May 2005 Update

In April, the New England Baptist Convention sent me to a missions conference where a missionary, Bruce Carlton, from Cambodia who was sharing about Church Planting Movements in Asia. He saw 10,000 Cambodians come to Christ in a few years in the 90's. He shared that among the defining principles were prayer, abundant evangelism, indigenous lay leaders and churches meeting in homes (cells or house churches).

I went to the conference with a collegiate minister, Randy Bond, from New London, Connecticut who was trained under the Blackaby's in the Canadian Seminary and he has asked Lynn and I to pray about joining his team to plant a church. We are both praying to see if the Church Planting Movement principles are something God wants to use here in New England. God has given me experience in house churches, it seems that God may be bringing us together as a team to see a cell based church begun here in New England. Lynn and I have been praying for team mates who could balance our gifts and Randy, and his wife Sandy, seem to be a good balance to us.

As I was listening to this missionary, I saw a few key areas in my house church experience that had missed the mark... things that could be corrected and could lead to rapid growth. God seems to have led us to make a connection with quite a number of people who have learned a about how God is working through cell/house based church movements. The big question we are asking God now is...did God show us this because He wants to do a similar work here in New England?

We had thought the door was closed on church planting earlier this year when the funding did not come when we expected it but it seems Gods timing was just further down the road than we thought. Pray for us as we take a trip to Canada to spend some time with Henry Blackaby working through Gods calling.