by Kevin Ezell, President of the North American Mission Board
Church planter Jon Las preaches at Mosaic Church of Lloydminister, Alberta, a church he started last Easter (2014). In just one year the church has seen more than 200 people come to faith in Christ. The church started giving to the Cooperative Program a month after launching. Photo courtesy Mosaic Church
ALPHARETA, Ga. (BP) — One of the things I like best about being at the North American Mission Board is hearing all of the great stories about how God is at work through our church planters in North America. From time to time I like to pass these stories along to you.
The story of Mosaic Church of Lloydminster in Alberta, Canada, is one such story. Jon Las and a group of fellow believers started the church last year at Easter after several weeks of prayer and preparation. Jon had never started a church before. He had never even been a lead pastor.
But Jon and his friends started sharing their dream with others in the community — a dream of initiating a multi-cultural church focused on making disciples in all nations. The community of 35,000 people has only 12 churches of any kind. The very first time they met — as practice two weeks before Easter — eight people became followers of Jesus. The next week 240 people showed up for the church’s first official weekend of worship services.
The church has continued to grow ever since. Most weekends about 400 people worship with Mosaic. In less than a year they’ve formed 22 small groups. Though mostly young, they’re a diverse mix of ages and ethnicities.
And here’s the best part — more than 200 people have come to faith in Jesus at the church over the past year, and 44 of those new believers have been baptized.
Thanks to the generosity of Southern Baptists, the North American Mission Board has been blessing Jon through our Church Planter Support Ministry. Jon is committed to serving alongside the Canadian National Baptists and Southern Baptists. The church gave its first gift to the Cooperative Program the month after its amazing launch.
Stories like Mosaic’s don’t happen every day. Many passionate, godly church planters labor in the tough soil of North American cities for years before seeing 200 people come to faith in Christ. We must celebrate their stories as well.
But as Mosaic approaches its first birthday, I challenge you to share its story in your church as a reminder of the power of the Gospel — and as encouragement to continue our work together to push back lostness through church planting. More than 2,000 years later the resurrection power demonstrated on that first Easter morning is still powering the miraculous growth of the church here in North America.
And that’s something we can all celebrate!
To find out more about how your church can get involved in church planting in Canada, visit namb.net/mobilize-me.
Kevin Ezell serves as the president of the North American Mission Board.
