The Water's Edge Church

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Newsletter

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Apil-June 2010 Update

Update

•    First, I’m sorry it’s been so long and thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers. We need them! Much has happened at TWE in the past three months. Here are some of the high lights…

•    We had two new babies born as well as two weddings. Ben and Megan Shaner welcomed Katherine the end of March and Jenny Luiten welcomed Elizabeth in May. Zach Stano and Jaime Berthiaume tied the knot in May and Derrick Reder and Lauren Hellem did the same in June. Three more weddings are set for this fall.

•    In addition to these new additions we also had to say good bye to some precious regulars. Leah Richter, Ron Bailey, and Andrea Bierbrauer all took jobs away from Duluth. We miss them dearly.

•    Our bucket fund team prayerfully decided to support four world missionaries and four local outreaches as well as to put money away for an eventual TWE church plant. We were blessed to be able to send more than $2000 to each of these ministries from our 2009 fund and to begin to supporting them monthly from our 2010 budget.

•    Sharon Krause has begun working as our administrative assistant. She’s learning the ropes, getting set up, and has a big help already.

•    Speaking of Sharon, the DIVE Team is doing great! The DIVE Team is the new name for our youth ages and up and it is led by Sharon as well as Erik LoFald and Matt Scott. They continue to meet every other week for Bible study and are praying together every Sunday morning. Three DIVE Teamers, Conner Linde, and Jordan and Shawna Betz summer missionaries with CYIA this summer doing back yard Bible clubs around the city. Way to go guys!!!

•    Speaking of Erik and Matt, they are facilitating a new men’s Bible Study every other Sunday night on the book of James. A women’s Bible study is about to start.

•    Other new ministries include: Tuesday softball, Thursday morning play group, and Park Point Monday Nights

•    Jodi Zagrabelny has taken over as leader of our musical worship team and is doing an awesome job. Brian Johnson has also joined the team.

•    This past Sunday we voted in our first group of TWE members. Thirty-two adults committed to making TWE their home for the long haul! Praise the Lord!!!

•    At that meeting we encouraged our people to pray daily this month about who the one person is that God wants them to reach out to in a special and intentional way in this upcoming year (Each One Teach One) and to ask God to help them to see how He is at work in their lives and in the lives of those around them in order that we can join Him as a church.

•    We will be having a church picnic and baptism service at Chub Lake on July 18th. At least three people are getting baptized including Sharon Krause, Denise Cooper, and Lexi Peterson!

•    We are finishing up our series called True Joy – the Wisdom of Philippians this summer and will begin a new one called THE BIG QUESTIONS about Christianity September 12th. We plan to begin promoting the new series mid-August.

•    Two new prayer initiatives at TWE include 30 Hours of Prayer Sept. 11-12 and Prayer Week January 2-8.

•    Finally, new people continue to visit TWE and like what they see. We are hopeful that more and more will come, get to know Jesus, get plugged in, and make TWE their home!

Prayer Requests

•    For the many folks with connections to TWE who have yet to make the decision to follow Christ.

•    For those who are still considering whether or not to make TWE their home.

•    For those who have decided to make TWE their home.

•    And for patience, wisdom, boldness, love, and blessing as we move into this important fall season.

What a year!!!

The following is little note I recently sent to our mother church Mount of Olives Baptist to encourage them about what God has done at The Water's Edge this past year.  God is good!

The Water’s Edge turned one March 15th, 2010! Praise the Lord!!! Thank you Mount of Olives for all of the prayer, time, resources, and encouragement that you have given us. We are SO blessed to have your love and support. There’s NO WAY we’d be where we are today without you. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts! Here are some of the awesome things that God has done this past year…

