In March 2010, the Winepress held its sixth Empower Conference for Small Church teams.

Empower is the result of a long-term vision of Pastors Arthur & Dani Cherrie. Arthur says, “It seems only a few years ago that Dani and I started Winepress out of our garage in Berwick. We’d go to conferences and hear great talks, but generally it was from people so far ahead of us, that we found it hard to implement what we had learnt. A vision was born in our hearts to help folks who are in small churches through getting their teams together with our team and speaking into their situations at their level and then supporting them in their journey”.

Arthur & Dani’s dream has now been realised.

Some comments received from Pastors who have brought their church leadership teams to Empower conferences:

“Our team members were greatly blessed and encouraged and could not stop commenting on how wonderful every aspect of the weekend was.”

“In all my years as a Christian I have attended many conferences in all states of Australia and never in that time have I attended one that has had such a big impact on me as an individual.”

“The love that was expressed to all of us was overwhelming.”

“You have encouraged and inspired me to work more at loving and releasing my people more.”

A key to Empower’s success is the emphasis on relationship and honesty, not just on sharing information. As one attending Pastor said, “I really appreciated the relevance, transparency and genuineness of Arthur & Dani who know what it is like to walk in our shoes.”