The theme was 'URGENT' - establishing a gospel priority for your church. Over 25 CRCA pastors, church members, and leaders gathered at the Geneva Push Multiply conference in Melbourne 14-16 May. The main speakers were Greg Lee, lead pastor at Hunter Bible Church, and Sam Chan from the City Bible Forum Sydney. There were people from over 100 churches in Australia, including many CRCA churches.

As a denomination we recognise the urgency of evangelism and outreach. This urgency is rooted in our vision to be 'a church reforming to reach the lost for Christ.' With over 21 million people in Australia who never attend church, this urgency cannot be overstated. In one of the final talks at Multiply we were all challenged to do five things: Pray for it. Normalize it. Help everyone do it. Spend money on it. Talk about the city, not the room.

Reflect on these five things for a moment. As the CRCA we know that our number one task is prayer. We need to pray for the lost, for an ourpouring of God's Spirit on our land, for revival to happen in our day. This is first.

But evangelism needs to become part of our everyday life. We need to normalize it. In our lives, in our families, and in our churches. Outreach is not something we do. It is not a program. It is not something additional. Evangelism is something we do naturally and something we do intentionally. It is part of every aspect of church life and our individual lives. For this to become a reality ...

We need to help everyone do it. Evangelism is not reserved for the clergy or the professionals. The church needs to equip people to do evangelism -- and to do it naturally, organically. For this reason we have been encouraging churches to engage in 'Organic Outreach'. Organic Outreach is not a program on evangelism but a strategy to change the operating system of the church so that everybody in the church engages in evangelism.

Churches need to spend money on evangelism. You can quickly tell if a church sees the urgency of evangelism. You just need to look at their budget. How much money has been designated to reach the lost for Christ? Is there a gospel priority reflected in the annual financial records? And finally ...

As Christians we need to talk about the city and not just the church. So much of our focus can be on the people inside the four walls of the church. If evangelism is going to be a priority among us we need to focus on the city around us. Once we leave the 'sanctuary' we enter the mission field.

Check out The Geneva Push for all the talks from the Multiply18 event and all previous events.