Friday and Saturday 14-15 June was The Gathering, incorporating the Annual Assembly.  Almost 500 people from 168 churches were part of The Gathering on at least one of those days, either at the Macquarie Park main site or at a regional venue in Alstonville, Canberra, Mayfield, Molong, Tamworth, Wagga and Wollongong.  Thanks to everyone who was part of this time together!

During those 2 days we were blessed with Keynote sessions shared by Mark Wilson (National Ministries Director of Australian Baptist Ministries) on Friday, and Kirsten & Jamie Long (pastors at Epping Baptist Church) on Saturday.  Both talks were inspiring and encouraging – you can view them again HERE along with other great video articles which highlight what God has been doing in and through our family of churches.

Keep an eye out for future Insights where we’ll be sharing more stories from the Gathering about how God has been at work across our movement over the last year!

The 23rd Baptist World Congress is being held in Brisbane in 2025 on 7-12 July.

Experience this one-of-a-kind opportunity to gather with Baptist sisters and brothers from around the world and learn how God is at work in and through our global family. It will be a powerful time of worship, prayer, fellowship, teaching, and service.

For information more about the Congress and the once in a generation opportunity that it will provide, visit OurStory where we look forward to the Congress.

OurStory – Baptist World Congress

As we move from June to July, we enter the third season of prayer for 2024. This winter season our prayer spotlight is “leadership”. This aligns with one of our four vision pictures as we move together towards our goal of 1000 healthy churches in a generation.

In our prayers in this winter season we’ll particularly include praying that God would continue to raise Kingdom leaders from across generations – women and men from various backgrounds who are called to invest in God’s Kingdom work.

This week we’ll be sending out the 4×4 Winter edition prayer calendar. We sincerely hope you’ll make sure you pick this up from your inbox and use it throughout the next 3 months when you pray.

We’d also love you to join us for our winter season online prayer time. It will be held on Wednesday 14^th August from 7.45pm to 8.30pm. You can join us by registering HERE. Please feel free to pass the invitation and registration link on to people in your church as we join together with our Baptist family throughout NSW and ACT to pray together.

4×4 Winter Prayer Gathering

IMPACT is a great opportunity for young adults to spend a year shaping their ongoing development as followers of Jesus and being connected with others who share their passion and desire to join in with what God is doing in the world. If you know a young person aged 17-23 who is looking to grow in their faith, personal skills, ministry, and understanding of Gods work in the world, IMPACT could be for them. Would you consider inviting them along to our next open session on 17 July, 1-3pm at Morling College?

IMPACT Open Day

The Advanced Creating Safe Spaces Course will be held from 9am to 5pm, Saturday 27^th July 2024 (on Zoom) and then your choice of either Saturday 10^th August 2024 (on Zoom) or Monday 12^th August 2024 (in person at the Transform Southern Sydney Ministry Centre in Hurstville). This course is for pastors, church leaders, Safe Church Teams and those who want to expand their knowledge and skills in this area of church ministry. Register using the link below!

Advanced Creating Safe Spaces

State Kids Camp is on again July 8-10 at Kiah Ridge. This year kids will be taking a deep dive into Psalm 23. This annual peak experience for kids in years 4 – 7 and leadership development opportunity for a small group of junior leaders (years 9-12) is packed with memory making experiences. We will be rock climbing, tye dying, launching bottle rockets and making new friends. Check out the promo video to see what it’s like and consider sending leaders and kids from your church in 2025. Pray for the team of leaders and kids coming together this July school holidays that they may know God as shepherd whose goodness, mercy and love follows us all the days of our lives.

‘Our Story’ is where we share stories of our wider Baptist movement; stories from our journey towards our goal of becoming a movement of 1,000 healthy churches in a generation, stories of how Baptist Churches in NSW & ACT are navigating key issues, and stories from our affiliated groups.

Sharing stories is vital so that we can learn from each other, be encouraged to persevere in our ministries, and witness how God is working amongst his Church. We hope that Our Story will be an inspiration for you and your church.

At the Gathering we welcomed three churches into our NSW & ACT Baptist family, one of those churches is Glorious Hope Community Baptist Church. Focused on their local community, Glorious Hope initially saw their call is to serve the struggling and vulnerable members of their community, including victims of crime and broken families. Visit OurStory to read more of the story of Glorious Hope and how they came to be part of the Association using the link below.

Glorious Hope Community Baptist Church

If you have a story about how your ministry, church, or region is stepping into the Gen1K vision send an email to hello@nswactbaptists.org.au with more details.