Welsh Tasmanian David Jones will be inducted as the next Moderator General of the Presbyterian Church of Australia at the General Assembly Australia in Sydney on September 13.

Mr Jones, minister of Mount Stuart Presbyterian Church Hobart, will take over the three-year role from Rt Rev Robert Benn. He said he was looking forward to taking on the job.

“I believe that prayer and preaching is what builds the Church,” he said. “I want to see churches and ministries multiply and gospel growth in Australia. My prayer is that we will become more and more gospel centred as a denomination. I intend that to be my emphasis during the time that I am Moderator.”

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Australia meets every three years generally in Sydney.

This year it will meet in the Chinese Presbyterian Church at the corner of Crown and Albion streets, Surry Hills, commencing at 7pm on Monday September, with the induction of Mr Jones and members of the public are welcome..

The Federal Presbyterian Women’s Association (PWA) Conference will also start that day; at 10am in the Scots Church, 44 Margaret St, Sydney.

The General Assembly will then continue the following day with the Assembly Communion Service from 9.30am.

The Preacher will be Sydney Missionary and Bible College lecturer, Rev Kirk Patston.

Tuesday September 14 will also see a celebration of the 450th Anniversary of the Reformation in Scotland.

Dr Paul Logan, who has been Clerk of the GAA since 1991, said the gala event, at 7.30pm in the Scots Church, 44 Margaret St, Sydney, would commemorate the great changes that came to Scotland through the preaching and teaching of the gospel of the Lord Jesus during the 16th Century.

“We are very pleased to announce that our speaker will be pastor, historian and theologian, Rev Dr Sinclair Ferguson, who will also give three expository addresses throughout the course of the Assembly,” Dr Logan (also the Clerk of the Assembly of the PCNSW) said.

Currently minister of 1st Presbyterian Church in Columbia, South Carolina, Dr Ferguson serves the church as Professor of Systematic Theology at Redeemer Seminary in Dallas and is a council member of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.

The GAA will see the end of “three busy and very special years” for current Moderator General, Rt Rev Robert Benn.