Baptisms Spring 2012

On our way out of the school year, we had "Payday", as Pastor John tells us, by celebrating new life. Since our Fall Retreat in October, we've had 9 students make a verbal commitment before the church to follow Jesus.

At 10pm in our pastor's driveway, using his hot tub as a baptismal (because that's how we roll), we heard the testimonies of these 9 students, baptized them and prayed over them. It was a phenomenal way to end the year.

Feel free to join us in praising God for His life-changing work!

Pittsburgh Church Plant

This Fall, we will send out a team to officially plant a church at the University of Pittsburgh. In a partnership with our sister church at Michigan State, we our sending out Pastor Ed Courtney, staff members Bill Lautenschlager, Peggy Myers, Amanda Craven (currently support-raising), associate staff Melissa Fritts and a slew of alumni who were great leaders in our church.

We recognized the team at our last service of the year, this past Saturday. In October, we'll bring everyone back for a bigger send-off ceremony but for now we wanted to recognize that this was the last service many of them would be attending. We are so excited for this plant and yet it is obviously a time where we'll be grieving not having these guys and girls around next year.

If you'd like to follow the team on Facebook, you can go here

Please pray for:
- Jobs for our leaders who are not on staff.
- God to prepare the campus for his servants there.
- Safety of the students as they have received several bomb threats this year.
- Unity and purpose of the team as they prepare this huge task.

Many of you knew Sherri Bent from Hope Community Church. She went to be with the Lord on Thursday, with her husband Stephen and two children, Kainan and Navi'a mourning her loss. Please be in prayer for this family. Below is a link to the obituary page.

We know this world is not our home and that Sherri is with the Lord today. It's a time to celebrate that and yet our hearts and prayers as well need to be with the family who is mourning this time of separation until they meet again.

Obituary Page

Thanks,
Chris

May 2012 Prayer Letter

Hey everyone,

This month, I share about our Rock Appreciation Dinner, Staff Conference, Garrett's ordination and Equipper Retreat.

I hope you are encouraged by what the Lord is doing here at Mizzou.

Take care,
Chris