Last fall, we shared a video and an article and revealed some big news about a new church we were helping to plant in the new community where we live. We received many positive comments and prayers from viewers and readers. We appreciate the outpouring of support and wanted to provide an update on the new church.
September 10, 2017 was our last service at our former church. They prayed over our family and others that were leaving along with us, and sent us off to our new community to do the new work God was calling us to. While we were excited, it wasn't easy to say goodbye. Our church was our family, they loved us, cared for us, bore our burdens, taught our children, and "raised" us in the faith. But when God tells you to, "Go and make disciples of all nations," to GO means just that, we've got to leave. And thankfully, we didn't have to go far because our new church is only about 11 miles away from our old church.
God also stirred in others' hearts to join the work and throughout the fall, we gathered on Sundays in a backyard, and in a barn, and under a pavilion before we were graciously given the keys to a local business in town to use their facilities as a meeting space.
We turned their offices into classrooms for the children and a nursery for the babies, and we held our services in the garage. When we started to outgrow the garage, thankfully, the weather was nice enough to open the garage doors and add chairs to the driveway. It was a very special time of growth and building relationships with each other and the local community.
When it was apparent we could no longer fit in the garage, we contacted the superintendent of the local schools. They opened their doors for us to meet in the high school cafeteria and take over their home economics room with our children's ministry. Today, this school is still our meeting place on Sundays until God moves us somewhere else. We load everything on two trailers and pull them up to the school every Sunday morning to transform the school into our gathering space.
Our Christmas Eve service was jammed full of people we had never seen before!
And our Easter service was, too.
The amount of favor the community has shown us has blown us away! We have partnered with the local churches in town for various children's programs. We also hosted a trunk-or-treat on Halloween and decorated a float for the town's Christmas parade. It's been exhilarating, exhausting and amazing to see what God is doing in our little community and we are so humbled to the work He's called us to! We have seen salvations and baptisms and pray for many, many more!
"Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:20-21