OUR VISION
Established in 1977 as a servant ministry to the churches, Christian Growth Ministries Inc (CGM) was brought into being through the vision of a group of Christian leaders in Sydney.
As an interdenominational and non-profit organisation, our mission is to contribute to the life and growth of God’s people and to the church at large, wherever possible and with whatever means are at our disposal.
WHAT WE DO
Our focus is on equipping, training and encouragement. We believe that God is committed to His church. We therefore believe in the future of the church and are committed to contribute to its health and growth. Our emphasis is on the necessity for understanding Bible principles for life and growth, both within the individual Christian and the local church. We believe that all aspects of Christian living, church life and evangelism are a consequence of understanding and appropriating the clear principles of Scripture.
HOW WE OPERATE
We have an executive Board of Directors drawn from a number of Sydney churches, all of whom are active and highly respected within their denomination. Our Director, Rev Kel Willis, is an ordained Baptist minister with extensive experience in youth and student work, evangelism, pastoral ministry and itinerant Bible teaching. He is the author of a number of books including Clearing the Cobwebs, Escaping Mediocrity, The Experience Trap, Preaching for Impact and Living with You, Living with Me.
PREACHING WITH STORY
By Kel Willis
My grandchildren love it when I tell them a story. ‘Is he safe? What will happen to Blinky Bill now, Grandpa? Please tell us a bit more!’ There’s nothing like stories to engage people. Even those who’ve grown up with electronic media all their lives still love them.
In the last edition, we spoke of how important it is to capture people’s attention in the first 30 seconds of our sermons, and we all know how easy it is to lose them if we don’t continue to engage. Most of us don’t have the ability to keep people with us on just an intellectual level for more than a third of the sermon and need to find other ways to engage them, such as asking questions or using punchy quotes. Whilst these are helpful, I believe that those who don’t develop the ability to tell the Bible story in engaging ways are at a serious disadvantage as preachers. Some believe that the more biblical truth they convey in any given sermon, the more will stick but this is not so if people haven’t connected with it. The use of stories is not only clearly biblical, but is also culturally relevant to our Australian audiences, many of whom now come from ethnic backgrounds with rich story telling traditions...
SUPPORT CGM
Christian Growth Ministries Inc is a non-profit ministry under the Associations Incorporation Acts 1984 (Australia). As an interdenominational organisation, CGM aims to contribute to the life and growth of God's people and to the church at large, wherever possible and with whatever means available.
Donations should be made via direct transfer to our bank account. Please enter your name in the Notes field during transfer.
BSB#: 062-128 Account #00905481 Account Name: Christian Growth Ministries