"New Church" Plans

[Stargater59]

Well, to give a brief history of my family, my Dad has been a pastor for over 18 years now. His first Church was in Northern Michigan and we were there for 7 years before he resigned around 1998. He then took another church in Western Michigan for 5 years before resigning somewhere around 2003. He then took another church up north again for 2 years before resigning there around 2005. It was at this point that my Dad decided to take a break from ministry as the past two Churches were pretty rough on him. There were serious ownership and other issues in the last Church that really drug my Dad down. So we moved back down state where my Dad drove truck for a pallet company for roughly 8 months before deciding to candidate again. We candidated at 3 churches before being voted into one towards the middle of the State. We were only there for 1 year when my Dad resigned and took his second break from ministry. Again, the last experience in the Church wasn't good at all...

For the past two years my Dad has been driving truck again. He was working for a company doing a dedicated run every night down to Chicago and back before being laid off in the first part of 2009. After spending some time on unemployment, he started working as an owner/operator driving a sprinter van all over the eastern side of the country (tried to drive through Canada once going from New York to Michigan, but he got kicked out... I still don't know the whole story). However, by doing this job we were going into debt. So now for the past couple months he's been working for the same pallet company he worked with nearly 4 years ago.

When he took his first break from ministry he and a good pastor friend of ours had talked about starting a Church, but ultimately my Dad had no ambition to do so. Its been mentioned again here and there a few times over the past 2 years, but again, nothing has really happened.

Recently my Dad has become rather discontent at the Church we are currently attending. There's only, on average, 15-20 people who attend and the Church is not moving anywhere and that really bothers my Dad as he wants to see things progress.

This morning I came up stairs and my Dad told me that he and the pastor friend of ours had breakfast earlier this morning and they talked about starting plans of starting a new Church.

There's apparently a Church building a little ways from here that the current pastor his hanging onto, regardless of the fact that there's only 5 people who attend. The Church is basically dead and needs to be handed over to someone else, and I guess we're hoping we can get the building.

From the way my Dad talked, they want to try and have something started my May or June of this year.

So, I think its great to see some plans moving forward. Its been a long time coming, and personally, I feel that my Dad needs to get back into ministry again. He's been beaten down over the years, but he's great at what he does, and no matter where we've gone, or what pulpits he has filled, there's always people who really enjoy his preaching. Its what he is called to do, and I miss his preaching greatly.

So I pray that God would just have his hands in this, and that a building would become available for us. And I hope that the plans progress, and not fade away.


I set up a blog for Dad some time ago where he has been posting quite a bit. If you would like to read it, and get to know him more, here it is: http://drlennieb.com/

Thank you,
-Gater / Keith

[PunT]

Werd, pretty awesome that your father is looking for a way back into ministry.

The plans will not fade away, but other things may need to come first before the actual plan happens.

I give you guys my best wishes and prayer.

[Cuda]

That has to be tough on your family too. Will pray.

[EDAC]

Good luck to your family, and I'll be praying for your dad; as a PK myself, I understand how hard things can be on ministers. (My dad actually went through an experience remarkably similar to your dad's.)

Keep us posted

[Fa7h3r Mik3]

That is awsome that your dad is going to start back into ministering. I will pray for your family and his new adventure. Im sure that God will bless him and his friend.

btw... who gets kicked out of Canada?? Seriously.. AD lives there... they'll take anyone

got'm

[MOOSE]

ill be praying! great to hear about people wanting to do His work.

[HangGlyder]

Will be praying for your dad too! It's great he's getting back into ministry.

Hang.

[shadowsbane]

Great to hear Gater, I'll definitely be praying.

[Guest]

Praying God's will! Hang on God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

Plato

[Stargater59]

Thank you to everyone who was praying about this before. I realize its been some time but just a quick update on this:

The building I talked about previously isn't going to be possible. Apparently those who are there are quite content with their little thing going on and most likely will never leave. But we've actually come across a different building; it's an old elementary school that went into bankruptcy and has been empty for about a year now. The building just went on the market and is selling for $560,000. Obviously we don't have this kind of money...

The current plan is to find a school where we can try to get a group started and see who we would have to start a church (between the people we know from former churches, and people our pastor friend knows they expect we could get around 100 people). Depending on the way things go we can then move forward and see if we can either get the building cheaper, or see if we can get it on a lease-to-own.

Either way, things are moving forward, and we're really relying on God to provide. The cool part is if this is God's plan, then some really amazing things are going to start happening in the next few months.

So again, I ask that you guys keep this in your prayers.

Thank you