Thanksgiving

We sure have a lot to be thankful for at The Light!

We had a team from the Jones County Association in with us this month. They got to tour Baltimore, eat at our NEW pizza hangout (no long wait like at Matthew's), and help us serve the homeless by passing out blankets and coats and hats right before the weather turned down right cold here last week. Thanks Jones County!

We were able to work out a deal with our landlord to have them finance the addition of a heating system at the Light. (again, it just got really cold here in Baltimore). The Light has had NO heat since we moved in. But the work has begun and hopefully by Thanksgiving weekend will be nice and toasty! Thanks God (and our landlord)!

We got the honor of sending two of our leaders down to Florida to assist Temple Terrace with their first art show. Temple Terrace was kind enough to fly the guys in to help pull this event off and at the same time, encourage us in the how we are making an impact with artists who come into contact with our church. Thanks Temple Terrace!

We have our next Art Show all lined up to open on December 5th. We've also managed to snag one of the hottest young jazz bands in Baltimore to play at the opening! The Beakers have recently played shows for the likes of The Baltimore Symphonic Orchestra at a private show. We are really looking forward to the exposure their band will help us generate for our gallery. Thanks God!

As we look at celebrating Thanksgiving we are thankful for all of our partners who have made this past year possible. Your prayers, email encouragements, financial support, mission teams and friendship has made this a fantastic year and give us great hope as to what the Lord will use us to accomplish in 2009.

We wish you and your a Happy Thanksgiving!

These are a couple pictures from a recent Sunday in the no-heat Light!



PS. Have you seen our new website? www.atthelight.org

October 10th Inaugural Art Opening!

Friday October 10th, The Light celebrated the opening of our first art show! We had around 90 people walk through that night - 10 came in from the street after seeing the celebration through the window and another 10 came from the neighborhood after hearing about it in local coffee shops! It was a great night of refreshments, live music and spectacular art. The night was even more of a success when we found out our two artists showing work, both had pieces sell! Since that night, we've had people come in to see the art almost every time our doors have been open, and leave each time with information about our church. Praise God for His work at The Light!

Moving Forward

Imagine with me the opening credits of each Star Wars film.

Each line moving farther away from the viewer - getting smaller as it goes.

Each time telling a little bit more of the story, but leaving you wanting more.

Excitement builds because you're moving forward in the ongoing saga.

 

 

Well, our permit saga with the city has ended! And now we are moving forward to the next part of our story. But let's have a quick recap...

 

After months of hold-ups with health permits (due to misinformation and building 'needs' based on the whim of the inspector), we got our health permit on September 2nd. (I'll pause here for the raucous applause.)

 

And then September 17th saw our fire marshall inspection permit come to pass. This was another unexpected challenge as we were made to get an OUTSIDE exit sign to hang up on the building behind us. A retired Baltimore City electrician told us he had never even heard of that in all his jobs in the city in over 40 years. But we got it done.

 

Finally, September 18th came. And with much trepidation, we submitted to the final building inspection. God's mercy shone down on us, and within an hour of the building inspector checking out the space, I was down at the permit office getting our final permit!

 

'These things I have spoken unto you, that in me, you might have peace. In this world you will have tribulation. But be of good cheer! For I have overcome the world.' John 16:33

 

This verse gave me hope for the past 6 months as we battled to get this project done. And I say battled, because I believe God's spiritual forces in the heavenly realms were waging war on our behalf to get the doors of The Light opened up at 1015 N Charles St. And through the prayers of the saints - and the many who were the hands and feet in getting the physical work taken care of - God got it done.

 

So now what? 

 

The temptation is to take a break. Sit back. Enjoy the fruit of our labor. 

 

But the reality is, the building isn't the fruit that we're looking for! God didn't call us to start The Light so we could get a another building refurbished in Baltimore. It was just one of the chapters in the beginning of our our epic story!

 

Now comes the part where we join Him in His work. 

 

But here's what the building is allowing us to do: 

• Sunday mornings from 9-10 we have 9 people meeting for discipleship.
• Sunday mornings from 11-12:30 we have our Sunday service.
• Monday nights we have leadership meetings.
• Tuesday mornings from 7:30-8:30 is journaling and discussion.
• Wednesday nights we have our misional community service.  - About 30 people are coming out for Bible study, men's small group, prayer group, and women's small group.
• Thursday thru Saturday nights are open from 5-9 for gallery viewing and informal hanging out.
• And Fridays or Saturdays from now til Christmas have Art show openings/Poetry slams/Open Mic Nights/Art-worship nights and more taking place.

