After a couple weeks of being here, I've been able to see the different things that are happening to plant seeds and tend to the field to use ministry language. In the last week I have had chances to settle in and build trust in the new found relationships with the different people involved. This has also given me a chance to think and pray about what the next step is in my time here.
To update on the events in the last week, I had a chance to go to Montreal last Monday night with a few people from Sherbrooke to a Church Planting Strategy Meeting for the providence of Quebec. The meeting was in all French unfortunately but I was able to pick up here and there some things that they were talking about. The main goal (I think) is to plant 1,000 churches by 2020 in this providence and also to have more French churches in this area.
Tuesday through Friday my team and I spent the day at Bishop's University continuing to try and build relationships with people and then try to draw them to the different activities we have going on. On Tuesday nights we meet at a house called "The Cottage." This is a place where a family opens up their home, cooks a meal for free for college students (who wouldn't pass that up!) and then just hang out for the rest of the evening. This allows us to meet new people and continue to build on the relationships with people who we've already met. Wednesday night we went to the University of Sherbrooke to check out a Bible Study that they have on campus. They kindly started in English for us but naturally went to speaking French to finish out the study but I was gracious for the chance to be able to at least know what the discussion was about! Thursday nights are the big night to disciple the Christians in the town. We have a thing called Down Under, where this semester, we are going through the book Radical by David Platt. We meet on Thursday's to discuss a chapter and then throughout the week we meet in smaller groups to try and get on a deeper level with the book.
On Saturday we got to experience our first ski trip since coming to Canada. For me this was my first ski trip ever so definitely new territory! Just for the record I didn't fall! It was a great time with friends just getting out and experiencing parts of the beautiful creation around us here.
Going back to what I mentioned at first about the next step here, we had a meeting this morning to talk about just that. Some thoughts I've had is about the focus on evangelizing or discipling. I think that there needs to be an emphasis on both but I also believe that more emphasis needs to be placed in the area of discipleship. With only a short time here, it is necessary to plug into other people who will be here after we are gone so that things can continue to go on. Jesus had only 12 men that he continually poured himself into so that when he left they were ready to continue what Jesus had started. He discipled the 12 so the 12 could disciple many more and the ripple affect continued.
Along with this, I am thinking about joining another member of the team in researching on starting some kind of organization that is similar to FCA on the campus of Bishop's. With a lot of emphasis on athletics, this would be a great way to reach out to those believer's as well as the non-believer's who love to play sports.
Please continue to pray as we map out what needs to happen next. There are a lot of opportunities to do great things and also pray that we are lead to the people and area's we need to focus on.
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