Club 5

Each Sunday we pray our Diocesan mission prayer.

This prayer is based upon the Diocesan mission: “to Glorify God by proclaiming our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ, in prayerful dependence on the Holy Spirit, so that everyone will hear his call to repent, trust and serve Christ in love, and be established in the fellowship of his disciples while they await his return.”

In order to put this mission into effect the Synod last October adopted four policies.  The first was a call to prayer and spiritual renewal.  The second was to reinvigorate parish strategy.  The third was to recruit and train more Christians into ministering the gospel.  The fourth was to reform diocesan structures.

Over the coming weeks the Cathedral Courier will spell out some of the details of this mission and its policies.

However this week I want to draw your attention to the third of the policies, as I need your prayerful support for this important work.

During the next two months I will be speaking at six weekend conferences seeking to recruit men and women into paid Christian ministry.  These conferences are called “Club 5”.

On the Friday there is a one-day conference with clergy and other full time Christian workers about how to recruit select and coach candidates for the ministry.  From Friday night to Sunday lunchtime we conduct a series of talks, Bible studies, discussion groups and individual interviews with people interested in ministry.  At the same time we conduct a smaller side conference called “Club 50” for those in their senior years considering a career change.

Club 5 has been operating for about ten years starting from Sydney and spreading to the rest of Australia. This year, conferences are being held interstate in each capital city.  The only interstate one I am speaking at is in Tasmania.  Similarly programmes are now operating internationally.

Several thousand people will be coming to these conferences.  Wonderful young men and women keen to use their lives in the service of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Many are interested in overseas missions.  It is a great privilege to be involved in such an enterprise, and I am inviting our Cathedral congregations to be part of it, at least in prayer.

Paul saw Timothy as his true son in the Lord for he bore the same concern for the affairs of the Lord as he saw the apostle had.  Timothy, like Paul, lived for the service of the Lord Jesus by serving others especially with the gospel.  Paul told Timothy to find other faithful and reliable men to whom he could entrust the gospel ministry.  They were to teach the truth to others as Paul had taught it to Timothy and as Timothy had taught it to them.

This is the process of Club 5 – looking for the faithful reliable Christians to whom the baton of gospel ministry can be passed – so that in the next generation and the generation after that, the great news of Jesus would be preached throughout the world and here in Sydney – until the Lord returns.

Please pray for this work and for me in particular as your Dean representing you in our commitment to fulfilling this part of the Diocesan Mission.