 

All these things we have a place for now. A gallery where artists, students, graduates, neighbors and friends can experience the love of Jesus and the warmth of a place to belong as they see what a creative God we serve.

 

And those are just the things happening at 1015 N Charles St.

 

Be praying for teams of our MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art) students as they do a 'Dorm Storm' this coming week - October 6-9. They'll be going 2x2 to each floor, knocking on doors and passing out information about The Light and our upcoming art show opening on the 10th.

 

We were just on campus on Friday September 26th for a community invlovement fair. We were invited to be there by the school and were able to make several great connections with different organizations such as the MICA Alumni Newsletter. They offered to include all of our gallery info and show information in every newsletter! We also were able to meet some 60 students in the two hours the fair ran and get contact information for art work submissions.

 

We were also featured as 'Critics Pick' in Baltimore's 'City Paper' for the mural organized and done by four of our members at one of the top hostels in the world here in Baltimore. One of the things that made this so exciting was that the mural was reviewed in the 'Best of Baltimore' edition of the paper. Easily one of the biggest issues of the year!

 

So, from on-location events to off-location events, people are hearing more and more about The Light. Thanks for all your prayers and support as we step up our outreach and programming to make use of what God has given us!

 

Artscape 2008 - July

Wow - so much has happened. We had 2 teams join us in time for Artscape. About 8 people came from the Jones County Association in Mississippi, and 6 from Temple Terrace, FL, to help us.



Arriving first, Jones County helped us to finish up our space as best as possible for our impending Health Inspection, Monday July 14^th. They painted, cleaned, and overall got the place ready for the Health Inspector.



The Health Inspector arrived, and unfortunately, we got a "Yellow Light". That means that while we didn’t “fail”, we also did NOT pass, and have to make some rather large changes/additions, such as adding another bathroom and a 3-compartment sink in the kitchen. This was a little disheartening, as we had hoped to move forward with other permits, such as occupancy limits and an artisan permit (to operate as a gallery), in time for Artscape. The big crimp that this put in our plans was that we could no longer hold our first Art Show to coincide with Artscape, in which two of our in-house artists, Jocelyn Bocchino and Jason Pastrana, were going to show their work.

But that didn't thwart us in the end! We stuck with the basic plan, but also made some significant changes, (of course!).






Temple Terrace arrived in the midst of this, and started covering the area in prayer.










As you heard in my last post, we were approved for a booth at Artscape, in the Family Art Park. We continued with our original plan – to invite the kids to make a “stained glass window” for us. The teams helped us cut out tessellations, which would serve as the basic template for each child’s “window”. They would cut holes out of the black construction paper, and fill the holes with translucent tissue paper.

They could make one to take and one to leave with us (or more!), and of those they left, seeing as they all interlocked, we planned to put them in the huge plate glass window that fronts The Light. In this way, we could invite them to participate in our space, and also invite them to come by later to see their work! We had great interaction with the kids and their parents. While some of our volunteers were hands on, helping the kids (“Have you ever make a paper snowflake?” and ”Do you go to church?”), our other volunteers were engaging Mom and Dad, talking to them about God, church, and The Light. And, as each kid left, we also sent them on with a “package” advertising The Light that included a cup, filled with a magnet, button, pen and carabiner.












We also volunteered with Artscape, again, but this time we were assigned to a different role than last year: mostly working the information booths throughout the festival. This was at times difficult for some folks, as most of the teams we provided to Artscape were from out-of-town and weren’t even sure of what info to give! But Southern charm won out in the end, and everyone did a great job representing the Lord and The Light.

