MOLDI dinners: In the late 1990s, the Sydney University Christian group realized that it was difficult to get ‘not-yet believers’ to come to outreach events. So they decided to go to them. They organized dinners in King Street, Newtown, which were designed for the express purpose of discussing the meaning of life. Dinner and discussion took place in a neutral territory: a restaurant. A campus in Melbourne adopted this idea, and gave them the name ‘MOLDI dinners’. M.O.L.D.I stands for ‘meaning of life discussed intelligently’. In 2007, this campus ran nine dinners which were attended by 45 ‘not-yet believing’ Uni students.
I never went to one of these but I remember sitting around with Andrew Katay, staffworker with the Sydney Uni Christian group at the time, talking about these things, and what a great relaxed opportunity they were for talking about the gospel and all sorts of things. He mentioned one particular faculty member, a Christian who had realized he was somewhat awkward in matters of conversation, keen as he was to talk about things Christian. But he hadn't left it at that. He offered to sponsor a number of these dinners, ie pay for poor students to go to restaurants in Newtown, so that they could keep on happening. It was his way of both realizing his limitations and capitalizing on his strengths, so that people might hear about salvation in Jesus.
What a brilliant example of teamwork! It put me in mind of Philippians 1:3-5
3 I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, 4 always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.
where at least part of the partnership is that these guys gave money so that gospel work could continue.
1 comment:
Yes Gordo, Andrew Katay has come up with some brilliant evangelsitic ideas over the years. Good comment re: partnership. Benny
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