Indigenous Ministries
Partnering with and among Australian Indigenous people.
GMP seeks to partner with and among Australian Indigenous people, focusing on Indigenous ministry and development. Our Indigenous ministries have been developed and planned by a counsel of Indigenous people to allow for in-depth direction setting from key Indigenous leaders and communities around the country.
Indigenous Ministries Australia (IMA)
Indigenous Ministries Australia (IMA) is a new program area established by Global Missions Partners (GMP) that seeks to partner with and among Australian Indigenous people, focusing on Indigenous ministry and development. This ministry was launched in November 2013 at GMP’s Celebration of Global Mission in Perth. That occasion also acknowledged the legacy of over seventy years of ministry by the Australian Churches of Christ Indigenous Ministries (ACCIM) and the Federal Aborigines Board (FAB) before it, and looked forward to the development of new ministries emerging in the future with IMA.
Our History From ACCIM to IMA
A Council of Indigenous People
The work of IMA has been developed and planned by a counsel of Indigenous people who have agreed on the mission statement Encouraging new directions with Indigenous Christian Ministries. The emergence of IMA has necessarily taken time to allow for in-depth direction setting from key Indigenous leaders and communities around the country via the counsel which was facilitated by Mark Yettica-Paulson, a respected and gifted Indigenous Christian thinker, facilitator and communicator.
IMA Coordinators
IMA Coordinators, Remy Sese (West) and Nick Wight (East) are working in partnership with each other and the respective IMA Councils in the East and West to achieve agreed outcomes within IMA’s priority areas. Some of the key roles of the new coordinators are to participate in the Churches of Christ conversations about mission so that sensitivity to Indigenous communities is a part of the language and awareness of mission. Also promoting opportunities for individuals and churches to be engaged in Indigenous ministry activities, to represent IMA in key Christian and other Indigenous networks and to support and promote the overall work of GMP.
Ministry Priority Areas
- Strengthening Indigenous churches' culture and communities
- Teaching and training partnering
- Exploring new ministry paradigms and practices
- New initiatives
- Partnerships of equality
- Focus on justice and advocacy
- Focus on leadership development
- Focus on sustainability
- Focus on Indigenous leadership and autonomy
- Focus on mission and community development