The conviction for vocational ministry doesn’t always come in the season you expect, something that current first-year MTS apprentice Jenni Murray would definitely agree with. She began seriously considering ministry ten years into her career as a high school teacher, when she was in her early 30s.
Stepping out into change through faith 
As well as teaching English and History, Jenni spent several years teaching Christian Studies in Christian schools. It was here that she started to realise her love for teaching the Bible and seeing young people know God through it.
Jenni shares, “I was finding how much I loved talking about the Bible. I did some of the Moore College PTC courses as part of my prep for teaching Christian Studies, and I found it so fascinating. Christian Studies became my favourite bit of teaching.”
Jenni also got involved in the lunchtime Christian group at her school and enjoyed talking to her students about God in that context. Eventually, she began youth group leading at her church, Norwest Anglican, and it became her favourite part of the week.
She says, “I started to feel God was really putting passion in my heart to move away from teaching history and to spend time talking about God with kids.”
This conviction prompted Jenni to start seriously considering ministry. Some of the ministers at Norwest Anglican invited her to join a group going to the MTS Recruit Conference (now called MTS Mission Minded) in Katoomba in 2024. She happily agreed to go along, thinking, “maybe I’ll do MTS in a couple of years.”
However, God’s timing is not our own! Jenni walked away from the conference with a clear answer. She explains, “I realised the time is now. This is where my heart is, so what is the point of waiting?”
After returning to church, Jenni had intentional conversations with ministry staff, as well as her husband Pete. Norwest’s Youth Pastor, Miki Sinfield, was particularly impactful in Jenni seeing how MTS could work for her, as well as Jenni’s now trainer, Senior Assistant Minister, Paul Lucas.
Jenni says, “Paul was so helpful in sitting down with me and my husband and talking through why I want to do it and if it would actually work for us. He also didn’t start in ministry until his 30s, so he could remind me it’s not too late and I have time to give it a go.”
Given the majority of MTS apprentices Jenni had seen or known were in their 20s when doing their training, Paul’s counsel was particularly relevant when helping her and Pete make this more significant lifestyle choice in their 30s.
So after a 14-year career, Jenni finished up high school teaching and started an MTS apprenticeship in January 2025. It’s been a leap of faith, but so far, an amazing experience that she is loving.
Leading, learning and passing it on
Jenni’s apprenticeship is primarily in youth ministry as part of the kids and youth team. She splits her week between staff meetings, pastoral ministry, studying at Youthworks College on Tuesdays, youth ministry on Fridays and Sundays, and training sessions with her trainer, Paul, on Wednesdays.
Paul trains Jenni through a mix of formal and informal methods. They work through the MTS curriculum together, reading the Bible and discussing passages. Paul also works with Jenni on ministry competencies, like pastoral and leadership skills.
Jenni says, “Meeting one-to-one with people or leading small groups can be quite different from my experience, which is teaching a room of 20 kids, so it’s helpful to learn from Paul in this context.”
Spending her week reading the Bible, teaching it, and helping others live it out—especially young people—is a real joy for Jenni.
She shares, “MTS is amazing because it’s literally learning on the job how to pass on the gospel. It’s looking at how you pass on the gospel in a way that is loving and truthful, and helps build people up to be disciples, whether that means they do full-time ministry or not. Either way, they are owning their faith for themselves. They are holding on to God, and then they’re able to go out and also do the same for others.”
Maturity in the journey
For some, leaving an established career to go back into ‘study mode’ and be an apprentice and a student may feel counterintuitive, but not for Jenni. She sees that anytime is a good time to step into vocational ministry, and God will use that!
She shares, “One of the things I love the most is being able to model a different trajectory to other women. And to equip younger women while showing them different paths. It has been really encouraging for me to be able to build into the young women this sense of, ‘It’s okay if God’s plan is different to what you thought it would be’.”
The experiences of hardship, illness and anxiety that Jenni and Pete have walked, as well as all the good times too, help her in ministry to be useful to many people.
Jenni reflects, “The biggest highlights have been seeing the impact you can have on a smaller scale when you are walking with people one-on-one or in small groups, and the difference that you can make by sharing God’s Word with them in a way that allows them to talk to you about it and get a better understanding of it. It’s cool to see God at work in their lives. And it’s cool to see that when I’m not feeling very confident, God is doing stuff through me anyway.”