A Testimony to God's Grace
Christian Jobs Australia the beginning
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'If it was not for our faith and vision that this business was something that God had brought into existence 'Christian Jobs' would have ended that very day. '
Author: Andrew Thonemann
Date: 22nd October 2009 |
Unemployed, struggling on centrelink's ‘New Start Allowance’, no savings, and a child on the way was not the ideal environment to launch a new business but it was in this very setting in 2002 that ‘Christian Jobs Australia’ came to be.
Andrew Thonemann, the founder of Christian Jobs Australia shares his story.
"I was a self employed recruiter at the time and in early 2002 my relationship with a major client came to an abrupt end severing my regular income. I spent much of 2002 looking for employment and as a Christian was keen to find work within a Christian Organisation. How perfect it would be to have a website that specialised in advertising jobs in Christian organisations, why hadn’t anyone thought of this?
In 1996 I had discovered the internet and as a new Christian at the time sought after other Christians. In partnerships with others that I met online I started a worldwide online Christian Ministry and for 6 years actively; evangelised, witnessed, studied with and counselled thousands of new Christians.
It was through this online Christian Ministry that I met Lindsay Robinson, a young IT student in Queensland. I shared with Lindsay my idea for an Australian Christian Jobs website and he was keen to work with me in developing the service. We worked evenings and weekends communicating only through MSN Messenger, never having actually met each other in person. There was little planning or structure, just me with my ideas and Lindsay with his php coding ability and his understanding of how I wanted it all to work. The first public version was crude but worked well and attracted a number of the larger Christian Organisations some of whom assisted in the early development. The site as first launched can be viewed on the web archives.
We launched www.christianjobs.com.au in February of 2003 and things moved very slowly with the site generating only a few hundred dollars a month. It was a struggle for the first few months and I was often the first applicant responding to the jobs advertised. It soon became impossible to feed a hungry new business as well as a young family on New Start Allowance whilst also putting in the required effort to find full time employment. Something had to give.
I met with Centrelink to see if there was some way I could get assistance. I was declaring the income from the business and the allowance was being reduced proportionally yet the business needed to use the income it was generating to survive. It seemed that Centrelink hadn’t come across such a problem before and after much thought I was advised to close down the business.
On returning home from Centrelink I shared the suggestion with my wife and we sat in stunned disbelief. If it was not for our faith and vision that this business was something that God had brought into existence 'Christian Jobs' would have ended that very day.
We spent many hours in tearful prayer that day and finally came to the decision that we could not close the business. We decided instead to sever our ties with Centrelink, cancel the Newstart Allowance and trust that God would somehow provide.
In April 2003 Christian Jobs generated a mere $440 and the very next month after Centrelink advised we should close down the business generated $1,925 which more than replaced the cancelled allowance. God provided!
Business grew exponentially after that. We paid Lindsay for all his work enabling him to set up his own IT Business (of which we have continued to contract much of our work since). We supplemented income through developing other online services. We partnered with a UK firm in setting up and managing an online Christian singles site. We built a Christian Business Directory. We replicated our Christian Jobs model setting up in: UK, South Africa, USA and New Zealand. We became recognised for our expertise in website marketing and search engine optimisation and have since assisted many organisations in their internet marketing strategies. All this supplemental income was used to re-develop, promote, advertise and market a resource poor but faith filled ‘Christian Jobs Australia’.
Starting a business from scratch without any start up capital, business plan or experience is destined to failure and any business advisor would tell you it would take a miracle for it to survive.
Today, after 6 years in business, Christian Jobs Australia has found its place in the Christian Business world with the website now receiving over a million hits a month, equating to tens of thousands of unique visitors every month.
It was only a year or so ago that I was approached by a stranger after Church, who introduced himself to me saying he had a word from God for me. He had no idea who I was or what I did but the word was “God wants you to know that he is knitting what you do into his Kingdom” He had no idea of what that meant, but I did.
There have been many times in the past 6 years when I have looked for a way out. I could earn more doing something else without the stresses of running my own business. I have occasionally applied for roles that I feel I could add greater value to and that would further challenge me. Each time I put my head out the door I am drawn back to concentrating all my efforts and energies on the management and development of Christian Jobs Australia, so I conclude that if that’s what God would have me do until the end of my days then that's fine by me."