News

A Message from the Board – 7 May
2024-05-07

Kia ora church,

We are heading into an exciting and busy period as a church. We recognise that our last update was in February 2024, so we would like to keep you informed. Church leadership have recently announced the launch of The Gathering: God Chasers as a great opportunity for members of Arise in every location to gather for a time of worship and impartation. We have been greatly blessed by the response and hope to see you there in October.

We have much to update you on the key movements happening within Arise.

Charities Services Update
We can confirm that the Charities Commission have closed their investigation into Arise after determining that they did not find “sufficient evidence to determine an ongoing breach of the Charities Act 2005.” Arise has continued to co-operate with Charities Services and supported their investigation and review of Arise which commenced in 2022.

Charities Services did identify areas of insufficient policy and practice and provided Arise expectations about the steps required to “support improved compliance with the Act.” These expectations were consistent with the recommendations received from the organisational review previously completed by Duncan Cotterill. The expectations cover best practice processes and policies for Organisational culture, Financial Management, Human resources, Privacy, Health, Safety and Wellbeing, and Governance.

Upon receipt of the letter in February 2024, many of the expectations had already been satisfied by prior work. The remainder are in progress as our team continues to strengthen our foundations with good policies and procedures.

This week the trust board ratified an updated Trust Deed for Arise Church which is one of the last items to satisfy the Charities Services expectations prior to their deadline of 23 August 2024. The trust deed will be signed by all current Trustees and then sent to Charities Services and will be published as soon as this has been processed.

The ‘letter of expectations’ from Charities Services is available here.

MBIE Investigation
Arise continues to work with the ERA in relation to the investigation by MBIE. We have a scheduled mediation meeting in the next couple of months. We will provide further updates as soon as we have information to share.

Trustee Changes
The Board welcomes Prabashini Govender as a new trustee. Prabashini has been a member of Arise for 5 years and attends the Porirua campus. She has many years of proven expertise in finance, governance, risk, and control. She is also a passionate part of the prayer and intercessory team. Welcome to the Board Prabashini!

Joe Bundy-Cooke is stepping off the board. This is a part of our continued plan to have no executive trustees on the board. We want to thank Joe for his incredible contribution to this board through a very significant season. His leadership and wisdom brought great strength to this team. Joe will remain as the Hamilton Campus Pastor with his wife Jess and a part of the church leadership team.

We are still looking for potential trustees. We are especially interested in anyone with professional skills in HR and communications/PR. Please contact us if you are interested in finding out more.

Church Milestones
Lastly, we as the Board want to thank the church leadership team and staff who have made tremendous leaps forward over the past year continuing to work towards pursuing Jesus and building His church in our communities. Their contribution is significant and has been accompanied by much prayer and consideration. We are thankful that the leadership are prayerful in every decision they make in pursuit of where God is leading Arise.

As always, if you have any questions on any of these topics feel free to contact us at board@arisechurch.com. We love you church. Keep praying and believing for what God can do through us all.

Nga mihi nui,
The Arise Board.