We also still hung Jocelyn and Jason’s work at The Light, as well as set up a table in front of The Light, on the sidewalk. Being about 3½ blocks from the action of Artscape, we are in a prime spot for outreach. We handed out free, ice-cold water bottles (FREE!), along with our various promotional items: magnets, flyers (cleverly folded to look like a fat pencil), buttons, pens, and cups. While it was funny to see the number of people who couldn’t believe that the water was actually free, it was great to see and meet the folks who not only were grateful for the FREE water on a HOT summer day, but also wanted to see what we were doing in our new space. We found out that the local neighborhood/community has been curious about what we’ve been doing in there, as it had been empty for 2-3 years before us. They were excited to hear that it was to be a gallery, and surprised that a church could be associated with it. We also told folks that though we weren’t open yet, we would be soon, and invited them in to take a look around, as a “sneak peak.” This allowed us still to advertise, get the word out, invite folks into our space, and connect with the neighborhood and fellow artists. This, in turn, let us specifically make connections with the art community and develop a list of contacts for our future art shows.

We also were privileged in that the husband in one of our new couples, Jesse, had a piece chosen to be installed in the median of a major thoroughfare in Artscape, and it will remain there until NEXT year’s Artscape, in part because one of the requirements of the pieces was that it provide outside seating! Congrats, Jesse!

Though, that “Free water! Get your free water! Would you like some free water?” will ring in my ears for a while.

It was three exciting days of outreach and engagement and advertising. The Sunday of Artscape was exciting, as we had over 50 people at service. But it didn’t come without a cost.

As I mentioned in my May post, our tenant/neighbor has not been pleased that we are even there. After Artscape, he complained to our mutual landlord again, and has made moves to contact other neighborhood bodies about our permits or lack thereof. While, thankfully, our landlord still likes us, unfortunately our tenant/neighbor has asked that we not even talk with him. Please continue to pray for him and us in this.

As we have been renovating and completing permit requirements (with conflicting messages from Baltimore City!), we have decided to rejoin our downtown church for Sunday services for the month of August (or until permit-ted! – whichever comes first!). This was a difficult decision, but it allows us to finish the renovations more quickly and be “above reproach” in our compliance with city ordinances. An unexpected bonus is that our core group is taking advantage of this time to visit other churches and services that are doing creative things along the East Coast.

We have already seen several people come by church as a result of handing out water bottles on that hot summer day. Thanks Jones County and Temple Terrace!

ALSO, I have a praise report from our role in LAST year’s Artscape. The volunteer coordinator with whom we worked last year, Heather (mentioned in my Artscape post of last year), is still working with Artscape, though in a different capacity – with the Family Art Park. What has been really great is that she has been contacting us as she and her husband have started looking for a church! We are hoping to see them when we are finally officially open. In the meantime, we are keeping contact with her, so thanks again to our Mississippi teams who helped us in forging this relationship last year as well as this year.

June 2008

I just returned from a partnership development trip to Mississippi and it was great to meet up with some of our partnering churches there. If I didn't get to see you on this trip, I hope you'll shoot me an email, or leave a comment, as I'd love to hear from you.

It was also great to meet new pastors and leaders, sharing with them what God is doing here at The Light. Please pray for those relationships, and their continual development.

We also got our Summer Missionary, Christa Clarkson, a Mississippi College student from Holly Springs, MS. She has served with us twice on missions trips (once for Artscape last summer, and again this last March, over her Spring Break), both times with a group from her church, just like the teams who are with us this week. It has been exciting to see her return, on her own, to serve again with us and join with what God is doing through our church in Baltimore. She has been a HUGE help as we have been working hard and preparing for a busy outreach season. Thank you, Christa, and thank you to the Mississippi Convention who was instrumental in making her presence possible!

Most of this month has been spent on getting our new space ready. After the team from Temple Terrace came, we were in a much better place, as I mentioned in my last post. Many in our team have spent their free time in painting and prepping the walls, but there was still more to go!

So another great team came from Morrison Heights, Mississippi, led by Mark Sandifer. They were crucial in getting most of our kitchen in place, and laying most of the new flooring. While they were only with us for a short period of time, they got so much done. Thank you, Morrison Heights - for your help, your partnership in our plant, and your friendship in ministry.

However, we still have plenty to do. We need to finish the flooring, more painting, laying of carpet in the small back office, and lots of little touch ups. Please pray for an additional team in the next 2-3 weeks, so that we can finish up, pass all of our permit/inspections, and finally start outreach events following Artscape.

Artscape begins this next weekend (July 18th-20th), and there is a lot to pray for! We do have 2 teams for this busy time, again, and are glad for the help. This year, we DO have a booth in the Family Art Park, and have some great ideas for involving what happens there with our new location. Essentially, we are hoping to encourage the kids who come to make art that can be installed in our new space, in a new and exciting way. Our hope with this is simultaneously to create great art, with the involvement of the community, while getting the word out about our church and gallery.

