Catching the Age Wave

Webmaster | 29 August 2006

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Re-connecting with God: evangelism in the age wave

The largest "de-churched" segment of the population is the Boomers. Many attended the 1950s Sunday Schools that were bursting at the seams across Sydney.

“A lot of people have had contact with the church in their early years,” says Mike Maude. “The fact that we go in representing the Anglican Church is important.”

Mike explains that a lot of the Grey Nomads he meets are keen to talk about God, saying things like, ‘It’s been far too long since I’ve had contact with a church’. “Visiting one camper might take two hours. There is virtually no other Christian contact in these caravan parks at all.”

He has seen many converts, whom he has been able to put in touch with supportive churches in cities like Perth. With this in mind, the Campers for Christ theme this year was ‘reconnecting with God’.

“The response was tremendous,” he said.

Mike ‘doesn’t like the numbers games’, but says the team preached the gospel ‘to some 1,000 people’ and ran 14 breakfasts at five different locations.

The powerful impact on a remote corner of Australia reinforces the many opportunities to ‘re-introduce God’ to the age wave generation.

From surfers on the coast to ‘Grey Nomads‘ in the outback, Boomers will lead a retirement revolution right across the nation, reports JEREMY HALCROW and MADELEINE COLLINS.

So will our family-focused churches be washed away by a grey-haired ministry tsunami?

Steve Ross and fellow surfers start most days enjoying God’s creation on Sydney’s Northern Beaches.

The 54-year-old father of four has been surfing since he was eight ‘because I love it’ and has no plans to slow down.

Like most Baby Boomers, retirement is nowhere on his horizon. Steve works at Wicks Surf Centre on Collaroy Beach and is a well-known face in and out of the water as the man who sells boards to Australian world champion surfers.

In many ways surfing is the iconic Boomer pastime. In fact surfing has become much more than the mere hobby enjoyed by the pre WWII generations.

But surfers tend to live a ‘hedonistic lifestyle’, admits Steve, so witnessing in the waves is hard going when surfers think they have no need for Christ.

Dr Ken Dychtwald began studying aging Americans in the 1970s. Dychtwald coined the term ‘age wave’ realising that the beliefs and attitudes of the Boomer generation were destined to revolutionise the notion of aging.

For good or evil, Baby Boomers – the largest generation in Australia’s history – have changed the face of everything in their path, from sex and schooling in their youth to child rearing, family and fitness in their middle years. So it should come as no great surprise that the ‘forever young’ generation are about to reinvent their post-child-rearing years as the age of activism and action.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics says as the first Boomers hit ‘retirement’ age the number of over 65s will quickly surge past three million people by 2015. By the time all the Baby Boomers reach 65 in 2030, about one in five people will be retired.

But will it be the kind of retirement our churches expect of today’s seniors?

Together with his brother-in-law Glenn Walsh, Steve Ross has had a low-key but strategic ministry to surfers since they became Christians 30 years ago.

It is a long-haul ministry they expect to last a lifetime. The two men together with their wives, Sue and Sandy, were part of a mini ‘revival’ at North Narrabeen beach in the mid-70s that eventually took them from a pub and drug lifestyle.

Steve says as men get older, into their 50s, ‘life can fall apart’ and they realise they need Christ. By being involved in the hardcore surfing scene in Narrabeen, and serving as everything from a ‘rector’s warden to a garbage man’ at their church, St Faith’s, Narrabeen, Steve says most people in the local surf scene know that he and Glenn are active Christians. This gives them opportunities to evangelise.

“I can see the value of long-term ministry, knocking shoulders with surfers,” Steve said. “They know we’re real friends; there’s no agenda. As time goes on they realise we’re not a threat; we don’t judge them. We’ve gained a lot of respect.”

And over the years, God has blessed the community with conversions through the investment in long-term relationships and the shared struggles of life.

“That’s our mission,” Steve said. “I’m available to talk to anyone, anytime about Christ and that happens fairly regularly.”

Glenn became a Christian at age 26 and says ‘it’s hard being converted later in life. You get a lot of baggage’. He tells of a powerful experience from earlier this year when he spoke at the funeral of his best friend Rob in front of hundreds of surfers. Rob was converted on his deathbed after Glenn urged him to realise that he needed to be saved from drowning by the ‘lifeguard’ in heaven.

