Here is an update from one of the new SUPA Clubs. It runs at Edney Road Primary School, with volunteers from Maida Vale Baptist Church. The church also runs a mentoring program through SU at the same school… Exciting news!

“SUPA Club is going well. We had two girls on the first day and last Tuesday (three weeks later) we had 31 kids, a mixture from church kids and mostly non-church kids. they really enjoy what we are doing which is really simple – usually a Bible story with a craft. They have lunch with us so we have them for 40 minutes. Each week we are handing out more permission slips and the kids are coming to the music room to collect them and are keen to invite their friends. I have talked to the Principal because we originally talked about only having 15 kids, but she is happy with the way it is growing and she is supporting it. From SUPA club kids are also connecting with Maida Vale and are coming to Coolkids on Thursday afternoon which is great. Isla is coming out to see us next term.” Robyn Douglas, Maida Vale BC

One of the groups that SU work closely with here in Western Australia is OAC. OAC’s great strength is equipping people for evangelism and developing evangelists. For those of you wondering what an evangelist and evangelism is let me give my short explanation.

Evangelism is helping people understand who Jesus is and allowing them the opportunity to decide if they are interested in following Jesus and joining the “kingdom” that Jesus invites people to become a part of. An evangelist is someone who is particularly skilled and gifted at evangelism. The word evangelism can be a dangerous one to put forward. For example if I put the prefix tele before the word evangelism it creates a word and concept that makes me feel unlike using the word evangelist at all.

But I do want to use the word evangelism/evangelist because I believe that introducing people to Jesus can be empowering. Jesus makes unique claims and I am always excited to see people engaging Jesus whatever their response (some call him crazy, some call him great, others even call him God!). Good evangelism allows people to make their own response to Jesus and not a predetermined or manipulated response.

A number of SU programs provide people with the opportunity to be introduced to Jesus. This is where our partnership with OAC and in particular Geoff Westlake the State Director of OAC has been fantastic. If SU programs are not led by people who can introduce people to Jesus in appropriate ways then these programs fall far short of their potential to be both exciting and life affirming. And programs that do not have something special about them are just not worth the effort of running.