Please pray for all that needs to happen this week (this includes a Health Inspection! and other inspections before we can "open"), as well as the Artscape weekend itself.

Pray that we would be able to meet as many people as possible, building relationships and reaching as many other people who will be coming to the festival.

Pray for the artists we will meet, that we would establish good connections for the future and develop a sound reputation in the community (both for quality and integrity), as well as show them a true, living, and loving God (even if they don't recognize it at first!).

Pray that our outreach efforts would be effective and that God would open the doors for effective outreach. Pray for those "God moments" with the missions teams, that the people they meet would have soft hearts, and that God would reveal Himself through them!

May

May has been busy so far.

Here we are at the end of May, and I have so much to report and share. Your prayers have been so powerful in our search for a more permanent space.

I mentioned in my last post that the frustrating search has made us “continually refine and re-define what this church is and will be.” And while difficult, that has been good. It has also allowed us to find a space that really suits who we are and what we want to do. We have found a space on the major thoroughfare of N. Charles Street, right in Mt. Vernon. Having a space on this main artery of Baltimore City means that we have maximal exposure in this community.

What we find so funny is that this is the VERY FIRST space we looked at in our search back in January. However, what we were looking for then is very different from what we realized we actually both wanted and needed. Part of that realization has been that we need a space that would allow us to ultimately run an art gallery and possibly a cafe in it, as well as services on Sundays. In order to engage a community and population that has no desire to step foot in the church, we have realized that we need to be a space that they value already, in order to eventually see the value of church. And the spaces they value already? Galleries where they can show and sell their work. Cafes where they can hang out, get sustenance, and meet people. Gathering spaces where they can do and learn what they are interested in, while meeting people and forming communities, places where they can belong.

So, the space. It is an entry-level storefront (formerly a hair salon) with a video store beneath it and apartments above it. The landlords also own/run the restaurant next to us and are both very friendly and very excited to have us there.

The space itself needs a fair bit of work. While most things are in good condition, overall, it is not yet outfitted for either a gallery or cafe in mind. The floors need a fair bit of work, and the small, single bathroom is in an awkward place - right in the middle of everything. Part of it has beautiful, high ceilings, and another has low, ugly, white, drop ceilings. However, we began meeting there almost instantly, in order to both bathe the space in prayer, and to begin to establish our presence there. Our first Sunday in the space was May 4th, and that brought with it more challenges than we imagined.

Our plan had been to start meeting there and then figure out how to get the construction done, and then to begin using the space as a gallery, working up to a cafe, eventually. However, the tenant who rents the apartment above us is also the tenant who rents/runs the video store below us. And the music on our first Sunday, well, he decided it was too loud, and complained to the landlord, complete with threats to turn us into the city for lack of a "live music permit". While our landlord likes us, she also, understandably, didn't want to upset her other tenant.

And thus began our plunge into the confusing and varied world of Baltimore City permits and regulations. In addition to the live music permit (which we may or may not need, as that is usually requested in conjunction with a liquor license, which we won't need), we need an Artisan permit to display art, not to mention sell it, as well as fire and health inspections. Failure to achieve any of them could mean that we are prohibited from even meeting there until we make the corrections and gain the permits. Needless to say, this has also sped up our plans for renovation and our schedule. Please pray for favor with the City, as well as wisdom to do the right things at the right time.

Thankfully, one of our partnering churches, Temple Terrace, in Tampa, Florida, offered to bring a missions team of workers, experienced in renovations and church building. With a contractor at the helm of this team, this past week, they were able to move the bathroom to a more convenient and discreet place within the space, and disguise the ugly, low, drop ceilings with a coat of black paint - it has virtually disappeared. Then they installed track lighting so that we can better illuminate artwork on the walls (in preparation for the gallery). I cannot tell you what a blessing this has been to us.

