From his earliest memories of hearing the gospel, to planting a thriving church in Melbourne’s inner west, Josh Allen’s story is a testament to the multiplying power of gospel ministry training.

At every stage—apprentice, college student, and church planter—Josh’s life has demonstrated how a healthy gospel ministry trainer shapes not only one leader but countless lives reached for Christ.

Early faith and evangelistic formation

Josh grew up in Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, in a home where faith was lived and modelled.

“I’ve had the privilege of never knowing a time where I didn’t know Jesus,” he recalls. Influences at home, school, and church shaped his love for God and desire to serve. A striking moment came at age ten, when a school gardener preached about the cross. “It struck me that my sin was so serious that the Son of God needed to die for me. That showed me something that was true about me that I would never have seen or believed otherwise.”

In 2004, after completing high school, Josh undertook a gap year program run by his school. Part of this involved running outreach programs locally and in New Zealand. One of these in particular cemented his commitment to serving Jesus. “It was on a kind of mountainside in the Ahipara in the North Island of New Zealand, where I remember kneeling down on the side of the road and praying, ‘Jesus, I want to serve you with my whole life.’”

Learning by doing

This early commitment led Josh to pursue structured ministry training. After university and a brief period of work, he began an MTS apprenticeship in 2010 at Hunter Bible Church in Newcastle under the guidance of Richard Sweatman.

Reflecting on the apprenticeship, Josh says, “It didn’t just involve doing ministry. It focused on character, conviction, and competency. I’d meet with Richard weekly or fortnightly to read the Bible and pray, and he coached me in my ministry responsibilities. We’d meet with other apprentices and staff for shared training where we shared our week’s stories and tackled ministry challenges together.”

Josh’s apprenticeship was hands-on and evangelistically vibrant. He preached at church, led multiple one-to-one discipleship relationships, oversaw small groups, and trained leaders.

“There was a lot of responsibility… a lot of word ministry, leadership, and ministry with people. It was about training and replicating, preparing people to pass on what they were learning. And there was always evangelistic stuff going on, personal evangelism, one-to-one gospel conversations, and outreach initiatives.”

Multiplying leaders

Following his apprenticeship, Josh completed four years at Moore Theological College in Sydney, before planting Laneway Church in Footscray, Victoria in 2016. From the start, he carried the DNA of MTS into his own ministry.

“When we planted, we raised a launch team to come with us… of those people that we recruited, one had just finished an apprenticeship, another started an apprenticeship with us the first year, and another the second year,” he explains. Through this approach, Laneway Church integrated ministry training as an essential part of its life, even as a young plant.

Josh has trained four apprentices so far, with Assistant Minister, Angela Prentice, and his wife Sarah helping train the women.

Each apprentice has brought different life stages and gifts. “Their contexts have ranged from single, to newly married, married with one kid or more… We tailor training for them in their current circumstances and also future hopes. We try to be mindful of their particular gifts and where they’d like to be under God in ten years.”

Sam explored cross-cultural mission, so Josh gave him “entrepreneurial, evangelistic work”, including helping evangelise a Christian group into existence at Victoria University. “In 2016 there was no AFES group… by 2018 there was a group with three staff.”
Josephine helped launch the Welcome Dinner Project locally, connecting new migrants with the church.
Immanuel previously pioneered a university residential college outreach program, and now works as a physio while serving as the church’s “key evangelist and trainer of evangelists.”
Cindy leads magnification and ministry at church, “helping us to love God and serve Him joyfully and fruitfully.”
Vanessa begins soon with Angela Prentice as her primary trainer.

Josh uses the MTS curriculum intentionally. “We work through the three Cs… proactively and responsively… so apprentices actually demonstrate they’ve achieved the outcomes.”

A gospel-centred vision for training

For Josh, his central motivation for training apprentices is the gospel itself. This is something that Greg Lee, Lead Pastor at Hunter Bible Church, instilled in Josh and his fellow apprentices.

“The extent of the gospel must match the content of the gospel. Since Jesus Christ is Lord of all for all ages, then the gospel must be proclaimed to all people and down the ages. Raising and forming gospel workers is inseparable from that vision. MTS is the pointy end of the journey for lots of people. I pray that as a church and personally, we keep raising up and sending out people to go with the gospel to reach the nations.”

His advice to churches and potential trainers underscores the multiplying power of training: “2 Timothy 2:2 is a job description for Christian leaders. You need people to pass on the gospel, people that can teach others. Everything you do is training. It needs to be integral to your whole understanding of what it means to win the world with the gospel. MTS is just one part of a whole ministry where training is at the heart of passing on the gospel.”

Josh Allen’s journey illustrates the long-term, evangelistic impact of a Healthy Gospel Ministry Trainer. From apprentice to college student to church planter, each stage has been a launchpad for multiplying disciples, leaders, and the gospel itself, showing that investing in the next generation of ministry trainers is not just good practice, but Kingdom work.

Josh Allen is one of the MTS movement’s Healthy Gospel Ministry Trainers.