Fall 2003 Update
Dear brothers and sisters,
Wow! I can’t believe it’s already October! Time has flown by. If I could sum up in one thought what God has been teaching me the past couple of months, it is that HE is not bound by my plans, and that HIS plan works. Always.
As much as I wanted to leave right after Thanksgiving, God has shown me over the past few weeks that He wants me to wait until January. I prayed and asked God to make it clear to me if He wanted me to wait, and this is what was brought to my attention within the next few days:
*The Mountainview International Church, which I will be working with in Madrid, gets their paperwork through at the end of this year to be a registered entity, which means that they can give me a letter of invitation to come to Spain, which I need for a resident visa. Praise the Lord for HIS provision!!! However, this also means that I need to wait until January to arrive in Madrid with the letter of invitation.
*A few of the churches interested in partnering with me financially indicated to me that their new budgets start in January.
*Third, my mom told me she had been praying that God would work it out so that I could be home for Christmas this year. At this point, I was saying “OK, God, loud and clear.”
So, I plan to leave for Madrid in January; tentatively January 10th. The main thing that this changes, other than the departure date, is that I won’t be living off of financial support until December, so the support in my account right now will be saved to cover initial expenses such as a plane ticket, paying my relocation agent, shipping costs, initial household expenses, etc.
One other big development is my association with Mountainview International Church. Since I am still the only current Impact staff headed for Madrid, I need a team of people to work with. While continuing to be on staff with Impact, I will be acting as an “intern” for Mountainview for the first several months I am there. Again, God is awesome. When Troy Cady, their team leader, and I talked about the possibility of my working with them, he mentioned that they have several international students and would like for me to be in charge of that part of ministry. Other than that, I will be taking some courses through the church in leading small groups, studying the Bible, and lifelong leadership; and I will be spending a lot of time on campus getting to know students. (If you want to find out more about Mountainview, you can go to www.mountainview-church.com.) God is so good. He has provided a group of people that I can work and learn with while beginning campus ministry. What an awesome God we serve!
Here are some things you can pray about:
*Pray that my focus will remain completely on God. It’s so easy to let preparations and
ministry cause distractions in our pursuit of HIM, so I ask you to pray that my
focus on HIM and my passion for HIM will grow every day.
*Continue to pray that God will raise up more staff to come work in Madrid.
*Ask for God’s presence at the Universidad Complutense Madrid, and that HE would
draw students to Himself.
*Pray for boldness among the Christians on campus at UCM.
*Ask for God’s continued provision in financial and prayer support.
Thank you all for your support and friendship. I look forward to seeing what God has planned. We serve a God that blows away our expectations over and over!
Praising HIM,
Kelly Wills
A Very Long P.S…..
Some people requested a few more details about what I am doing and how I will get started in Spain, so here is a more comprehensive addition to the Fall 2003 Newsletter.
Mountainview International Church is a non-denominational international church made up primarily of small groups. Their main focus is actually on the small groups and not a large Sunday service, so there is a lot of personal accountability within the group. This is the church I will be working with when I arrive in Spain. My main responsibility with them will be the college age ministry within the church. I will also be helping with the worhship team and spending the rest of the time on campus meeting students. In addition to responsibilities, I will also be getting some Bible study and leadership training through the church. WWW.MOUNTAINVIEW-CHURCH.COM has a lot of information about the church and the Cady family.
The Cady's are the family that I will be staying with when I first arrive in Madrid. Troy is the team leader for the Mountainview Church team, and he and his wife Heather and their two children live on the outskirts of Madrid. Some people within the church are already looking for an apartment for me so I can move into my own place (as close as possible to the university) as soon as possible.
Here are some statistics about Spain:
1) population: approx. 41 million. Madrid is the
capital of Spain, with about 5 million people
2) 94% Roman Catholic
3) less than 1.5% Evangelical Christian
4) Universidad Complutense Madrid--the main University
in Madrid--has 126,000 students—less than 50 are
involved in Christian campus ministry.
One of my methods for starting ministry is to work with college students in the church that are already plugged into the university--moving more activities onto campus to bring other students in. Christian international students can be a big help to starting the ministry. No one relates to a student better than another student.
I also plan to contact the two other campus ministries already in place (Campus Crusade for Christ and University Bible Group). They are both small ministries and could use encouragement. I want to be sure a good relationship is established with them from the beginning.
Another method to get started is just to be on campus meeting people during as much of my free time as possible, making friends. Ministry is often slow with Spaniards--they are friendly on the surface, but it takes a while to establish trust with them to dive into spiritual questions, so frustration with the slowness of ministry is something I have been warned that most missionaries in Spain deal with.
Right now I am in the middle of preparations to leave. My tentative leaving date is mid-January, hopefully around the 10th, but that depends on a couple of things: 1) the dates for Impact’s team leaders’ conference in mid-January, and 2) financial support. I can't go without $2,000 a month raised. Right now (November), I need about $700/month more, and I have a couple of churches getting back to me within the next few weeks about support.