But even this was not without its difficulties. On their final day with us, they were in the space early, working hard before their drive back to Florida, when they began to smell smoke. They couldn't find the source however, and after several investigations, found that it was coming from outside the building. Baltimore City is re-paving the sidewalk in front of our space, and in the process, their workers set fire to the outside of the building. Our team called 911, and with the quick arrival of 8 firetrucks, the fire was put out, and it was determined that little damage actually occurred, and none to our space itself. *whew*

Needless to say, the team was somewhat spooked and the space still smells of smoke. But as always, God is faithful, and we have been seeing that in both the renovations as well as our near brushes with events such as these.

Another partnering church from Mississippi is trying to come up in early July to help with both kitchen renovations and installing new flooring. Please pray for this as well.

April

We feel a tremendous sense of urgency as we look for a place to settle. We are continuously stymied by our lack of space and physical presence in the community. Outreaches have been only so successful, and the core group members are struggling with frustration as they try again and again to engage people.

Like I mentioned in my last update, Bill and John have been doing an all-out search for a place so that we can move onto the next phase of our church plant. We feel like it is so close, but never quite there. Promising spaces are often revoked or have hidden things that don’t work out. It has been frustrating, but we trust that God is leading us to the right space for this church. One good thing to come out of this search is that it forces us, as a core group to continually refine and re-define what this church is and will be. We are reminded, again and again, to give up ideas of what we know, in order to ask what God would have us do.

So, we have increased out efforts to meet for more prayer and to vision again as to why we started the Light church in the first place.

And again, life circumstances have become a struggle. For myself and my family, we are again facing financial pressures as house repairs have taken on new urgency, since many weren’t dealt with when we first launched the church (a leaking roof, followed by plumbing problems – which have left us with just one bathroom in the house to wash in (2 adults and 4 boys!), and now, just recently, Termites have shown up in the house!).

Likewise, Bill, since coming on as the co-church planter, has been plagued with ongoing car troubles that have put undue hardships to him and his family, as well as a leaking bathroom, too. It almost seems comical, if it didn’t wear us down so quickly.

However, our staff are not the only ones getting hit.

From our Core Group, students and recent grads are struggling, like most across the country, to find jobs, and ones that satisfy them. One young woman, so passionate about the church plant, will have to move home to her parents’ in August, due to finances, rather than continue her schooling and work here in the city. Another young man cannot get enough work to make his bills, and another young woman’s work environment has deteriorated with the economy, leaving her feeling trapped. All of these things have worked to discourage our entire core group, causing some to question their decision to remain in Baltimore, even for the church plant. While it is discouraging for the Core Group to see everyone struggle so badly, it has the added effect of demoralizing the entire group.

PLEASE PRAY FOR THE FOLLOW TWO THINGS:

1. To FIND a place for our church plant that is in the community and suites what God wants to do through us.
2. For the Spiritual Warfare that we are facing, that we would see a deliverance from it and that we will be able to overcome both the actual challenges presented as well as the their discouraging effect.

March

It has a been a busy couple of months. I hope you'll forgive my lack of an update, with this one, and another to follow shortly!

March

As I mentioned in my last post, we have been searching for a new space in which to meet regularly. It seems as if we are constantly doing this, and well, we have. While things have been going well at our smaller space/venue since the new year, we know that we need a different space in which we can meet throughout the week. We NEED to have a day-today presence in the community.

While our core group is still excited, we all recognize that we have reached a plateau in the church plant. We feel very limited in what we can accomplish in reaching this unique population of artists with out that day-to-day presence. While we are centered in the Arts District of Baltimore, we know that our target group is not a physically-defined community or neighborhood. The artist community in Baltimore is large and disperse, and without a defined space, it is impossible to reach them with only Sunday services.

As John and Bill have been looking, we have found 2 locations in the city, but neither is perfectly suited for what we want to do. Ideally, we would like a store-front property that can serve as a gallery/café: a base for our day-to-day operations and outreaches, ranging from Alternative Craft classes/groups, Poetry Slams, small concerts, etc.

In the meantime, we were blessed this month with a GREAT help – a missions team from Holly Springs, MS. They did an amazing amount of work to help us promote our Good Friday event, making contact with lots of folks in the city. They were Mike and Connie Clarkson, their daughter Christa, Webb and Tiffany Lewis, Jared Cummins, and Neal Boone. (Actually, Neal and Jared are not from Holly Springs, but they do go to college with Christa at Mississippi College.)

