Roslyn’s Path to Deaconess Candidate

Thirty years after her first stint of theological study, Roslyn Deal has just graduated from Christ College—this time as a Deaconess candidate.

Roslyn grew up attending church with her parents, but it wasn’t until she was at university that her faith became her own.

“It happened gradually,” Roslyn explains. “I think there were various forks in the road  where I needed to decide if I would go my way or God’s way.”

When Roslyn was a newlywed she attended a conference where she heard the Bible preached clearly for the first time. 

“I felt my heart stirred within me with excitement when I heard the gospel preached well,” Roslyn shares.

That Bible teaching convicted Roslyn to undertake a Bachelor of Christian Studies. 

Three decades later, after getting married and raising four girls, Roslyn started her second stint at Bible College. This time, she studied a Graduate Diploma part-time through Christ College. 

“What I found fantastic with studying part-time was having one subject that I did at a time and trying to apply it—apply it to my ministry life, to my home life, as I went along. And so you could ruminate on that one subject throughout your whole of life.”

One subject Roslyn particularly enjoyed was titled, ‘Gospel, Church and Australian Culture.’ 

“We really had to think through what the gospel is, and how to share that with others in a way they understand,” Roslyn explains. “It was a process of taking biblical truths and learning how to apply them to myself, and how to share them with others within current culture.”

Roslyn graduates with a Graduate Diploma in Divinity this month, and she’ll be commissioned as a Deaconess by her Presbytery in her local church this month, too.

“I think the role of deaconess is important because it shows that the Presbyterian church values women and that there are recognised ministry roles for women,” Roslyn shares.

Roslyn will continue working as a pastoral assistant two days a week at Ashfield Presbyterian Church, as well as the SRE (Scripture) director for Presbyterian Youth.

Roslyn started teaching SRE almost 20 years ago—and she has been involved in SRE one way or another ever since.

“I think part of the theological study was to understand what I believe and also to be able to answer questions from my students,” she shares. “I think sometimes you need to understand a very complex theological topic in order to explain it simply to children.”

Roslyn is passionate about encouraging more women to enrol at Christ College.

“As a female at Christ College, I found the lecturers to be very approachable and very willing to apply the teaching to the ministry I was involved with at the time,” she shares.

She only graduated a few weeks ago, but Roslyn is already missing the study.

“I loved learning,” she admits. “It was a fantastic opportunity to just delve deep into God’s word and apply it. I’m already missing it.”