Tony Webb, executive director of Vision USA, a cooperating church planting ministry in the Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches, recently sent an update with much to give praise for, along with prayer requests. A portion of the newsletter appears below. Click here to read the complete letter, along with additional photos and requests.
Last week, while I was in the Bahamas, I received confirmation that God has taken us through the 500 barrier of new church starts/new churches, GSE processed in our Vision USA Network since 2007! Amazing!
I ask you to pray for a very short time before He takes us through the 600 barrier in our network! God is giving us the conversations that make me believe that the time could be very short to arrive here. Much to pray for in all this!
Short confession: I am often not able to put in print all that God is up to – this month is no exception to this. The reason I cannot mention some things is because of the sensitive nature of the conversations and the scope of what God is up to. You will find out eventually, as I will make things known as prayer focus needs – as He unfolds things, but until then . . . pray!
As our network continues to grow, we have many more options of what we can do together to further His mission. We are going to work harder on this and tackle various ways we can do more together for Him.
I was invited to share with the Skywatchers regional campout a few weekends ago. I had a great time sharing with 140 men and boys in N Ohio. It was cold sleeping in the tent that night, but it warmed up quickly. Pastor Mark Abel leads the effort and it was fantastic to see the differing boy’s units come and set up camp, fix meals and use the time to grow outdoor skills with the biggest focus on growing in Jesus!
I remember when my son was growing up and we did these campouts – it was a great time. Cathy spoke to the girls’ work that gathered together that weekend as well. A great effort and great work underway – pray for Skywatchers as they continue to grow boys and men more like Jesus Christ!
I returned last week from the Bahamas, yes, the Bahamas. You read that right. But, not the Bahamas like you are thinking. We did drive by those tourist areas – for about 45 minutes. The rest of the 8 days was focusing on starting new churches.
The time was amazing. Pastor Henri and his wife Margaret hosted us (Pastor Dumont and myself). Margaret prepared Haitian meals for us and they were delicious! Thank you, Margaret.
We have tried to make this trip happen for over a year, but there was always something in the way. We did GSE training each evening from 7:30-9 pm; we visited pastors during the day. God did many things this trip, but 3 I want to mention:
1) Ten gatherers affirmed God’s stirring in their heart to begin new churches in Nassau:
Please pray for these dear ones as they explore their direction to starting something new under Pastor Henri’s oversight.
2) In Bacardi, a church needed to close in 2012. This church was restarted on the weekend we were there. It was exciting to arrive there on Sunday afternoon and see about 30 people assembled from Pastor Henri’s church. Over the next 30 minutes, I was positioned so I could see people walking down the path to the opening where we were meeting, just a clearing in front of a house, another 30 people or so came. Exciting!
3) It was a pleasure meeting the Haitian pastors at their churches and to hear their story. There is much going on and much yet to do!
We are working hard at many aspects to movemental thinking and actual, in the field movement. I ask for prayer as we (our team who focusing on this) continue this work. We talk about mid adopters, both early and late mid adopters; late adopters and laggards. We talk about the role chaos plays in all movements and how chaos is the heart of what we are focused on. All new churches are in various levels of chaos in their beginning days. We talk about how established or conventional churches respond in these environments.
Our pastors are doing amazing jobs, but they are VERY busy people and desire movement in the harvest in a great way. But, there is very little to show itself in the field. Why?
We are talking and process these things from a mid-adopter perspective and ask you to pray as we move ahead with various objectives to see the gospel move out where it is not; see churches started where they are not!
Click here to read the complete letter and view additional photos.