SHOUT TO THE LORD, ALL THE EARTH LET US SING; POWER AND MAJESTY, PRAISE TO THE KING!! These are the words we heard resounding from our congregation of 91 at our launch service for Bay Life Baptist Church of Bogue Village, Montego Bay. Apart from the laughter of my grandchildren, it might possibly be the sweetest sound I have ever heard. After years of planning, months of canvassing, and hours of prayer, our new baby church was born. In our congregation of 91 were 13 children, 62 adults from our community, and 16 Americans from our team in North Carolina. We were both packed out in our little room and simultaneously overwhelmed with God's incredible goodness to us.
For those who don't know, Bay Life Baptist Church was conceived in our hearts back in 2007 when we first felt God calling us into full time missions. Little did we know then, but God had already burdened Harvest Baptist Church of Burlington, NC several years earlier with the need to plant a church in the greater Montego Bay area. They had been working with a Jamaican national for quite some time who had committed to come alongside and plant this church. When he switched gears and took an existing church in Kingston, we were there to work with them. Fourteen of their membership arrived here last Tuesday to help us do one last blitz in the Bogue Village community before having our launch service yesterday. As a result of their work in canvassing and the blood pressure clinic done on Saturday, eight souls were won to Christ before our launch service yesterday. God is so good!
In typical fashion, when 10:00 starting time rolled around yesterday morning, we only had a handful of people at church. As we began the service with the singspiration of Jamaican choruses there was a steady stream of people filing in. By the time our praise and worship portion was over the place was packed! We had to move all of our visiting team and some of our core group team out into the hallway. When we dismissed children for childrens church, thirteen children followed our workers out. As Cletis preached from John chapter one "Turn on the Light" there was full attention and even interaction from the congregation. The invitation was given and a stream of people filed out into the hall to be counselled by our leadership. A final tally showed six decisions for salvation and an equal amount for rededication. One mommy was even born again in childrens church as she listened to our leadership give the gospel to the children in very simple terms. As you can imagine, our hearts are overflowing.
Continue to pray for our core group of leaders who have embarked on this adventure with us. Pray for God to protect them from the evil one and keep them strong in their christian walk. Pray for our community, Bogue Village. It is a middle class community with large numbers of single mommies and couples who live together but are not married. Some of them came to Christ yesterday. Pray that the Holy Spirit will mature them and they will be obedient to following what Christ has now called them to do. There will be a series of messages given on the gospel of John and then Romans. Sound doctrine is so necessary here. Pray that God will sustain us in this mission...this is definitely a stretch for us.
For future needs....we are going to need a building and maybe sooner than we think. Our little room is already packed. There is a parcel of land for sale right beside the unit we now rent. We are praying for God to give us that land. Please make this a matter of fervent prayer. We are seeing Him do great things here....and we know that nothing is impossible with God.
Thank you for holding our arms up. We feel it every day. The challenges here are many and sometimes completely overwhelming. We know we can count on you to pray.
This has been a very excited rambling from one very tired Jamerican.....SELAH!
