Hey guys this is Matthias. Andrea and I are in a real time of transition right now. We actually just gave notice here at our current place of ministry at Central Christian Church in order to pursue what we believe God is calling us to right now: CHURCH PLANTING in AUSTIN, TX.
About two years ago we received a packet from a church in Austin, called Hill Country Bible Church or HCBC, that advertised a student ministry pastor position. We weren't interested in that because I felt like I was doing more ministry here (in terms of what I feel God has called me to and gifted me for) and that ultimately I wanted to be a teaching or senior pastor, but the packet was amazingly well done and included a DVD by the senior pastor about the city of Austin and their vision for it. He described the city and what was going on in terms of growth and development and gave his vision for how they could reach every man woman and child in the greater Austin area with the life-changing gospel of Jesus Christ.
While we were not interested in the church and the position they offered, the city and the vision to reach it somehow struck a cord with us and Andrea and I started thinking about Austin. It kept coming up...
Austin is an amazing city of 1.4 million people. Some researchers suggest that this city will be growing by 1 million people over the next 10 years. The vibe is young, creative, and somewhat unconventional. The city is only 17 percent churched, and most of the people there are really turned off to religion. Sociologists are saying that this city just overtook San Francisco as the most creative city in the nation. There is a new trend out that describes how society and culture will be shaped over the next couple of decades. They are calling it the creative revolution (think industrial revolution) or the rise of the creative class. The theory goes something like this, there are certain creative centers in the world were creative and innovative people gather (the top five are Austin, San Francisco, Seattle, Raleigh, Washington/Baltimore) these people bounce ideas of each other and innovate which affects the way we live and view the world. Sociologists suggest that our world will be shaped by these urban creative centers. Anyways, there is a lot more to this, suffice it to say that I want to be a part of reaching these places…
A little while later we started looking at churches we were attracted to because they seemed amazingly effective at reaching the lost and advancing the kingdom. Northpoint or Mars Hill Seattle for example. Every church I was attracted to and did research on had started as a church-plant. So I started looking into church-planting. The more we looked into church-planting the more it seemed that in terms of evangelism and life-change church-planting was the most effective method of furthering the kingdom of God. I started reading about it, listening to people talk about it and praying about it. I even talked with our elders and our senior and executive pastors about this growing desire to be involved in church-planting.
We kept in touch with that church in Austin ( www.hcbc.com )through internet, listening to sermons, vision, business meetings, etc. They have an amazing vision for church planting and actually have a 12 months residency program that helps potential church planters train for planting a church in Austin and help with the launch. This church has actually strategically mapped dozens of locations throughout the greater Austin area and has an aggressive God-sized vision of reaching every man woman and child in the greater Austin area with the life-changing reality of Jesus Christ. If you're reading this you have to listen to the vision for this (well - you don't have to but you could...) you can find it at http://sermons.myhcbc.com/index.html "Leadership Community Meeting" from fall 2006. We talked with them, went through a series of interviews and prayed a lot.
In June we were contacted by a ministry out of Houston called New Church Initiatives(they were hired by the church in Austin to assess potential church-planters and make recommendations as to who should come to Austin to plant)who invited us to be assessed as potential church-planters. Since we didn't know if we "had what it takes" we agreed to fly to Austin to be assessed. The process was grueling, but I really enjoyed it. It took place at the same church and the executive pastor, senior pastor and his wife took part as assessors.
Since then Andrea and I have been praying hard as to what God is doing in our lives and He has little by little given us direction and peace to give up everything we hold so dear here(our thriving ministry – we are out of room in our morning service at over 200 people every week and still run a large night service as well, our many close friends, salary, influence, position, house, yard, pool, etc.); all very unspiritual things but we were counting the cost and the sacrifice. It will be a costly move, and we will have to raise some support, but we are willing to make that sacrifice in order to be missionaries to the city of Austin!
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