When Tarun and Melanie Stevenson were appointed senior leaders at Authentic Church early last year, they were also given a chance to play “shop”.
But it’s been a huge undertaking to manage the church’s food co-op and op-shop.
The rising cost of living is putting more people under financial stress and in need of low-cost groceries.
Initially, the food co-op was run out of a single bedroom-sized room. Now, that room has grown to a 70-square demountable space, and it is overflowing.
“During Covid, the demand for low-cost groceries and food hampers became so great that we actually had to build a facility out the back and that’s expanded to quite a large operation which services around 300 people a week,” church pastor Mr Stevenson said.
“When we first got here it was operating out of a room the size of a single bedroom, now we have a demountable space around 70-square and we have outgrown it.
“We are just about to build a 150-square facility because we can’t handle the volume of people that come through.
“It’s a great problem to have, it means we are being effective and we are reaching lots of people which is really exciting.”
Mr Stevenson says the food pantry, which is sponsored by Foodbank Australia and SecondBite, is available to the whole community.
“We are open to anyone, we’re not means tested so anybody can access the low-cost groceries and we do emergency food or emergency hampers to families in need,” he said.
“With the op-shop, they work from donations where the general public can just drop in donations to the shop Monday to Friday.”
Late last year the team also opened a coffee shop which is housed in the foyer area of the church and is designed as “a space for people to connect”.
“It’s becoming very expensive to eat out or even get a coffee now and so we wanted to create a space where food prices are still affordable but people can come and connect and build relationships.”
Mr Stevenson, who was raised in Papua New Guinea by his Indian mother and Anglo-Australian father, says he is proud to welcome people from “all walks of life”.
“We’ve got anglo-Australians, we’ve got Indians, Samoans, Tongans, Cook Islanders, Mauritians and indigenous individuals so we’ve got a whole range of people from a whole range of backgrounds.
“We just hope that we keep representing our community.
“Everyone’s welcome.”
Authentic Church Young Adults Leader Floretine Atai, who is of Cook Islands descent says the lives transformed from the services are “phenomenal” she loves that Logan is so rich in community support.
“You get a lot of people coming in for one thing and not realising that we offer the other services.
“Sometimes people are just trying to get through each day, my heart goes out to them but I’m just so grateful that I’m a part of an organisation that just wants to love people that way.”
