Opportunity

I can hardly believe we're more than halfway through the month of July.  That means that in just a couple of weeks we will have said good-bye to our last mission teams of the summer and sent out wonderful interns back to their home towns and universities to continue living as missionaries in their worlds.  In the midst of that and beyond that we are left with a great opportunity!

What is that OPPORTUNITY?



We have the opportunity to plunge head first into a HUGE field of new relationships and begin to make disciples who will make disciples who will make disciples.  We've been telling our mission teams as they come to serve with us that our goal for them is not to make converts.  Our goal for them is to make connections so that our church, who is here for the long haul, can make disciples.

This past week we had 2 groups come to Tacoma.  One was from Walnut Ridge in Mansfield, TX and the other Immanuel Baptist from Temple, TX.  They hosted our first ever, and hopefully first annual, KiDCity Soccer Camp.  When you do something for the first time you have no idea what to expect.  Absolutely no idea!  Then you add another x-factor so to speak when you invite groups to come and lead the soccer camp knowing full well that they have never put on a soccer camp before.  This is a scary thing and I'm not sure if it is motivated more by faith or desperation!  Whatever it is that caused it to happen, I'm sure glad it did.

I have yet to see the exact numbers but I know for the week we had somewhere in the neighborhood of 120+ different kids come through the camp.  I think our high day was in the 70's and most days we had around 60+ kids.  Then on Saturday we had an incredible block party where we got to see so many families and meet so many parents.  We connected with people that we have been connecting with for years now.  We met so many for the first time and we got to meet some that we had met as a result of previous mission teams.

The result was one of the largest Sunday gatherings we've ever had as a church!  I pray that our church saw the opportunity in the gathering.  I pray that they recognized how many new faces there were.  I pray that they recognized the beauty of more and more and more voices worshipping God and lifting high the name of Jesus.  I pray that they seized the opportunity to meet new people and invite them into community.

I pray that I lead our church well through the next several days, weeks and months as we have the chance not to just have a successful block party, soccer camp or Sunday gathering.  But as we have the chance to be faithful to Jesus by making disciples who make disciples who make disciples.  I pray, and hope you will pray with me, that we will see our Intentional Communities not just grow, but REPRODUCE for God's glory.  I pray that more people than we can imagine will profess faith in Jesus and be baptized.  I pray that people will start to saturate their hearts and minds with the Word of God and will decide to be sharpened and challenged in and through Intentional Community.

We have an opportunity.  We covet your prayers.  We serve a really awesome, powerful, graceful God.  I can't wait to see what he does next!