Wow! I can’t believe it’s already October! Time has flown by. If I could sum up in one thought what God has been teaching me the past couple of months, it is that HE is not bound by my plans, and that HIS plan works. Always.
As much as I wanted to leave right after Thanksgiving, God has shown me over the past few weeks that He wants me to wait until January. I prayed and asked God to make it clear to me if He wanted me to wait, and this is what was brought to my attention within the next few days:
*The Mountainview International Church, which I will be working with in Madrid, gets their paperwork through at the end of this year to be a registered entity, which means that they can give me a letter of invitation to come to Spain, which I need for a resident visa. Praise the Lord for HIS provision!!! However, this also means that I need to wait until January to arrive in Madrid with the letter of invitation.
*A few of the churches interested in partnering with me financially indicated to me that their new budgets start in January.
*Third, my mom told me she had been praying that God would work it out so that I could be home for Christmas this year. At this point, I was saying “OK, God, loud and clear.”
So, I plan to leave for Madrid in January; tentatively January 10th. The main thing that this changes, other than the departure date, is that I won’t be living off of financial support until December, so the support in my account right now will be saved to cover initial expenses such as a plane ticket, paying my relocation agent, shipping costs, initial household expenses, etc.
One other big development is my association with Mountainview International Church. Since I am still the only current Impact staff headed for Madrid, I need a team of people to work with. While continuing to be on staff with Impact, I will be acting as an “intern” for Mountainview for the first several months I am there. Again, God is awesome. When Troy Cady, their team leader, and I talked about the possibility of my working with them, he mentioned that they have several international students and would like for me to be in charge of that part of ministry. Other than that, I will be taking some courses through the church in leading small groups, studying the Bible, and lifelong leadership; and I will be spending a lot of time on campus getting to know students. (If you want to find out more about Mountainview, you can go to www.mountainview-church.com.) God is so good. He has provided a group of people that I can work and learn with while beginning campus ministry. What an awesome God we serve!
Here are some things you can pray about:
*Pray that my focus will remain completely on God. It’s so easy to let preparations and
ministry cause distractions in our pursuit of HIM, so I ask you to pray that my
focus on HIM and my passion for HIM will grow every day.
*Continue to pray that God will raise up more staff to come work in Madrid.
*Ask for God’s presence at the Universidad Complutense Madrid, and that HE would
draw students to Himself.
*Pray for boldness among the Christians on campus at UCM.
*Ask for God’s continued provision in financial and prayer support.
Thank you all for your support and friendship. I look forward to seeing what God has planned. We serve a God that blows away our expectations over and over!
Praising HIM,
Kelly Wills
A Very Long P.S…..
Some people requested a few more details about what I am doing and how I will get started in Spain, so here is a more comprehensive addition to the Fall 2003 Newsletter.
Mountainview International Church is a non-denominational international church made up primarily of small groups. Their main focus is actually on the small groups and not a large Sunday service, so there is a lot of personal accountability within the group. This is the church I will be working with when I arrive in Spain. My main responsibility with them will be the college age ministry within the church. I will also be helping with the worhship team and spending the rest of the time on campus meeting students. In addition to responsibilities, I will also be getting some Bible study and leadership training through the church. WWW.MOUNTAINVIEW-CHURCH.COM has a lot of information about the church and the Cady family.
The Cady's are the family that I will be staying with when I first arrive in Madrid. Troy is the team leader for the Mountainview Church team, and he and his wife Heather and their two children live on the outskirts of Madrid. Some people within the church are already looking for an apartment for me so I can move into my own place (as close as possible to the university) as soon as possible.
Here are some statistics about Spain:
1) population: approx. 41 million. Madrid is the
capital of Spain, with about 5 million people
2) 94% Roman Catholic
3) less than 1.5% Evangelical Christian
4) Universidad Complutense Madrid--the main University
in Madrid--has 126,000 students—less than 50 are
involved in Christian campus ministry.
One of my methods for starting ministry is to work with college students in the church that are already plugged into the university--moving more activities onto campus to bring other students in. Christian international students can be a big help to starting the ministry. No one relates to a student better than another student.
I also plan to contact the two other campus ministries already in place (Campus Crusade for Christ and University Bible Group). They are both small ministries and could use encouragement. I want to be sure a good relationship is established with them from the beginning.
Another method to get started is just to be on campus meeting people during as much of my free time as possible, making friends. Ministry is often slow with Spaniards--they are friendly on the surface, but it takes a while to establish trust with them to dive into spiritual questions, so frustration with the slowness of ministry is something I have been warned that most missionaries in Spain deal with.
Right now I am in the middle of preparations to leave. My tentative leaving date is mid-January, hopefully around the 10th, but that depends on a couple of things: 1) the dates for Impact’s team leaders’ conference in mid-January, and 2) financial support. I can't go without $2,000 a month raised. Right now (November), I need about $700/month more, and I have a couple of churches getting back to me within the next few weeks about support.
posted by kelly_w at 10:05 AM
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