Indian Christians Life Centre (ICLC) hosted its annual event—Christmas Production— on Sunday, December 9 at ICLC Centre on Springs Road in Henderson.
The event, started by Pastor Moses, the head of ICLC, 19 years ago, continues to receive strong contributions from the community. This year, the event brought together more than 400 people.
December 9 saw the first part of the event—the second part takes place on December 16—that included different performances in Hindi such as drama, live music, short film productions, and dances.
The second part will see an English musical production.
“Christmas Production is an annual community event run by our team, and we cater to 400–500 Indians and still growing with record-breaking attendance,” Pastor Moses’ son Joshua Singh said.
The programme on December 9 commenced with a live music followed by a skit performed by church kids group based on biblical chapters and themes.
The theme for 2016 was ‘Born to Save'. Different performances depicted the birth of Jesus Christ to save humanity.
Sugar-Free, an independent skit group, also gave a stellar performance at the event.
“We have received positive feedbacks from people. They were impressed to see the inclusiveness we have at ICLC,” Mr Joshua said.
Jaggie Singh, a renowned singer, performed qawwali at the event with his team of musicians who played on the tabla and harmonium.
Pastor Moses started ICLC in 1997 with Alice Singh when they came to New Zealand after travelling around Asia Pacific. The church started with six people, and today, is one of the largest and strongest community churches in Auckland.
In the last few years, ICLC has hosted major events such as featuring Johnny Lever in ASB Stadium that saw more than 2000 people and Ekk Life, a nationwide free to air TV show that reached out to many nations through relief and aid. Recently, ICLC also gave away $60,000 worth of products to Fiji to the cyclone-hit areas earlier this year.
“We wanted to create a community where people can serve and help one another; a community where we are all connected. We have seen many lives transformed and want to transform many more. We have a vision of a community where people come together for change,” Pastor Moses said.
Besides organising community events, ICLC also holds various programmes such as stress management, marriage seminar, parenting course, kids and youth programmes, business community programmes, health focus activities such as sports and healing meetings.