Advent and Adventure 12/3/13

As we enter into the Advent/Christmas Season, we also enter into a new phase/adventure in our service to the Lord through Restoration Ministries. We have the opportunity before us, to obtain an excellent property for a new Restoration Church and start a new phase of ministry. The land and church building is on a main thoroughfare between two population centers, Stanwood and Camano Island, north of Seattle. It is a 6 acre site with an existing church facility. It has been sitting empty for quite sometime. We would love to see a vibrant ministry for Christ happening in this location. We have partnered with a respected investment company called Semble to obtain the property. They have set up a process by which our friends of Restoration Ministries can invest (not donate) and receive a 4% annual return on their investment for 5 years. We have the backing of the North American Mission Board (if we get enough investors for the process) and partner contributions to help us service the loan, do ministry, and pay interest to our investors. Unfortunately, we do not have the luxury of time. The owners of the property are a large church in another town that would like to use the funds from this property for their own ministry initiative and need the funds in January. So, we are asking our ministry partners, friends, and family who believe in the Restoration Ministry vision, to look at our investment website here, read over the material, seek God in prayer, and click the 'Get Started' button. Doing so is NOT a binding agreement but a pledge of what you want to invest. It is not a complicated process to move IRAs/CDs and old 401ks into this investment. Semble will assist any of our investors. Compared to the current performance of these kinds of accounts, most people can quadruple their annual interest return.

To start this new church, in this location, we need our ministry friends to make this decision as quickly as possible.

What happens if our ministry friends don't get on board and invest in this initiative?
1. We do not obtain the property for the new church
2. NAMB funding is contingent on the success of the Semble investment process. So, funds will not be available for Tim's salary or this ministry.
3. Tim will need to get a full-time job outside Restoration Ministries.
4. The momentum of church planting through RM will slow considerably.
5. May God's will be done!

Blessings to all Friends of Restoration Ministries!

5/16/13 Update

Since our arrival to our mission field in January, 2013 we have been focusing on leadership development and ministry processes. I know that may sound a bit dull, but here are some of the results:

• a new children's ministry has begun with eight trained leaders and it is growing steadily
• the worship ministry has added several musicians and vocalists and ministry leaders are saying it is the best worship experience of their lives.
• a new student ministry launches next Sunday called XP3. We have equipped three adult leaders and a student leader to do this ministry.
• we have 25 people who have expressed that they want to join Restoration Church Mukilteo. These include ministry families (9 people) and 16 new members, 6 of which to join by believer's baptism. 
• A newly remodeled, two-story Restoration House has been secured for ministry to hurting pastors/missionaries and their families

Thank you for making this ministry possible through your generous financial gifts and faithful prayers.

Pastor's Perspectives

Restoration Church/Restoration Ministries Update

Hi Everyone,

Pastor Joe

Pastor Tim and Melissa have been here for several weeks now and I have to say that I have more and more assurance that this was God's plan all along to help us become a healthy and dynamic Church.  Tim has challenged me to a deeper walk with the Lord, pay attention to more efficiency in what I do from sermons to administrative and lifted my heart with encouragement about our future.  As most of you know I love Jazz and in jazz there is a sense in which each individual does their own thing.  Maybe the bass is slapping to its own rift and the piano is doing something different and perhaps a vocalist is even scatting and saying non-nonsensical words along to the basic melody line of the song.  All of that individuality somehow flows in syncopated rhythm to create a unique American art form and incredible music.

I am loving it.  

Pastor Timothy

This Sunday will be our fourth opportunity to worship with our RCM family. We are being blessed every time we have an opportunity to be with you all, whether at church, in your homes, or at coffee shops. These are some things that we are working on:

•   I have been asked by the Leadership Council to present what I perceive are the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) of our church this Sunday evening. We will all give input and develop our plan to reach our area most effectively with the love and message of Jesus. 

•   Communications: We are updating our church website to a new format that is easy for Joe, me, Melissa, etc. to keep current, reformatting publications (bulletin, invite cards, brochures, e-news, etc.), and building the church database.

•   Developing worship 'sets' and processes that will help people celebrate and respond to the goodness of God and redemption/restoration in Jesus Christ.

•   Making connections with civic and community leaders for service and outreach opportunities.

•   Inviting people to worship with us at RCM and praying for strangers (I know...sounds odd, but it is well received)

•   Building partnerships with churches and individuals to support future ministries of the church (Celebrate Recovery, City of Refuge, etc.)

Thanks for the opportunity to serve you as Co-Pastor (Tim) and Ministry Coordinator (Melissa)!

Easter is not far away, I hope you are praying about who you will invite to our Easter Celebration this year.  I am praying that God will reveal a face and a name of someone who needs to be invited to hear the Gospel.

See you Sunday!

Forward with Jesus!

    Three weeks on the field! Two Sundays with a new church family. Three weeks of finding a place to live, finding furniture, moving in, making (working on) necessary changes (banking, insurance, driver's licenses, etc.) spending time with the kids, and making connections with people who need Jesus. I let the Mayor of Mukilteo (Joe Marine) know that I am praying for him daily and available to serve/volunteer in our town. He responded very positively and said he looked forward to working together.
    I had coffee with an elderly, unchurched gentleman, who donated the money to build the Boys and Girls Club in Mukilteo. I found out that his daughter-in-law, Pam, regularly attends our church. We are meeting people, having church leadership meetings, and getting settled in for service to our Lord.
    Also, our church will be hosting a Pastor's Summit for The City of Refuge ministry on February 19th. Church ministry leaders, missionaries, NAMB representatives, and a key leader from The City of Refuge ministry at First Baptist Church of Woodstock, GA will be coming to lead this training. Pray that God will bless and multiply this much needed ministry to hurting ministers and their families.
    Thanks to all who are praying for us and making this ministry possible by your generosity!

