The young writer program falls under Press Service International (PSI) which is one of the volunteer ministries of Well-Being Australia and that is the crucial thing about PSI – it is volunteer ministry.
People put-in to ensure that it works smoothly with 85 young people from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, ambique, China, USA, Canada, England, the West Indies, Papua New Guinea ...
It is a fine engagement by everyone involved. Each young writer has to come up with a fresh idea for an article once every 5 weeks. Another set of volunteers coordinates the collation of those articles. Then another group are Week Editors. Then there is a Chief Editor.
A weekly newsletter is sent out each Thursday. In this newsletter is a section titled "newsy bits" where the young writers in their turn send in their news – the philosophy is that it is not a youth group where people see each other each week – so they keep in touch with their news.
There are conferences to plan, videos to produce, data bases to update, article titles to upload, articles to mark for the annual Basil Sellers Awards, a statistician to collate it all and most important of all, Christian Today who publishes these articles. It's a quite an undertaking.
The volunteers
85 young writers
Pre-publishing
Week co-ordinators - 5 volunteers
Week editors - 4 volunteers
Chief editor - 1 volunteer
Upload article titles to PSI - 1 volunteer
After publishing
Article comment - 1 volunteer
Distribution of daily PSI - 1 volunteer
Friday international data base - 1 volunteer
Panellists
Australian panellists - 6 volunteers
New Zealand panellists - 6 volunteers
International panellists - 6 volunteers
Sport panellists - 5 volunteers
Statistician - 1 volunteer
Other
new writer co-ordinator - 1 volunteer
videos - 1 volunteer
date base - 1 volunteer
leadership group - 3 volunteers
conference flight arrivals - 1 volunteer
2017 conference - Sunshine Coast volunteers
2018 conference - Auckland volunteers
young writer on Well-Being Australia board - 1 volunteer
senior writers - now past 'young writer status' - 15 volunteers
This is the Lord's handiwork and what ensures the young writers ministry functions so smoothly along with your gracious precious giftings.
There is a problem area - yes there is one - getting articles in on time - too many young writers seemingly work best under pressure and leave it to the early evening of the due date - then a friend texts - "meet me for coffee at ..... "
The entire young writer program is set out in a 5 week format – this is referred to as a Cycle. There are 10 Cycles in the year. In effect, the whole package is done over and over again thru the year.
Volunteers
These young people are volunteers. This is a ministry of young Christians 18-30 being published internationally. It works like clockwork. Everyone involved makes it work. One of the reasons it works well is that no money is involved. Financial matters are in the hands of Well-Being Australia, not PSI.
But make no mistake – today's young people in volunteering roles with win-win outcomes illustrate how energetic, forthright, determined, focused, fulfilled and passionate for the Lord they are.
Our young writer volunteer team is excited!
Dr Mark Tronson is a Baptist minister (retired) who served as the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years (2000 ret) and established Life After Cricket in 2001. He was recognised by the Olympic Ministry Medal in 2009 presented by Carl Lewis Olympian of the Century. He mentors young writers and has written 24 books, and enjoys writing. He is married to Delma, with four adult children and grand-children.
Mark Tronson's archive of articles can be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/mark-tronson.html