Team Belgium has started group French lessons each week. We are having a great time attempting to learn a new language since French is a vital part of our church planting process. I have to laugh sometimes thinking about a transplanted Texan living in Middle Tennessee trying to learn a European language. One of my ministry partners once said that I could “butcher the King’s English.” He was probably right as evidenced by my blog post. But, it is so important that our team learn to speak the language of the people we are trying to reach and influence. Pray for us as we gather each week, laugh at each other and ourselves, as we learn to speak French with a southern accent and grow closer as a team for His glory.
Can You Believe This?
The picture below shows both of the church planing teams from LifePoint Church together on the platform with Pat. This past Sunday, Pat, introduced both the Bangkok team and the Belgium team to the church so they could see who they will send out and so they could begin to pray for each family.
There are 30 people LifePoint is going to commission in the next year to go the nations to plant reproducing sending churches so others might know and respond to the Gospel of Christ.
Please pray for these teams.

Memphis and Mission
On July 1o Pat, Tim and I went to Memphis to meet with four other churches and the leadership of the International Mission Board (IMB) to discuss the process of sending missionaries from the local church. The other churches involved with LifePoint in the process are Cornerstone, Pinelake, The Church at BrookHills and Summit Church. The gathering was very informative and historic I believe for the way mission is implemented and carried out in our denomination.
The main focus of the meeting centered around how the local church can lead out in being the mission sending organization and the IMB return to being a facilitating organization for the local church. Because of the local church’s abdication of it’s responsibility the IMB has had to pick up the task of being the sending organization. God has ordained the local church not para-church organizations. Somewhere along the time line of history the local church got involved in looking inward for too long of a period of time and the mission stopped being the “main thing”. Let me be clear, we do not want to stop being cooperative with others or change any offerings. The local church must get back to sending, strategizing, and caring for the missionaries that come from their church. It will take all of us to accomplish the task, but we must take responsibility for those we send and how they are sent.
Sometime in the next month each of the churches that were represented will have their Mission pastor travel to Richmond to hammer out more specific details of what the partnership could look like for churches that are ready to take the task of sending missionaries from the local church. Please pray for the leadership of the IMB as they seek to help the church mobilize it’s members to spread the fame of God around the world to each nation and people group. Pray also for the local leadership of the church to be bold and responsible for the sending of the church into the world to Spread His Fame among the Nations.
1 Church in Multiple Locations
We began last year challenging ourselves as a body to follow the vision that God had given us to become a church in multiple locations. We did not realize how quickly that would come to fruition. God began to call people from our church to go and plant their life and their family in other locations around the globe to see God’s glory revealed in places where a true picture of Biblical community is not understood.
In January 2010 a group of families and singles will begin training in Atlanta, GA in preparation to move to Bangkok, Thailand for the purpose of planting a church. Another group of people are beginning to meet regularly in preparation for moving to Brussels, Belgium to plant a reproducing sending church for French speaking people of Belgium. Wow…this has happened quickly in our body.
Last evening our church voted unanimously to receive another church in our area into our body and accept all of their property and liabilities for the purpose of uniting to spread the fame of God in Middle Tennessee. The former Stonebrook Church will officially become LifePoint Church on July 1, 2009. God lead the members of Stonebrook to unanimously dissolve and become a LifePoint campus. It is going to be an incredible sight for a lost community to see two churches become one for the Glory of God.
In less than one year God has lead LifePoint Church to move from 1 campus in 1 location to 4 campuses in 4 different locations. We are asking God to give wisdom for next step in the journey and to raise up new leaders for His kingdom enterprise.
We want you to join us in this prayer and get involved in leading out.
Go…ology again
Go…ology will begin next Wednesday, February 11 @ 6:30 p.m. in the auditorium. I hope to see you next week.
Go…ology
God Sends…We Go
1. Co-Missioned to Go
2. The God Who Sends
3. Jesus Sends His Followers
4. Praying as You Go
5. SHAPEd for Going
6. Going as a Team
7. Going with My Story/His Story
8. Going to a Different Culture
9. Going to Your ‘Hood
10. Celebrate Going

