Tony Webb, who works with VisionOhio, one of the Fellowship’s premier church-planting organizations, sends along the following updates from church planting efforts.
New Grace Brethren Churches in Ohio: I had shared in my last prayer communication about a Gatherer/shepherd/elder (GSE) effort to planting a new Grace Brethren church in Ft Recovery. To update you on this project, the team there: Pastor Nick and Charlene and Nick and Stacey are going to invest six months worth of prayer walks in Ft Recovery as they take on this project. I think they are doing a great thing! Pray for them and for Ft Recovery.
Continue to pray for other new works God is stirring here in Ohio.
Johnstown: Keep us in your prayers as we continue to work at the formation of our new Grace Brethren church here. Cathy and I are working with another couple, Wes and Libby, to form this new work and penetrate our immediate area. We are continuing the neighborhood gathering events and also focusing on determining who we are and how we wish to communicate who we are to those for whom God has already prepared their hearts.
White Stone: We continue on with our work in the Polaris, North Columbus area. We meet on Wednesday nights and our recent prayer focus has been on others with whom we can share the White Stone vision and story. Pray for us as we engage others. Pray as well for our White Stone Bible study we are doing on Fridays at lunch time. God is stirring hearts and allowing us opportunities to meet new people.
One a day Symposium: We had our second One a Day Symposium last week. These events are for the purpose of building kingdom relationships in Ohio among groups that preach the powerful, life transforming gospel of Jesus Christ. Our goal is to share the “one new church a day in Ohio” vision and building relationships for communication, prayer and other support areas. Our best numbers is around 80 new churches a year in Ohio, we are asking and praying for a new church a day, or 365 new churches in Ohio in a year. Please continue to pray for this.
Greater Columbus team: Our VisionOhio 2020 Future Story has directed our attention to work at forming teams of leaders to help the various visions of local churches to work together for greater penetration of a metropolitan area with the gospel. These team’s goal is to “find visionary ways to cooperate” together (from our Future Story) and work as effectively as possible together. A group of Grace Brethren pastors from around Greater Columbus met two weeks ago and are in a three-week prayer cycle seeking how God wants us to build this team here in Greater Columbus – pray for this process and these wonderful co-laborers here in Greater Columbus.
GSE to West Penn District: I have the great privilege to share together with our Grace Brethren brothers in West Penn at their district retreat. I am looking forward to sharing how the Gatherer/shepherd/elder model for forming new churches works. Please pray for this opportunity and how God might be able to use the GSE in Western PA for His sake. The retreat is May 1-2.
Retreat for 35 year old and younger leaders: On April 1-3 the leaders of the five church planting efforts in our fellowship (Tim Boal, Nathan Bryant, Neil Cole, Dave Guiles and myself) are hosting a retreat in which we have invited leaders 35 and younger to come away for two days. Our desire is to seek God with what He would have for us during this time. Pray for the two-day event and ask God to continue to make Himself clear to us as we pursue Him and others who do not yet know Him.
Fund Raising: The most amazing thing happened with the last prayer letter I sent out in February. I hit the “send” button and in the next 24 hours God sent two more financial commitments in support of us – it was amazing! Thanks for praying. Right now it seems that I am about $5-6,000 short of full support for 2011. Thank you for financially supporting me and thank you for praying for me – it is all very obviously felt and seen! God is amazing – and so are His people!