This anniversary service was an important event for Sacred Mission Like many rural areas, these communities have been hit by many disappointments in 2020 from the pandemic, the economic downtown, and the recent derecho. The service was a needed reminder that there are still great things happening and things worth celebrating. Pastor Tim said, “If I could describe how our anniversary service felt in word it would be “alive.” Most rural communities feel like they are dead or dying. It was encouraging to celebrate that Jesus is alive and He’s still forming churches that are alive.”

Sacred Mission has been blessed to experience a lot of gospel fruit in their first year. They have baptized many new believers and have witnessed about 20 people come to know Jesus. Just last Sunday, one student in their youth ministry gave his life to Jesus at their evening meeting. Pastor Tim said, “It has surprised me a little bit. Not knowing how hard the ground would be when we arrived to plant a church, we assumed rural Iowa might be dry soil. It has been much more evangelistically fruitful in first year than we anticipated.”

From the beginning, Sacred Mission has focused on community relationships as a key strategy. “Our community wasn’t experiencing a lot of ‘community’ and we knew the gospel would bring true community. We knew small groups were going to be an important part of our church plant, especially in our first year. We also identified youth in our communities to be a unique unreached people group and we sought to treat it as such. BCI has been a huge help in providing funding for us to support kids and youth ministry staff which has been extremely fruitful. We had 50 participating in our kids ministry and recently had 50 youth students at our fall relaunch. Working with the school districts in our area is a major source of community relationships. We enjoy a really strong relationship with the mayor of the City of Collins and our church partners with the city to serve a free meal to about 400 people in Collins every week as part of a food distribution grant. This has been a huge opportunity for us to shine the light of the gospel in our communities.”

In the next year, Sacred Mission would most love to see the Lord grow their church in love for one another. They pray that they would be moved by God beyond fighting with each other (about masks, politics, or whatever else) toward fighting for each other. Pastor Tim said, “In rural communities, it often feels like the best days are in the past. They used to have a strong local economy and social network. It would be easy to be pessimistic. But we keep asking ourselves, ‘What if the best days of these communities are in the future because Jesus is on the move, on His mission? That is the reason we called our church Sacred Mission. Jesus Himself is on a sacred mission for the people of rural Iowa and we get to be a part of it. He could have done the work Himself or chosen others to do it. What’s most surprising is just His grace to use us in His work!”