I hope and pray this newsletter finds you well. First, I wanted to say thank you for your prayers, financial support, and just genuinely caring enough to want to know what’s going on with us. Things are moving right along.  We’ve been praying for the Lord to provide, and as is typical, he did it in a way we never would have expected.  The Bridge has a sister church, Willington Baptist, who has really taken the Bridge under their wing.  The Pastor has been a great mentor, and encouragement to Aaron and I, as has the congregation.  One of the members of the congregation, who runs the Evangelical Christian Camp (a Christian conference center), called me one day in January and told me that they had some housing on campus they could rent to us for significantly less than we were planning on paying when we moved down there.  Needless to say, this was a huge open door for us, and after prayerfully considering whether this was where we should live, we said yes.

Last Friday was my last day in the office, and I’ve officially started this week at the Bridge. We are moving in about 2 weeks!  So, its a madhouse around here with all the packing and time with family and friends to say goodbye. We are excited to jump into life and ministry at the Bridge.  I was down two Sundays ago, and had the opportunity to preach at Willington Baptist Church in the morning, and the Bridge Sunday night.  It was a snowy Sunday, but there were still 65 people at the Bridge, and several were first time visitors.  The Lord is doing some great things there, Jesus is being exalted through His Word, and we couldn’t be happier right now.

What Now?

Some things you can pray for:

1. That the transition would be as smooth as possible, especially for the kids.

2. That we would continue to trust the Lord Jesus Christ in, and for all things.

3. That He would bring more families to the Bridge.

4. That He would provide more prayer partners and financial partners so we can adequately provide for our family’s needs.

If you, or an individual/church you may know would be interested in partnering with us, please let us know. We would love to sit down with them and share what God is already doing at the Bridge. Contact: olivernate@gmail.com or (603)707-2245

Steve Thiel, church planter, reports:

We are working through our sermon series in the book of John and I continue to delight “that these things are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His name.” I certainly pray that these words are true for you and that you’re growing in the grace and knowledge of our Savior!

A number of things to update you on with regard to our church planting efforts here in Greater Hartford.

1. February Snow / Church Attendance
Over the course of February, we got approximately 30″ of snow. What was unbelievable is that it seemed to snow every single Saturday night or Sunday morning. When you’re renting a building and setting up each Sunday, that’s a big deal. As you can imagine, our average attendance dropped to 95. What’s really encouraging is that last Sunday, when there was no threat of snow, our attendance jumped back up to 127 (73 adults, 54 kids, and 9 visitors). Praise the Lord for continued growth!

2. Youth Group Winter Retreat
Other signs of health at Christ Proclamation Church include a Winter Retreat that our Youth Group recently took in mid February to Lakeside Christian Camp. We had 6 adult chaperones and 19 students between 7th-12th grade. In addition to food, fellowship, and fun, we had a great time interacting on how the whole bible is about Jesus and how we’re commissioned to share our faith with others. Praise God for such a vibrant Youth Group!

3. Men’s Evangelistic Breakfast
We have a monthly evangelistic breakfast that we put on at our local restaurant from 6:30-7:30am on the first Friday of the month. We spend the first 30 minutes eating breakfast and then I share for 30 minutes on the essential qualities of a great leader summarized in being willing, worthy, and wise. Each quality points us to the Lord Jesus Christ so the gospel is always clearly presented. This morning we had 22 total guys with 4 visitors. Pray that the Lord would use this avenue to save souls!

4. Leadership Development
We currently have two different avenues which I’m using for leadership development. The first is our small group leaders meeting. We currently have 6 small groups meeting weekly with an average attendance of 10 adults. Everyone other Saturday morning, we meet for breakfast and I disciple the men in the areas of theology and shepherding. One other time each month, I meet a group of guys to walk through Grudem’s Systematic Theology. It’s exciting to see the guys growing. Pray that God would raise of godly men to lead this church!

Prayer Requests
1. Please pray that men, women, boys and girls would come to faith in Christ as we share the gospel indiscriminately with the people of Greater Hartford.
2. Please pray that we our church would continue to grow as we faithful minister the gospel of Jesus Christ.
3. Please pray that our young people would have a zeal to share the gospel with their friends.
4. Please pray that God would raise up godly men to lead Christ Proclamation Church.
5. Please pray that our church would remain unified as a body and would be well known in the community for being friendly and loving.

Yours in Christ,
Steve Thiel
Church Planter and Pastor
Christ Proclamation Church
sothiel@christproclamation.org

Praise God! We have been praying for over a year as Nate Oliver and family raised support to move down from New Hampshire to be our Pastor of Discipleship. Thanks to some connections through sister churches in CT, inexpensive housing has opened up and the Oliver’s are moving down in March! Praise God! I cannot imagine a greater encouragement than God sending a like-minded family here to jump in and serve with us. Please pray with us as they move away from family, make a transition to a new job and ministry and as they continue to raise support to get to fully funded.