• We still exist! Lots of church plants don’t make it through their first year, especially in this neck of the woods. Not only are our doors still open, but we are an independent, healthy, growing church.
• We are becoming who we set out to be. We are a welcoming church where both believers and unbelievers can come to take the next step in their faith journey. We are raising up God-centered, prayerful, relational, ministry-minded, joyful, self-sacrificing ambassadors for Christ who are seeking to make a difference in the place where God has planted them. Each Sunday and throughout the week we put the changed lives of our people on display, and God is blessing our effort.
• Our average weekly attendance has gone from less than 60 when we started to over 100. We had 183 people on Easter which is about as many as we can fit!
• We have over 100 people involved in small groups and many of our new regular attenders are plugged in and serving significantly in various capacities.
• We are standing on our own two feet financially and have pretty much been doing so since the beginning. We have been able to save much of the money that has been gifted to us thanks to the generous giving of our congregation and God’s wonderful provision of Lakeview Christian Academy as our meeting place. We are currently in the process of distributing almost $30,000 toward world missions, local outreach, and church planting and look forward to continuing to dedicate at least 15% of our budget to these endeavors in the future.
• At this point our original launch team that started the church 18 months ago is entirely intact. Everyone has honored their commitment to be at TWE through March 15, 2010. Many are considering making TWE their permanent church home. This is VERY RARE in the church planting business.
• We have 15 men reading a book on biblical eldership and considering whether or not God would call them to pursue pastor/eldership either now or sometime in the future.
• We have an every other week youth Bible study attended by more than 25 nine to fifteen years-olds.
• We have seen 22 people baptized this year at TWE. At least six of them came to Jesus this year at least in part because of the ministry of TWE. At least two others have made the decision to follow Jesus since March 15th.
• There is much more that could be shared, dozens of individual testimonies and stories of lives being changed. We sincerely hope that all of you can come to the May 2nd evening service at MOB so that you can hear some of these wonderful stories of God’s grace and goodness straight from the mouths of our people.

Prayer Requests

• For God’s continued blessing in 2010.
• That the many seeds of the Gospel that were been planted in 2009 would take root and begin to grow, especially in the lives of supportive but unbelieving spouses and loved one.
• That we would come alongside and disciple those who are new in the faith, that those who have been following Jesus for a time would continue to mature, and that many, many of our people would commit to making TWE their home by becoming members.
• That we would continue to reach out as individuals and as a church and that God would lay on the hearts of each believer at TWE someone He wants them to reach out to specifically in this upcoming year.

Feb 2010 Update

Update

•    We had our first baptism service at TWE on January 31st thanks to MOB’s portable baptismal. It was awesome!!! The service was packed with family and friends of the five young men who publicly confessed their faith in, thankfulness for, and allegiance to Christ. Though each of them said they were nervous, each spoke passionately, eloquently, openly, and at length about the work God had done in their life. It was clear that the Holy Spirit was upon each of them. We concluded the service by laying hands on and praying for the five young men and then singing Amazing Grace together. Many greeted and encouraged them afterwards with hugs and kind words. It was truly a day of great joy, praise, and celebration!

•    The following Monday, I (Erik) had the very great privilege of attending the Desiring God Pastor’s Conference in Minneapolis. There were over 1500 people there from around the world. Most were pastors, but there were also missionaries, students, and potential pastor/elders there as well. Three other men from TWE went down including one who was just baptized this summer and another who had just been baptized the day before we left! It was so neat to experience the conference with these new, young believers. It was also really neat to be able to spend the three days with the fourth man from TWE as well as the group that went down from MOB. What a blessing!

•    On February 10th, Elliot Corban Johnson was born to Brian and Shayna, their first. It was a long, hard labor, but the end result was worth it. Praise the Lord!

•    We had our second New Comer’s Dessert where people can come and hear more about the vision of TWE and how they can get involved, meet people, and get their questions answered. It was well attended and a blessing.

•    On Valentine’s Day we had a baby dedication service. LuLu Watczak and Isaac and Johnny Emerson were dedicated.

•    Our “Bucket Fund” team met again and determined how to distribute the 15% of our budget that we have set aside for church planting, local outreach, and world missions. Our vision is to give significantly to a few. We thought it was going to be very difficult to narrow down who to give to given all the great ministries out there. Though it wasn’t easy, God was good, and we came away with what we believe is a good direction. We’re excited to finalize things and get that money out into the field.

•    Beginning February 12th we started 30 Days of Praise and Prayer leading up to our first anniversary March 15th. Each day a new person from TWE sends out a thought or story from this past year to spur on praise and prayer. It has been really neat.

Prayer Requests

•    As you know we’ve been asking God for the past year to lead 30 people to Himself through our people by March 15th, 2010. So far this year eight people have been baptized. Of those eight, three came to Christ directly through the ministry of TWE. We have another baptism service scheduled for the day before our anniversary, March 14th. A fourth person who has come to Christ this year through TWE will be baptized at that time. Though it seems impossible, and like time has run out, we are continuing to pray with great diligence, and as much faith as we can muster, that God will do something HUGE in these next few weeks. After all, over 3,000 were saved and baptized in one day on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). God can do it! Additionally, there are well over 26 people in, or connected to our church, in whose lives God seems to be significantly working. Please join us in praying for an incredible outpouring of God’s Spirit over these next few weeks. We believe that this prayer aim was from the Lord, and we want to do all we can through prayer and openness to the leading of His Spirit, to be used by Him to bring it about.