Mission Update – Uni Bible Group @ UOW

In March, Mission of the Month giving is directed to Uni Bible Group. Uni Bible Group is the Christian group at the University of Wollongong. It is part of AFES, the Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students, which supports ministries on university campuses across Australia. The branch of AFES that reaches international students is called FOCUS (the Fellowship of Overseas Christian University Students), which also operates here at UOW.

AFES campus ministries are big gospel opportunities because:

• University is often a time of increased openness to exploring new ideas;
• International students are often curious about Christianity;
• Christian students from a variety of backgrounds are exposed to solid Bible teaching;
• Future leaders of our nation and churches often come from the ranks of uni grads.

From St Michael’s, Rob Copland is Uni Bible Group’s Campus Director. Marlee Green is the senior female pastoral worker. James Kerr oversees ministry training. Jon Baird leads the local FOCUS work with overseas students.

In addition, the AFES team at Wollongong train up many next-generation leaders via ministry traineeships. This year, there is a large ‘crop’ of trainees who attend St Michael’s: Jake Ashley, Caroline Chege, Rachel Chin, Jonny Hann and Josh Keatley.

All these people must raise their own support. Apart from giving to ‘mission of the month’ at church in March, you could contact any of them if you wished to sponsor one of them individually. More information at support.afes.org.au by searching for ‘Wollongong’.

Please pray for diligence and creativity as Uni Bible Group/Focus tries to adjust campus ministry post-COVID; and for continued bold proclamation of Christ and raising up future gospel ministers. A recent “Pastor’s Heart” podcast features Rob Copland speaking about this.

Parish Council Update: February

• After beginning with Bible reading (Isaiah 53) and prayer, as usual, we focus first on ministry under the 4Es discipleship pathway: Engage, Evangelise, Establish and Equip.
• We again sponsored the church soccer teams as part of engaging the community.
• We noted Kids Kollide and Simply Christianity coming up as Evangelism chances.
• Likewise, we were glad to see the Men’s and Women’s Breakfasts on the agenda for fellowship and helping establish people here in the faith.
• We rejoice that an encouraging number have taken up the Equip Ministry Intensive.
• We spent some time reviewing the changes to COVID safety restrictions, being glad of increased capacity, and noting Sandy’s letter requesting recommencement of singing.
• We regularly ask if there are any unresolved safety incidents at Parish Council; and can also report that the new Safe Ministry Check has been completed properly by the vast majority of youth and children’s volunteers (who otherwise can’t commence or continue until it is complete).
• We agreed to return to a mowing roster for the cathedral lawns.
• We are thankful for ongoing AV work done by Ed (of Elk Elektronik); hall screen next!