Bishop Kelvin Wright’s Hikoi of Joyful News ended on Palm Sunday with a festival event proclaiming the gospel to Dunedin’s city centre.

The hikoi wrap-up party ended a month-long pilgrimage that has seen Bishop Kelvin and his supporters traverse more than 870km of Southland and Otago, bearing witness to 200 years since the gospel came to this land. 

Since March 13, the core three walkers, plus hundreds of others besides, have covered 400km on foot, 280km by bike and the rest by air, car, rail or on water.  

As many as 1400 people directly took part, either walking portions of the trail, joining for boat or train sections, or by hosting the walkers in one of the 30 towns and cities visited along the way.

In style with the down-to-earth sharing that’s been evident throughout the hikoi, the finale was an open street party in Dunedin’s Octagon for whoever wanted to come.

Children in the crowd were drawn to 200 brilliant yellow helium balloons bearing the message “GOOD NEWS since 1814.” 

In his speech from the band platform, Bishop Kelvin called his hearers back to the basics. “God is real and God loves you,” he said. “That is all there is to it.”

Hikoi planning began over a year ago, and by the time Bishop Kelvin set out, he’d acquired two tramping mates who were signed-on for the full course. 

On one side was spiritual director John Franklin, bishop’s chaplain in Dunedin; on the other was professional evangelist and Director of the NZ Church Army, Capt. Phil Clark, who joined as part of a strategy to support bicentennial celebrations across different regions.

On Sunday afternoon both men shared what the hikoi had revealed, between musical sets from Queenstown’s keyboard maestro Mark Wilson and Dunedin Jazz duo Coleman and Cornish. 

The food, shelter and open welcome that Otago and Southland Anglicans have shared with the hikoi has been an defining quality of the experience for John Franklin. 

“In housing us, feeding us and having rich conversations with us they were offering us the hospitality of God, “ says John. 

As the evening grew colder, the hikoi’s farewell party offered its own hospitality. At 5 o’clock hikoi helpers began handing out 173 bags of hot fish and chips, free to passers-by and Anglicans alike. 

Another hikoi party gift was a new mountain bike, bought for Phil Clark’s Otago Rail Trail ride. It will now go to a Dunedin family struggling to cope on limited resources.

Social work supervisor Terri Goddard from Dunedin’s Anglican Family Care was there to accept the mountain bike on their behalf. 

“It’s a fantastic gift,” she said. 

“This could end up being the main vehicle for a family without one.

“Or we might match it up with a family where the children have bikes, so it helps the family to get exercise – to get out and spend time together.” 

Walking the hikoi has revealed encouraging signs of God at work all round in the diocese, says Bishop Kelvin. 

But walkers have also been faced with the flip side. Declining and aging congregations are desperately in need of greening. And then there’s the general sense of disinterest.

“Out there is a huge percentage of the population for whom we’re seen as irrelevant…” says Phil Clark. “But the Good News can’t be irrelevant.” 

Surprisingly for a man of words, the standout aspect of the trip for Phil was the silence. “The three of us have had so much time in quietness, just walking with God.”

John Franklin actually wonders if more Anglicans should be out looking for God on the tramping tracks. 

He’s been awed by Otago’s majestic landscape, and in a different way, by seeing the ravages of human interaction with the land. But he’s pretty sure the walking was a big part of the hikoi’s appeal. 

“The walking itself has been like contemplative prayer. I have found it so grounding in the present – where God is. 

John has seen that working in his bishop, too.

“Every one of us has discovered a deeper sense of what God is calling us to do. 

“Whatever that becomes, it will start with the simple clarity of God’s love and acceptance and the companionship that we have all seen along our way.”