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Our Vision

Home — About — Our Vision

Dis­ciples of Jesus

par­ti­cip­at­ing in God’s trans­form­ing work

in every sphere of life

across cul­tures in all the world.

Who We Are:

The New Zealand Church Mis­sion­ary Society (NZCMS) was formed as an inde­pend­ent organ­isa­tion by the Church of the Province of New Zealand, and nur­tured within the Anglican Church of Aotearoa, New Zealand, and Poly­ne­sia. It was, and is, an evan­gel­ical mission com­munity, seeking to mobil­ise the Church in New Zealand for God’s mission locally and globally.
We partner with indi­vidu­als and churches who share a common vision. We seek to obey the call of God to pro­claim the Gospel of God’s grace in Christ Jesus to all peoples and extend Christ’s Kingdom through­out the world.

Founding Principles

NZCMS has always fol­lowed the mis­sional prin­ciples that were first expressed by John Venn at the found­ing of the Church Mis­sion­ary Society in the UK in 1799. We seek to:

a) Follow God’s leading
b) Send out people of the highest calibre
c) Start small
d) Put money in second place, not first
e) Depend on the Spirit of God for success

Our Commitment to Te Tiriti o Waitangi 

Te Tiriti o Wait­angi is a his­toric agree­ment signed between rep­res­ent­at­ives of the British Crown and Māori chiefs in Aotearoa New Zealand in 1840. It was trans­lated, advoc­ated, and wit­nessed by CMS mis­sion­ar­ies who had pro­moted the Gospel of God’s love, sal­va­tion, justice, and peace. The friend­ship and trust between Māori and the mis­sion­ar­ies were crit­ical factors in the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi.

NZCMS stands firmly within the New Cov­en­ant made by God with us through Jesus Christ. As fol­low­ers of Jesus, we are cov­en­antal people. As such, NZCMS believes Te Tiriti is a sacred cov­en­ant that con­tin­ues to be rel­ev­ant today. This echoes the belief of the mis­sion­ar­ies, espe­cially Henry Wil­li­ams, and many Māori chiefs who saw the Treaty as a cov­en­ant; a solemn promise that form­al­ises an ongoing com­mit­ment and relationship.

NZCMS acknow­ledges the good and the dif­fi­cult aspects of the history of Aotearoa New Zealand, includ­ing within the Church, and recog­nises the chal­lenges that were faced in meeting these com­mit­ments. Healing broken Treaty rela­tion­ships requires making amends for injustices of the past. NZCMS con­tin­ues to seek to live out these com­mit­ments in its present-day min­istry of ongoing part­ner­ship and friend­ship in the Gospel includ­ing working towards res­tor­at­ive justice. Today the Treaty is widely seen to be a con­sti­tu­tion­ally found­a­tional doc­u­ment and the basis of national identity.

Values: What drives us

Our Found­a­tional Values are the start­ing place and the ‘fabric’ of who we are and who God has made us to be. They are our col­lect­ive DNA and strongly bind us to each other. They are woven together, operate together, and all equally import­ant. Our Values guide how we do our work.
Full Ethos statement 

Our Whakapapa

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We are rooted in our history as CMS which is part of our DNA. CMS began as a vol­un­tary mission move­ment: com­munit­ies of fol­low­ers of Jesus sending and being sent to pro­claim Christ in the world. We both affirm our Anglican iden­tity and work within the wider body of Christ.

Faithful to the Whole Gospel

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We are com­mit­ted to the author­ity of Scrip­ture that pro­claims the Lord­ship of Christ over all things. Con­sequently our mission is to call people to follow Jesus as Lord and to see God’s Kingdom coming in all of life. We are evan­gel­ic­ally orthodox.

Deeply Relational

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Because God is love (a ‘com­munity of oneness’) we seek to ensure that everything we do is done in rela­tion­ship. We seek to be equal part­ners, recog­nising the vital place of humil­ity, mutu­al­ity, respect, and reci­pro­city in mission.

Kingdom Vision

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We are always listen­ing to the Spirit; open to cre­ativ­ity, new oppor­tun­it­ies and seeking to join where God is at work for transformation.

Whole-hearted

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We joy­fully sur­render our lives fully to the Lord­ship of Christ in response to His call on us to serve Him who gave His life for us. We pas­sion­ately commit ourselves fully to the work of God’s kingdom on earth.