Finally, the church search at an end, I was brought to the place God had prepared me for. The Holy Spirit weaved experience, dreams, prophecies and intimacy with Him, developed over decades, into one coherent ministry vision. Had I not reached an end of all my ideas and all the traditional concepts of ministry, I would not have been open to such a radical idea. I can now look back and see how God used it all to prepare me for this. He's using my past sins, my addictions, my illnesses and my ministry education and experience. It's all fallen into place!
Stitches in time: 10 years of small group ministry administration. An early vision of home church as a replacement for commercial churches. A Professor in Bible College saying in front of class, "Maybe some day Glen will found some huge Internet ministry." A Christmas program based on someone looking on the Web for help with his life. A book on need-centered evangelism. Learning to use search engines to help my dying brother. Experience and education in business. Frustration and disappointment with the present one-size-fits-all approach to ministry and evangelism. God used it all!
This was going to be a church...on the Internet. Not like the traditional church programs on the Web, but radically different. People would be reached based on the needs they searched for help with, led to Christ and then introduced to Christian fellowship. We would offer all the standard answers for addiction, abuse, weight, money, relationship problems and one additional, powerful answer...help from God. In 5 years on the Internet, I've yet to discover another Christian who approaches evangelism online form the needs of those being reached...yet, this is exactly what Jesus did. After they decided to hook up with God, rather than plug them into who knows what church, we would use the Internet to teach them about Christian life. To help people fellowship together, we would encourage and support small groups in homes. For people who feel there has to be an order of worship, we would have an online worship service with teaching, music...even an offering. As God revealed the details I was awed by the possibilities. A single community church that includes almost every community in the world, yet, is more local than the church down the street...it's the church in your house.
There were weeks spent, just dreaming and praying over all God had for me to do. But first, I had to learn how to build a website...and about a thousand other things. The fascinating journey begins with the next post...
How has God spoken to you? Have you ever experienced times when you could finally see where your experiences fit into a bigger plan? Have you ever wondered, why did God let this bad thing happen to me?