WHAT OPPORTUNITIES DO WE HAVE TO GROW IN 2025?

- IN THIS ISSUE -

2025 opportunities, all about drip irrigation & Anglican Missions hits the festival scene!

As we get ready for the next 11 months of 2025, I'm particularly inspired by growth. It's been a theme we've literally carried with us as we've gone to the events you'll read about below! I think we can learn a lot about ourselves from what it takes to care for a plant so that it grows and bears fruit:

A plant must be placed in a healthy environment and good soil
It needs water and the proper nutrients
It requires attention and maintenance
Sometimes pruning, trimming and shaping is necessary for continued growth and transformation

For those who saw our drip irrigation scale model at New Wine or Festival One, I wonder if you noticed how something as simple as a steady, intentional flow of water can bring life to an entire garden. Growth doesn’t happen all at once—it requires consistency, the right conditions, and the willingness to adapt.

At Anglican Missions, we’ve experienced this firsthand. The past year has been one of learning, adjusting, and planting seeds for the future. One seed that we're really excited to water is our Ontong Java Resilience Project in the Solomon Islands.

But growth isn’t always easy, is it? It requires trust in the process, patience when results aren’t immediate, and sometimes even the courage to let go of what no longer serves us. That’s why we’re stepping into 2025 with a renewed commitment—to nurture the work that’s already bearing fruit, to prune and refine where needed, and to continue planting seeds of hope for the future.

And, for those who follow Jesus, we believe that he's the absolute best gardener to have looking after us!

Reflect on your own journey of growth this year. Where are you being called to plant, to tend, or even to prune? Let’s step into these next eleven months with faith, purpose, and the expectation that great things will take root.

Kris Singh

Marketing and Communications Manager

Anglican Missions at New Wine

Rev Michael Hartfield represented Anglican Missions at New Wine 2025. Check out his thoughts below!

Bringing together a range of inspiring speakers from across Aotearoa and internationally, the annual New Wine conference aims to equip churches to live and minister in the power of the Holy Spirit. Anglican Missions was proud to attend and take part in a rich and meaningful event full of deep learning and lots of fun celebrations.

While I may be biased, I think we had a very clever and engaging display. We built and showcased a scale working model of a drip irrigation system, which has been proven to be a huge success, particularly in Tonga following the 2022 volcanic eruption and tsunami.

Anglican Missions was one of 18 ‘mission’ agencies participating and were delighted to stand alongside key partners like Tearfund, Barnabas Aid and NZCMS and participate in a well-attended ‘mission mingle’ where each agency provided an array of delicacies to be dipped in a chocolate fondue.

The three days provided a valuable opportunity for Anglican Missions, represented by myself and Jen (who was primarily there as a youth and young adults leader) and by Vicki Payne who regularly volunteers for Anglican Missions. It was a testament to the power of partnership and shared purpose that we share in passion for mission and ministry.

Anglican Missions at Festival One

Kris, Jen, Mark and Olivia made their way north to represent Anglican Missions for the very first time at Festival One.

We set out from Wellington with our drip irrigation display on the back of a trailer and a car packed full of gear to our very first Festival One! We made up for extra detours and road closures with a few real fruit ice creams on the way north.

We arrived in the afternoon and got to work putting our joint Anglican booth together, alongside NZCMS and Waves Anglican Youth Ministries. It was great to have a unified Anglican presence at the Festival, and having a few people around our stall was a great way to bring people in and start a conversation.

Festival goers were generally quite intrigued by our working garden, asking questions about how and why this type of system was so important. We were also in alignment with the theme of the festival around and However, the best motivator in starting a conversation seemed to be... jelly beans!

Jen and Olivia really ramped up the engagement with a jelly-bear-in-a-jar guessing game. Each jelly bean in the jar represented over 16,000 plastic water bottles sold every second around the world, and it was a great way to show people just how much potential plastic waste is being generated. Congratulations to Hudson and Ethan, who were the closest guess of 217 (220 total)!

Events like this really showcase the width and depth of ministry and mission around the church. We made tons of new friends from different churches and organisations. And, as a bonus, we got to enjoy some spectacular acts, lovely curated spaces and more than one decent food truck. See you in 2026 Festival One!