This past month, we saw God do some great things. We held our Evangel School of Church Planting training in San Francisco, California. We were working with Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church that is located in the mission district in San Francisco. One of the wonderful things about the Lord we serve is He commonly does a new thing.
As the training progressed, it was clear that God was doing a new thing. The word “tabernacle” embodies this idea of God’s presence dwelling with His people. The interesting thing about God’s presence in Scripture is it is seen in the burning bush, in the tabernacle, in the temple, in the Holy Spirit descending on the disciples; now we are the living temple where God’s presence dwells inside of us.
God drove home the point that this “church re-plant” needed to get back to the roots of its history and be an outpost of the Kingdom of God. To impact their community, it needed to be God’s power working through them to build new relationships, evangelize, and make disciples.
Through many presentations and practical exercises, the team was strengthened and developed a plan that will help them operate more effectively as a team and to have a more appealing witness to
the community around the church.
My prayer is that this church-plant school is just the beginning of what God is doing in the Bay Area. Bishop Israel, who is the lead pastor of the church, also oversees several other churches. There was a local pastor who attended as a visitor and said that this is exactly the type of training that his church needed.
In His Service,
Luke Raughley