Trip to TX and TN
We had a fantastic trip over Christmas and New Year’s. We made several new connections with people and churches. It was also really good to see many of you again. It was Bethany’s first time back to TX since leaving 3.5 years ago and she loved it.

New Semester
We are in our 4th year of ministry here. This will be the first class of students that we’ve had in our church from Freshman to Graduate. There will be some very difficult goodbyes in a couple of months. At the same time, this is our first batch of missionaries that we are sending out to serve and lead in other churches. Pray with us for fruitful ministry between now and graduation day.

Know that your gifts and prayers are making an impact on the kingdom. You are a vital part of what God is doing in New England and in our family. Words cannot express how grateful we are or how much we need you to continue to pray.

Prayer Requests
Pray for God’s Spirit to move and for people to be saved.
Pray for disciple-making believers to be raised up in The Bridge Church.
Pray for disciple-making believers to move to the area and find a home at The Bridge.
Pray for our family- that the peace and love of Jesus would continue to grow.
Please let us know what is happening with your family and how we can pray for you!
The Oliver Family: Nate, Tracey, Maddy, James, MaryBeth, and Luke. Among other things, Nate is an avid coffee drinker. One of the first things he plans to do is add coffee to our services. That should also reduce people falling asleep in sermons. Maybe.

The North American Mission Board sent Aaron to a conference in Oakland, CA. It was for pastors of churches in collegiate settings. It was helpful on many fronts, and a good break from the cold weather and snow. Now NAMB needs to send Becky to Hawaii or something…

In January, Bethany, Emily and Titus were part of their first opera. UCONN presented Benjamin Britten’s “Noah’s Flood” and used kids from the community as the chorus of animals. It was a ton of fun and a great way to meet families in the community.

Though it is only February, it has already been a year of ups and downs but God is on the move and some big things are on the horizon. We are so glad to be able to share what God has been doing in our family and at Faith Fellowship.

It has been an eventful January and February. With all the snow and poor weather conditions it has been hard to gain and keep solid momentum with the church ministries. We have also had several individuals that have had major medical issues and concerns over the past two months. However, despite all of Satan’s attempts to thwart God mission, the mission is still being accomplished in remarkable ways. First, our community groups have quickly multiplied on their own this year. We have students and community members requesting to start more small groups and increase time in fellowship, prayer and bible study. We are seeing a great hunger and seeing God fill people with Himself and His son. Second, with all the poor weather we still are having new people, both community and college students, join us each week for worship. Third, God has been doing a great work in the individual lives of people within the congregation. Several people have begun to step up to serve as leaders as well as become more passionate about evangelism and discipleship. Fourth, the university continues to open doors for us to have a greater impact on campus. They greatly value what we are doing and desire for us to continue. The university will be making me the official protestant campus pastor over the next couple weeks.

Prayer Requests
With the attacks of the enemy we do ask that you pray for the leadership of the church. Some of the leaders and volunteers have had some health problems over the past two month that have hindered involvement and impact through Faith Fellowship. We also ask that you pray for good favor with the campus as we make the transition for me to become the school’s protestant chaplain. We believe this will have a major impact on the faculty, administration and student body. We also ask that you pray for the church as we will possibility of having summer missionary and an intern. We are thinking through various outlets of a possible second future church plant and also how to have greater impact in the Hartford area. Finally, please continue to pray for both the harvest and for laborers. Pray that God will continue to help us reach the campus and community with the gospel and that God will raise up local and foreign workers for kingdom work in Hartford.

Thank you again for all your prayers and support! Because of your investments lives are being transformed by the Gospel and the kingdom is growing. If there are any questions or concerns please feel free to contact me however you would like. My information is below and I would love to chat with you. God Bless and I look forward to hearing from you!

In Christ,
Pastor Logan Loveday
ministerloveday@yahoo.com
http://ministerloveday.wix.com/loganloveday
43 Wethersfield Ave, Floor 2
Hartford, CT 06114

In my role as a church planting missionary, I encourage existing churches to sponsor new churches in nearby communities. The goal is to produce healthy communities of faith in areas underserved by vibrant churches. For this to work out well there must be a meaningful relationship between the sponsoring church and the daughter church. A great way to view this relationship is to use the analogy of parents raising children. Parents provide for and protect their young while teaching them to make good choices and develop into responsible adults. There are always some disagreements along the way, perhaps even strong ones, but when done correctly, it is a beautiful experience for all involved. The same is true in regards to relationships existing churches and daughter churches.

One of the most essential keys to healthy relationships between sponsor churches and their missions is good communication. The pastors of the two groups should meet often for prayer, encouragement, and planning. In many cases this will be weekly, or bi-weekly, especially at first. As time passes, it might shift to monthly, but rarely will a great relationship be maintained with less than that. Though it is possible to do this via phone or Skype when schedules get busy, face to face meetings are always preferred.

In addition to good communication between the leaders, the rest of the congregation must understanding the vision and purpose of the new congregation. This can be done in a variety of ways but often includes the pastor of the new church making presentations to the existing church about the plans, timetables and focus of the new work. It may also include the mission pastor preaching several times in the mother church before starting services in the new church. The goal is for the existing church to be fully committed to the new work.

