The Proclamation Trust exists to multiply faithful Word ministry, so that churches are strengthened and the gospel of Jesus Christ is heard more clearly and more widely in the UK and across the world.

The origins of The Proclamation Trust

In the early 1980s, there was a deep concern among a number of evangelical leaders that the inadequacy of biblical preaching in the UK was leaving congregations underfed and poorly motivated. The Bible was not being taught faithfully, and the gospel of Jesus Christ was not being proclaimed as it should be. To address this problem, Dick Lucas (pictured), alongside forty preachers met at a centre in Surrey, England, in the summer of 1981 for a conference on ‘expository preaching’.

Expository preaching is an approach with deep roots in Christian history, based on the conviction that the Bible is God’s Word in written form — God speaking, present tense. Like other Bible teachers, the expository Bible teacher desires to keep their message as close as possible to the message God wants them to give. But they do so by keeping the message as close as possible to what God actually says through the biblical text: expounding it in context, book by book, section by section.

The expository teaching of God’s Word at that first conference was then multiplied forty-fold when the preachers attending it went back to their churches and began to put into practice what they had heard and learned.

The multiplying of expository Word ministry was then multiplied again and again through further residential conferences. In 1984 it was decided to hold an additional non-residential conference to demonstrate and promote expository Word ministry, which became known as the Evangelical Ministry Assembly (EMA).

In May 1986, The Proclamation Trust was established to support the multiplication of faithful expository Word ministry into the future.

The principle of improving and multiplying future Word ministry has driven everything PT has done from the beginning.

The Cornhill Training Course

One reason for the scarcity of faithful Bible teaching and preaching in the UK at the end of the twentieth century was the lack of good Bible training. Many theological colleges had weak convictions about the Bible, and few paid much attention to developing good and faithful preaching. In 1991 a course was established by The Proclamation Trust, meeting in St Peter-upon-Cornhill Church in the City of London. The course now meets at the PT offices in Elephant and Castle, but the ‘Cornhill’ label has stuck.

Hundreds of students have completed the Cornhill course over the last 35 years. The result has been more faithful Bible teaching multiplied across multiple church families in the UK and across the world.

In 2020, the Cornhill Plus course was established, so that students can undertake all the training necessary to equip them for teaching and leadership roles in churches, with the same emphasis on the quality and faithfulness of future Word ministry.

The vision of The Proclamation Trust continues to be to multiply faithful Word ministry.

Our aim is for future Word ministry to be faithful and for it to generate even more Word ministry. We train people to do Word ministry that trains people to do faithful Word ministry themselves, multiplying the multiplication of the Word.

The ultimate aim of this is for churches to be strengthened, Christians to be encouraged, and for the gospel of Jesus Christ to be heard clearly, spreading the glory and honour of God’s name across the UK and the world.

Or follow one of the links below to sign up for a conference, apply for a course or make an enquiry.

The Proclamation Trust exists to multiply faithful Word ministry, so that churches are strengthened and the gospel of Jesus Christ is heard more clearly and more widely in the UK and across the world.

The origins of The Proclamation Trust

The Cornhill Training Course

Help us multiply faithful Word ministry