Five years ago, Gavin Hays thought he’d land a high-paying job in robotics, enabling him to be generous in his financial offerings to ministry. Instead, Gavin learned that God had a different plan for his life and how he would contribute to ministry.
From attending his first PY Summer Camp as a teenager, to being a leader on one, PYNSW has played a fundamental role in Gavin’s life.
Growing up, Gavin and his family attended the Presbyterian Church in Charlestown, situated just outside of Newcastle where they lived. Despite attending church each week, Gavin says that while he’s sure he loved church at a young age, he found friendships difficult and struggled through his time there. Thankfully, Gavin found some like-minded people during high school who were Christians and who saw the value in meeting together during lunchtimes.
“There was a Christian teacher there who was really trying to encourage us and get behind us, but couldn’t make it to the lunchtime groups, so we really had to run it on our own”, he says.
“Having a group that wanted to meet up and saw that it was important to spend your lunchtime meeting up, it was really encouraging, and I still keep in contact with those guys. I noticed that all those guys were kind of the leaders in our year and there was something about Christian leadership that people saw as ordered, a good way that matches up with God’s good creation.”
Discovering faith and community
Gavin credits his time at the University of Newcastle with helping him fully commit his life to following Jesus. He didn’t join the Christian group until his second year, but found them to be a great community centred on the gospel.
“They really wanted to invest time in each other and learn from the Bible. I met up with a staff worker and realised that there is so much we can learn from God’s Word just by sitting in it and spending time with each other. It’s great spending time in God’s Word, praying with each other, and meeting up”, Gavin shares.
During his studies at university, Gavin went to a number of dinners hosted by the Christian group designed to help people consider full-time ministry.
“They put those dinners on, and I got to ask some questions, see what it’s like, and I think the big draw for me was seeing the lives of these people in ministry. I loved catching up with people, reading the Bible, so I wanted to explore that”, Gavin says.
At the same time, Gavin joined Mayfield Presbyterian Church, which was undergoing some revitalisation and needed a few more helping hands. In his first year at Mayfield, Gavin was on the youth group team and began to consider what full-time ministry would look like for him.
It was at Mayfield that Gavin had his second introduction to PYNSW, the first being years earlier when he attended a PY camp as a teenager. As part of building the youth group at Mayfield, he attended a youth leader training day held by PYNSW that catered for lots of other leaders from other Presbyterian churches. Through the connections made at this event, the group decided to host a combined youth camp.
Gavin served as the Mayfield representative on the team and was responsible for the sessions and the run sheet. After running two of these combined youth camps, Dave Philips, PYNSW General Manager, reached out to the Senior Minister at Mayfield and suggested that their youth group attend PY Summer Camp, and Gavin was keen to join as a leader. Gavin said that a few kids went, but he came away from the camp convinced that all the kids should attend the next one.
“I came away from PY Summer Camp thinking the whole youth group should go along. It was so encouraging seeing kids’ responses after the evangelistic talk and then knowing each leader was going to follow up and chat with them about it and have a serious conversation. It can be hard to follow up well on a regular night at youth. But at camp, you’re there for six days, one after another, building relationships. It’s just so encouraging. I’m really looking forward to next year”, he shared.
“There was so much to learn from that camp and to take back to our regional camp as well. I wish I’d come along earlier and learnt those as well.”
Gavin’s story continues in part two. Click here.