There are times when the new church will share a facility with an existing church. This is particularly likely when there is a language or cultural group in the same town as the sponsoring church, but for which the sponsoring church is not equipped to reach. For example, if the existing church is Spanish speaking but is concerned about the lack of churches that offer services in Creole, they may start a Haitian congregation and allow it to use their building so that two completely different congregations are utilizing the same facility. When a building is shared, communication becomes even more important. Scheduling of rooms, sharing of the cost of utilities, sharing of volunteers for cleaning the building or having workdays to maintain the building all require good communication between the two congregations. Each group will have to accept some level of inconvenience in order for the other group to be effective, but good communication will allow both bodies to accomplish their mission.

Even when a building is not shared, there will almost certainly be some sharing of finances. Often the sponsoring church provides a significant portion of the new church’s income, especially in the first few months. They may even handle the money, keep the books and sign the checks, all depending on the situation and what kind of leaders God brings to the new church. Good communication is needed to work out the logistics of this, but it can be an amazing picture of the body of Christ when diverse people pool their resources for kingdom expansion.

Many church planters say that the most important part of their relationship with their sponsoring church is the friendships forged between the leaders and the members of each congregation. Those friendships often endure long after the new church has become self-sustaining and the formal sponsorship has ended.

Sponsoring a new church is a lot work, but many pastors can attest that it is also a faith growing and vision stretching time in the life of the sponsoring church. If you are interested in sponsoring a church in Connecticut, contact us using the contact form.

If your church is not able to sponsor a new church on your own, you can still be involved in church planting by becoming a partner church with someone else’s church plant. Many sponsoring churches are not able to handle everything for their daughter church. That creates room for other churches to help in smaller, but significant ways. As churches work together, new communities of faith are planted and lost people come to faith in Christ. It sounds very much like the New Testament!

As God continues to guide our church into the new and coming year, it seems that he is giving us abundant opportunities to deepen our faith together. Through some very challenging lessons that we’ve gone through on Sunday nights and in Community Group, we can sense God calling us to follow him at any cost. Praise God that he’s giving us these opportunities! May we continue to make good on them. As we enter the month of February, there will continue to be very special opportunities for spiritual growth. Here’s a sampling of what we have to look forward to:

• Our current Sunday teaching series, Core Principles of Life with Christ, has taken us through some great core teachings on what it looks like to be a disciple of Jesus. We’ll wrap up this series next Sunday, February 8, by looking at our final core principle and talking about how it applies to our lives and our church. Our discussion will take us through one of Jesus’ most famous lessons and right to the heart of the gospel. Join us for this important evening – 6 pm at the Augusta Curtis Cultural Center. (If you’d like to go back and listen to previous messages in this series, all of them are now posted online! Check out our podcast page at meridenchurch.podbean.com, or see our Facebook page – “Meriden Community Church” – or website – meridenchurch.org – for the links.)
• This Thursday, February 5, at 6 pm, our Community Group discipleship study will be picking back up. We’ll meet at McDonald’s on South Broad Street in Meriden to discuss Jesus’ teaching on loving our enemies (for those reading along, ch. 7 in The Good and Beautiful Life). This promises to be a very challenging and rich discussion – another opportunity to really grow in our faith! We invite you to come along and be a part of the discussion, even if you’ve never attended Community Group before or haven’t been reading along in the book. If you do plan on coming, here’s your challenge for this week: spend a little time each day praying for God to bless an enemy, competitor, rival, or someone you just don’t like very much! We’ll talk about our experience with this on Thursday. Going forward, Community Group will focus on this discipleship study on the first and third Thursdays of the month, have a “mission conversation” meeting on the second Thursday, and celebrate with a community dinner (potluck style) on the fourth Thursday of the month. Get involved in Community Group! Contact us for more info.
• The Christian season of Lent begins on Wednesday, February 18. Though we will not have a special service on Ash Wednesday, we will be talking about Lent and allowing it to guide our reflections on Sunday evenings for worship, beginning on Sunday, February 22. Whether you’re familiar with Lent traditions or new to it all, this will be a very significant time for our church as we turn our focus to celebrating Christ and his death and resurrection. Join us for this sacred journey.

Prayer Points

• For God to work in our hearts through the truth of his word, as we’ve been reflecting on core principles of discipleship and the challenging teachings of Jesus.
• For our new church Leadership Team, meeting for the first time this week. Pray for these leaders to see God’s vision for our church and carry out his will with wisdom.
• For our sponsor church, Friendship Baptist in Litchfield, as they look to call a new senior pastor next month.
• For those still struggling with illness and chronic health problems.
• For safety and warm shelter for everyone in our community during this harsh winter weather.

May God bless us with his wisdom, grace, and guidance as we grow with him!

Grace and Peace

Casey and Sarah Bushman, church planters

2014 was a banner year for church planting in Connecticut. By God’s grace 7 new churches were planted this year. We hope to see four more planted during 2015.