To the right is the first church where I served as minister

of everything, but preaching.  I worked with the youth, education, children and whatever else the pastor desired for me to do.  Unlike some who entered into the ministry in their early 20's, I was almost 30 and had two small daughters living at home.  I learned a lot at this little country church even though I was only there for 11 months.  This was the church where I conducted my first funeral.  It was the church where I learned how organize a Sunday School and children's worship.  It was also the first place I offended someone in the church. 

However, this post is not about me and my humble beginnings in the ministry, but about this little fellowship of believers.  It was located in between to growing communities.  Within a half mile of the church were older homes valued below $100,000 and newer homes over a million dollars.  Yet for the most part the church was still in a rural setting though that was about to change.  The pastor of the church was bivocational and needed help ministering to the needs of the church and so the church called me to help.  We talked about the future of the church and how we were going to reach the growing population that was around us.  People would drive by our little fellowship to attend churches as far as an hour away, churches such as First Baptist Dallas, First Baptist Plano, Prestonwood Baptist Church in Dallas at the time.  Our little country church had many good qualities but few if any noticed our the little church.

Something had to be done to help the church meet the needs of the people and become a church that was relevant to the community around them.  The growth was coming to the area and the church wanted to be ready when the people moved to the area.  I eventually left this little church and moved into the pastorate, but I continued to follow the ministry of this fellowship of believers.

This little church knew that something had to happen if they were going to reach their community with the gospel.  So in a leap of faith they purchased a piece of property down the street from the existing building and eventually built a new building to reach their community and minister to the needs of others.  It was a big step of faith for this group of believers.  They were not a wealthy church.  In fact most of the people in the fellowship were living on a fixed income.  They were blue collar workers with a handful of business men.  There was only one Adult Sunday School class and one youth class.  There were only three classes for children and we still had a cry room for babies in the back of the church.  Yet this church took an incredible leap of faith and built a new facility.  They sold the existing building to a Lutheran church and erected a state of the art facility that was comparable to other facilities further away.  Today the church is vibrant, relevant and ministering to the needs of the growing community.

They had a vision of what God wanted to do and step out on faith to make that vision a reality.  William Carey, the father of the modern day missions movement onced stated that churches are "to attempt great things for God and expect great things from God."  This body of believers believed in a big God and moved forward to do big things.  I pray that as  you read this post you will be encouraged that with faith you can do much more than  you ever imagined.  God wants to accomplish great things with you and in  you if you will only believe and step out on faith.  Or perhaps instead of stepping out on faith, it needs to be leaping out on faith.  With God nothing is impossible.  Have you dared to do the impossible today?  Oh, by the way below is the picture of the church today.