These folks went out each day, praying for the area and talking with people, inviting them to our Good Friday event, and letting folks know that we are in the neighborhood. They had a lot of great interactions, and you should hear their stories! Jared and Mike ventured into our local anarchist coffee shop, Red Emma’s, and learned a lot about another subculture in our very own US.

The team also helped us install 2 sculptures in a gallery in DC. Our very own Marie Cobb submitted one of her works, and we submitted a collaborative work, Incense (our prayersculpture from Good Friday/Easter 2007), to a juried show at the Honfleur Gallery in DC.

Both were accepted, but we needed a lot of help to install them. We got great feedback about them, and it was amazing to share what God has been doing in our church. One review described Incense as “whimsical, but reverent”. This would not have been possible without the MS team’s help!

Our Good Friday service went really well. Designed to be an experiential meditation on aspects of the Good Friday story, we centered the service around six words: Silence, Promise, Feeling, Broken, Question, and Change. We put out a call for original video, art, and written works that responded to one or several of these six words, and got some amazing pieces. We designed the room and the service so that after an initial time of worship, we split into groups and experienced each word (and accompanying art pieces) as a group and discussed what each meant to us and the world in the context of the Good Friday story. We meditated on the Word and His sacrifice, and shared that experience together. Many people were powerfully moved and affected.

Thanks again, Mike and Connie, for leading this trip, and thank you Christa, Webb, Tiffany, Neal and Jared for all of your hard work. You don’t know what an encouragement it was for us to have you here with us. You made our Easter weekend an exciting and blessed time.

Our ministry continues to see growth and people are being changed. I’d like to highlight and share with you a particular story from this month.

James is a 28 year old single guy who came back to the Lord about 4 months ago after several years playing the prodigal son. He told me at the beginning of February he felt God was calling him to start speaking up at work and begin mentoring some of the younger guys that he does appliance installation and delivery with. While James is 6'6" and about 300 lbs, he is a very quiet man and unsure of himself - so this was something like Moses hearing he was supposed to speak for God.

We started praying then that God would open doors for him to talk about his faith and see what would happen. One month later, James has had significant conversations with all 4 guys in his shop, had one of them attend small group with him and is beginning a Bible study next week with two of them whom he found out are Christians. One of the guys is asking more and more questions each week about faith and James believes he is close to coming to church with him. James is not only a changed man, but he is helping to change those around him.

Praise God for how He is working in James’ life.

(oh, and before i forget, thanks Neal for all the great pics!)

February 2008

Lots has been happening. Let me introduce you to our newest staff member, whom I mentioned in my last post: Pastor Bill Pitts.

In his own words:

Bill grew up in Atlanta, married a beautiful Jersey girl (Patty) and has made a home with their amazing kids (Cailtin, Cody and Mason) in Baltimore over the last 8 years. After coming to know Christ as a senior in high school, Bill spent 20 years in Youth Ministry helping students figure out that God loves them and has a plan for them. He's excited to now be a pastor at the Light and see people from all over Bolton Hill and Mt Vernon experience church simply and as a family. He's still working on completing his master's degree and figures to have it done sometime before his 4th grade son graduates high school. Eating out at new restaurants, watching American Idol and going to the beach are his family’s favorite things to do together. Bill loves reading, computer games and the Dunkin Donuts Caramel Swirl Iced Latte.

Bill’s transition into pastoring The Light has gone really well. Having him here has really freed up a lot of my time, and is allowing me to manage the transition of Dan out of the Downtown church.

Our move to the new space, in addition to Bill coming onto staff, has been good for us. Your prayers haven been so important to us during this time, and we thank you for them. We have changed some of our service and layout in the new room, specifically by arranging the seating around tables (café-style), rather than row-upon-row of lecture-style seating. Considering our desire to build community amongst those who have been coming, we found the fixed seating of our old room to restrict us too much. Essentially, people would arrive, disperse themselves around the room and then just face forward for the duration. However, in our new room, the very fact that people are clustered around tables, naturally facing one another, means that we have the opportunity to encourage community. While we were concerned that it might be awkward, it has been working out great. People are engaging one another and meeting new people.

The fact that the room is slightly smaller helps to encourage that sense of community as well. Room/space psychology can be peculiar that way, but in our new space, it feels close and comfortable, giving people that sense that they are part of an actual community.

