’s Mandate at the center of our lives.
Christ's Mandate: In Matthew 28, verses 19-20 we read, “Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” Through Christ’s Mandate, we see the following Biblical Passages providing inspiration to our community:
Christ's Mandate: In Matthew 28, verses 19-20 we read, “Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” Through Christ’s Mandate, we see the following Biblical Passages providing inspiration to our community:
- In Mark 11, verses 22 – 24, we read, And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.
- In John 13, verse 14, we read, “Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.”
- In Roman’s 6, verse 13, we read “…offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.”
- In Roman’s 15, verse 7, we read “Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”
- In Ephesians 4 verses 11-16, we read “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Annual General Meeting - Sunday, January 21, 2024
Church Council Members (2024) elected as follows:
Chairperson - Mark Orr - 42 yes, 3no, 4abst
Vice Chairperson - James Gibbens - 44 yes, 1no, 4abst
Treasurer - Lori Chalatsi - 44yes, 1no, 4abst
Secretary - Marina Georgopoulos - 45yes, 1no, 3abst
Deacon - Ruth Dougherty - 45yes, 4abst
Deacon - Binia Jaggi - 43yes, 3no, 3abst
Deacon - Chandimal Ranaweera - 44yes, 1no, 4abst
Deacon - Sonja Markou - 44yes, 1no, 4abst
Church Council Members (2024) elected as follows:
Chairperson - Mark Orr - 42 yes, 3no, 4abst
Vice Chairperson - James Gibbens - 44 yes, 1no, 4abst
Treasurer - Lori Chalatsi - 44yes, 1no, 4abst
Secretary - Marina Georgopoulos - 45yes, 1no, 3abst
Deacon - Ruth Dougherty - 45yes, 4abst
Deacon - Binia Jaggi - 43yes, 3no, 3abst
Deacon - Chandimal Ranaweera - 44yes, 1no, 4abst
Deacon - Sonja Markou - 44yes, 1no, 4abst