Oak Flats Anglican is a church with a new minister, and is working hard to reach out to the local area as it enters a new phase as a parish church.

“A large focus of what we’re doing here is door knocking,” says Oak Flats rector Jodie McNeill. “Because I’ve only been the rector here for less than six months, there’s a bit of an angle there to say ‘G’day, we’re with Oak Flats Anglican, did you hear we have a new minister’, so there’s a bit of that happening.”

“There’s also the standard kind of fare with the Mission team helping out with the toddlers program, going along to the schools, bits and pieces like that. But the main focus is door knocking, and that ties directly into what we’re doing on Sunday night, which is our Family Fun night. Essentially that’s our normal 5 o’clock church, which is for families, but then after that we’re going to have a jumping castle, free slushies, a BBQ, to basically send a message to the community that we’re open to having them here, kind of under new management, and really wanting people to come as they are, come to Christ here, and have real hope in the real Jesus.”

For Mr McNeill, the real strength of having the Moore College team is in having the people and the confidence to send men and women out into the community in droves.

“In a sense, it’s having the confidence to send people out en masse with our green t-shirts, knowing when they do that there’s the trust in the Moore team to be good ambassadors, and to have the maturity and the depth of understanding to answer questions. There have been some really interesting conversations I’ve heard come back, and they’re out for about three hours, roughly, a day. That’s a fair slab of time in the week.”

“I think the congregations have really enjoyed getting to know the team. I think that brings a breath of fresh air around the place in terms of their enthusiasm for mission, and I think that’s quite addictive.”

Having said that, though, Mr McNeill is quick to say there is a real importance in not thinking of college students or trainees in general as simply extra drops in the labour pool.

“Someone asked me ‘do you think we’re doing enough? are you happy with what we’re doing?’, and it reminds me of the old MTS days,” he says.

“If you take on an MTS apprentice because you want shared labour, then no one wins. But if you take on someone to train them, not only will they be trained, but it may be that you’ve empowered them in such a way that they’ll produce some great work in ministry. And that’s what I’m trying to see here, I want the students to leave the eight days here feeling empowered and equipped, and just getting a taste of life in this style of parish, and a parish at this stage of its life.”

Plug directly into the Missions feed at mission.moore.edu.au