April 10, 2011: Week 3 Service- Praising the Lord!

This week, we remembered how grateful we are for God doing the work building his church. A lot of our "regulars" (people that have been coming and are very interested/excited) were unable to be with us today for various reasons, and that brought our attendance count down to 48. From an historical perspective in church planting, that is pretty much expected, as is the growth that follows. Call it the end of the honeymoon period or the culling of those just curious, but Weeks 2-4 see a pretty steep drop in attendance. However, if we factor in the people that we fully expect to come back, that attendance number was actually pretty close to last week.

Also, we saw again the servant's heart in some as they chose to help our launch team setup and tear down. Praise the Lord!

Since the raw number of people present was lower, it allowed us to have a more focused approach with people, and we again had several first time attenders. Our follow-up this week was almost immediate, and that allows for a more personal touch to it. God is building His church in the ideal way, and we are thankful that we don't have to come up with what would be an inevitably worse plan.

We are also excited because the first implementation phase of Inquirer's Bible studies** is starting this week! This Bible study simply walks through the Gospel, allowing us to assess a person's condition and either see them come to a point of decision about salvation or make sure the saved person is on the same page as we are. Claudia has 2 studies scheduled this week with single women, and Pastor V has 1 with a couple. The more focused, in-depth follow-up this week will hopefully see more fruit in this way.

Regarding prayer requests, please continue on as mentioned in last week's update; however, please focus on those follow-ups. This is where people will again be confronted with the Gospel as they have been in the sermons, but there will be a person right along side them to guide them through the decision and answer questions.

**Now published as The Exchange, linked for review/purchase through Amazon in the box at the top, right of the blog