We asked, God answered!

Andy Stanley (Pastor of North Point Community Church) once said churches don't necessarily need more buildings; rather churches should learn to share existing buildings with more of a Kingdom mentality.  With this idea in mind, I sent letters to several churches throughout our region asking their leadership to consider hosting a church plant within their building.  It must have sounded like a far-fetched concept to many of them!  Meanwhile, we were still looking into fire halls, schools, and any other facility which could house a small crowd with a few rooms for children.

We prayed and prayed for God to reveal where He wanted the church plant to start gathering a launch team.  It felt like it was taking forever for God to answer (even though we had only been looking for a few weeks!).  I received a call from a kind gentleman during dinner on October 21st stating his church would be very excited to host us.  We were prepared to go up to 30 minutes from where we live.  Yet, his church was only 1 mile away!!!  Within a week, they gave us keys to the building and granted 24/7 access (with the exception of Sunday morning).  We have agreed to honor their church calendar and serve together as various community initiatives arise.  They even insisted that we utilize their building for a Christmas Eve service.      

On November 10th at 5:00pm, we had our first meeting at St. Thomas Church in Gibsonia.  That night, I laid out a vision for why churches need to continually plant new churches regardless of their size and resources in order to advance the Gospel.  The next Sunday, we looked at some passages of Scripture that communicated the Kingdom.  Christ reigns and will return for all His followers.  Therefore, we should function with a Kingdom mentality where churches work together.  Churches should never compete with each other for that is a scheme of the Enemy.  Last week, we experienced a night of worship with a full band.  It was incredible as several churches throughout the region were represented.

We have no idea if we will publicly launch out of St. Thomas Church.  However, God has richly provided an ideal situation to hold Boot Camp in preparation for the future.  We will continue to seek His will for every decision along the way (Proverbs 3:5-6)!