Summer Update

Grant applications

We were delighted to receive over 70 applications for trainee grants for the 2024/25 year, and to provide a record level of funding with ten churches partnering with us for the first time. We remain impressed and thankful for the potential, enthusiasm and gospel-heartedness of the next generation of leaders and workers for Scotland, and are heartened by amazing responses to our grant offers.

Annual dinner

In April we hosted what has been described as our best, most encouraging annual dinner to date. We welcomed 80 partners, donors, ministry trainers, and others invested in the work of the Trust. We heard from representatives from Scotland and overseas speak on the groundswell of national and international gospel training.

Residential Conferences

Several dozen Leaders in Training are attending our four Summer Residential Conferences in Pitlochry. These events are a great opportunity for fellowship, development, and Bible teaching skills for grantees. Passages and teaching are based on the books of Jonah, Malachi, Ruth and Hebrews. We are thankful to a growing team of ministers and others in the time and preparation they devote to leading and teaching.

New website

Finally, after months of planning, we are delighted to announce the launch of our new website. We hope it will be more user-friendly, and easier for people to navigate and to find out how to support the work of the Trust. Please visit it at www.bonartrust.org and let us know what you think.

The website also includes a new Resource Hub, where we have just posted the first in a series of training podcasts.

Future thinking and planning

We are delighted that the Trust has been pledged significant support in order to help us to partner more closely with training churches and training providers, as well providing grants to individual trainees. We plan also to be able to provide enhanced grants where circumstances would otherwise prevent people from training. These approaches are already bearing fruit, and we look forward to writing with more details in future updates.