Setting the Church Back 2000 Years

The Church is in constant need of re-calibration. It is a galvanized, exponential, and powerful force for good in the world when it is exalting and emulating Jesus Christ.

Church leaders must always be setting the church back 2000 years to its missional DNA. 

In 100 AD, there were approximately 25,000 followers of Jesus Christ. Over the next 200 years, in the context of intense persecution, the number of people who were following Christ, even though it put them in peril of losing everything including their lives, grew to 20 million (with no institutions, big buildings, focus on 'style' and 'performance'...without worship bands, cool student ministries, seminaries, or commentaries).

• AD 100 circa 25,000 believers
• AD 310 circa 20,000,000 believers (in the context of intense persecution)

Can it happen today? It IS happening today! It is not happening where faith is couched in comfort and performance-oriented. (America/Europe). 

China has experienced a numerical explosion of Christ-followers in the past century. This movement was fueled in the context of intense persecution under Mao Tse-tung. It's estimated that at the beginning of the 'purging' of Christianity from China there were around 2 million professed believers. All foreign missionaries were banned from the county. All senior leaders of churches were summarily executed. All second and third level leaders were imprisoned. All public meetings of Christians were banned with threat of torture and death. 

The Mao 'purging' ended in the 1970's. In the early eighties, some missionaries were allowed back into the country, albeit under intense scrutiny and government control. They expected to find the church decimated and a few weak and battered disciples. On the contrary, they found an exponential, Spirit-empowered, gospel movement of 'underground' house church networks numbering more than 60 million! In 2004, Time magazine reported that there were at least 80 million Christians in China. In Christianity Today magazine, Philip Yancy wrote about the movement in an article called, "Discreet and Dynamic: Why, with No Apparent Resources, Chinese Churches Thrive." 

I will never forget being in Thailand, giving gift bags that included a Bible in Mandarin to Chinese tourists in Pattaya. When Chinese believers realized we were giving away Bibles, they beamed with excitement and asked for as many as we could give them to pack in their suitcases in an attempt to smuggle them into their country, supplying house churches with a complete Bible. You see, the house churches would share portions (sometimes only a single page of Scripture) after they had studied it together, because they could not get entire Bibles. The Bible, to them, was this world's greatest treasure. Their mission was simple: share the gospel of Jesus Christ, treasure and teach God's Word, encourage and support one another. That's it. No buildings, no budgets, no equipment. 

Why is the gospel not prevailing in our culture? Could it be that we simply don't share it? Could it be that we are too comfortable (lukewarm)? Could it be that our commitment to Jesus Christ is so shallow that in face of the 'daunting' possibility that someone won't like us, we don't share the ONLY hope of salvation, redemption, and restoration for the world? It is a fact: persecution produces fully committed followers of Jesus Christ. Will it take that in America to shake us from complacency? Would God allow it because the most important thing to Him is that people know and follow His Son?

I believe a revolution could be coming to the American and European church. It won't be comfortable. It will be wonderful. A new/ancient kind of church can emerge. It will not require millions of dollars. It will not be the Sunday Morning Show. It will be simple and empowered by Spirit. It will not be in the form of the mega-church, spiritual health club. It will be a myriad of smaller communities of faith, exuding a love for Jesus Christ, people, and God's Word. 

Simple. Faithful. Reproducible. Supportive. Gospel focused. Treasuring the "great and precious promises" of God.

Moving West Once Again!

We are moving West on highway 90 once again! We were stuck for three days in Rapid City, South Dakota because of Winter storm Gandolf. We will arrive in Bozeman, MT this evening and stay with Bridge Church Pastor Curtis Crow. Wednesday we will be making the final push to Seattle. Pray for safety as we cross the Cascade mountain range! Love and Blessings to all of you,
Tim and Melissa

Ministry Update 1/6/13

Ministry Update: Melissa and I attended her home church, Bethlehem Lutheran, in Hickory, NC this morning. I preached the Epiphany sermon and they had a reception for us after church. We thank God for the Bethlehem church family and the encouragement they are to us.

We pick up the small U Haul trailer tomorrow, pack what little we are taking (clothes, outdoor gear, and a few plastic totes), then leave around 2pm. Our overnight stops will be Nashville, Kansas City, Rapid City, SD, Bozeman MT, Winthrop, WA, arrive in Seattle. We are going to take our time. I start at the church on January 17. We haven't found a place yet. We will be staying in the finished basement of a friend's house while we look. My ministry role will be Co-Pastor of Restoration Church in Mukilteo (about 15 miles North of Seattle). I will be developing leadership teams for this new church (all areas of ministry). In addition to this, we will be starting a Celebrate Recovery program for the general public struggling with addictions and hurts they need to work through. I will also be working in the City of Refuge program for pastors/missionaries and their families where there has been a burnout/breakdown that has sidelined them from ministry. 

Keep us in your prayers! Thanks