“I wanted them to know Rob had made that commitment,” he said. “You’ve got to get these guys to listen some way or other, because they’re hard as rocks.”

ON THE other side of the country, every winter some 600 Grey Nomads in their caravans and motor homes begin an annual migration to a peaceful and isolated farm known as Eighty Mile Beach on the North West Australian coast. Attracted by the quality of the fishing, there is not much in the way of facilities or other entertainment.

The property is owned by a Christian farming couple, and for the past three years Mike and Joan Maude, who co-ordinate BCA’s Campers for Christ program, have been invited to minister to the white-haired hordes.

This year, Joan and Mike – without any other assistance – cooked and served a big breakfast for some 150 campers, and Mike gave them a gospel presentation.

“It’s hard work but seeing people come to the Lord is exciting,” says Mike. “If we can give people value for money in their food, and a bit of entertainment, they will come to hear the gospel.”

Broome, the gateway to the Kimberly, is Grey Nomad capital of Australia. The population jumps from 19,000 to 45,000 in the dry season. Each year they come, mainly from Perth, and fill up the six caravan parks for the winter months. Similar population booms are repeated along the coast.

Mike Maude believes the coming age wave of boomer retirees is set to boost the importance of seasonal tourism ministry.
“The whole thing will grow dramatically. People in the tourism industry are aware what is coming and are really trying to beef up their facilities,” he says.

The strategic importance of the Maudes’ ministry is backed by industry sales figures showing the ‘leisure’ market growing five times more quickly than automotive sales. This industry estimates it will deliver 25,000 new caravans and motor homes this year, adding to the 325,000 already registered. According to the Caravan and Camping Industry Association around 80,000 of them are on the road this month, doing some part of the big lap around Australia.

Mike and wife Joan, formerly members of Quakers Hill Anglican Church, moved to North-West Australia six years ago. They wanted to use their retirement to help churches in a region that often struggles with a lack of ministry resources.

Mike got the idea for Campers for Christ when the couple went camping up the West Australian coast.

“The caravan park was overflowing and booked out for six months,” he said. “I thought this was an excellent opportunity for the gospel.”

He pitched the idea of a transitory tourism ministry to BCA, Campers for Christ was born, and the Maudes ran the first program in 2004. The program has now expanded to include Kalbarri, Carnarvon, Eighty Mile Beach, Broome and Derby.

This year activities ranged from breakfast meetings, craft sessions to fishing programs and musicians running concert events. Local churches, including an indigenous church in Derby, are supporting the ministry.

“It was important that BCA gave the ministry credibility,” Mike said, explaining that through the BCA Nomad program he is able to source much needed accredited volunteers from the eastern states.

Frank and Pauline Norton from Tamworth recently became BCA Nomads.

Frank, a motor mechanic by trade, retired in 2004. With drought biting hard, the couple thought they would ‘go outback and help’. Last year they trekked from Tamworth to Winton in outback Queensland, then to Mt Isa and across the Top End to Western Australia. Along the way they were able to renovate a number of church properties, adding much needed emergency accommodation and rental income for these parishes.

“They need help out there. In these places the minister and his wife virtually have to do everything,” says Pauline, who adds you don’t need special skills to be a BCA Nomad. “Even if you just cook meals and clean it will make a difference.”

However, Pauline says higher fuel costs this year have meant fewer BCA Nomads made the trek across the continent to help out in Western Australia, and thus hurt the Campers ministry.

So will the rising petrol prices put a halt to the growing band of secular Grey Nomads? Fuel costs only hit the camping ministry in the hip pocket and with fewer volunteers from the South, says Mike.

The caravan parks further up the WA coast were a little lighter in numbers, but those closer to Perth were busier than ever. Retirees on a set income only travel as far as they can afford.

“This is why we want to come down the coast next year towards Perth.”

The Maudes are thinking about running the ministry in Exmouth and Onslow next year, and they have also been invited to minister on some remote Aboriginal communities. But the plans are dependent on seeing more volunteers signing up to be BCA Nomads from places like Sydney.

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