The flexibility of the new room also means that our artists who participate in worship by drawing, sketching, and the like, can be situated within the congregation, rather than be sequestered off to the side, as they were in the old room, detached from the congregation. We are able to encourage artwork at the tables now, as well, by equipping each one with art supplies and paper. It’s been exciting to see people engage with God and the sermons and themselves in this way.

However, what has been the most exciting has been the re-ignition of our core group. Most everyone has pulled out of the slump that seemed to be wearing us all down. This has meant not only that people are excited about serving again, but that they are dreaming and visioning for the future again, and inviting people again. What has really encouraged us all is that some of our less committed people (or so we thought) have been inviting the most people of all. And they’ve been coming. And coming back!

Over the course of the last month and a half, we have easily ministered to at least 80-90 people. We have had more people than ever that just drop by, and then return the next week. We’ve been able to start 2 weekly small groups with more regular attendance than last year. But, as exciting as all these people have been, it has still been a bit discouraging that our Sunday services rarely top 40 people. The majority of those 80-90 are repeat attenders, but never all on the same day.

We’ve also been looking for a more permanent meeting space in which we could not only meet for Sunday worship, but also use throughout the week as an art gallery and hopefully a café. This would allow us to interact with the community in more ways than just a Sunday service. Bill and John Kovacs have been scouring the neighborhood of Mt Vernon for the space to which God is calling us. This has been difficult at times, as many spaces need a lot of work, are too expensive, or ultimately aren’t large enough. But we trust that God will provide this space, and are simply persevering. Please pray for us in this search.

January 2008

Things have been brewing here in Baltimore, and especially with The Light. While this blog is mainly about The Light church plant, The Light does not exist in a vacuum. Specifically, The Light is one of three churches that are integrally connected, that rely upon one another for resources, support and prayer. Even though I am currently the lead planter and pastor at The Light, demands and matters at the other two churches that are part of our network concern me deeply and create stresses on me. At times, I am required to step back into those churches to keep us on track with the vision God has given us.

Our leadership across all three churches went away on our semi-annual planning retreat last weekend, and had a great time. It was very relaxing, and provided a great time to gel with new staff and additions to our group: specifically John Kovacs and Jesse Johnson, whom I mentioned in my last update.
The biggest news within the network and for the Light has been that we will be adding a new full-time staff to further our work and to move it to the next stage of church planting: one of aggressive evangelism.

During the month of December, God presented us with a great opportunity – which we grabbed – to hire a pastor for The Light. He has been serving as a youth pastor at a mega-church in town, and as I have gotten to know him over the past 5 years, he has become a friend as well. I am very excited about this move of God, because for the past 3 yrs I have been asking this friend to join me in our church planting efforts but he’s turned me down until now! He brings with him years of ministry experience, creativity, and giftings that will complement mine.

I will introduce him more fully in a future update, but I hope that you will pray for us in this transition.

For other news at the Light, we have been taking a brief hiatus over the holiday season with the goal of starting the new year with a fresh vision. We are looking to move our location (just across the street to another room within the University of Baltimore) so that we can try some different things with our Sunday Services.

Our core group is in the midst of meeting and planning, dreaming and visioning, and hearing from God. At the end of 2007, our core group found itself burnt out and tired. As I mentioned in my last update, we had settled into "doing" Sunday Service, in part because we were tiring out and it was easier to do the same thing, week after week. But in the end, the routine nature of this and the lack of creativity were more tiring than staidly comfortable. Though the group is tired, there is a positive side to this. We have now learned, through experience, that we can never settle into this again, because "doing church" will never be satisfying. It is only in the pursuit of God that we can find our joy and fulfillment.

So please pray for us as we embark on this, that we would hear clearly from God. We also ask that you would pray for the new staff that we hired: for his transition into this role, as well as for the core group's adjustment to an additional leader. We are very excited to see how God will answer our "burn-out" prayers with a fresh and creative leader.

As always, we are continuing to develop more partnerships, and had a wonderful opportunity to meet with some pastors and DOM's from Kentucky today. Pray that we will find churches in Kentucky who God will call upon to partner with us.

Lastly, we have been developing our 2008 Spring/Summer Missions Opportunities. We are exploring several opportunities to connect with and impact the community in which God has placed us, and are looking forward to hosting teams and partners this summer. A .pdf of this brochure will be available shortly, if you would like to join us this summer as well.