Originally posted March 24, 2010. Reposted April 11, 2011.
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My most profound mission experience was planting a church in Santa Fe, NM as a missionary with the North American Mission Board. Santa Fe was one of the best and worst experiences of my life. My wife and I moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico in July of 2000 when Stacey was 7 months pregnant. We went to plant a church with big dreams and high hopes. We started with a Bible study in our home and 6 people. Soon we were 8 because we had our baby and another couple in the group had their first child as well.
Before long we developed a core group and launched our weekend services. We averaged about 40 people per week for our first few months. When we left Santa Fe in June of 2004 we were averaging around 80 people in attendance per week. These numbers were greatly discouraging to me because I had been on staff in much larger churches where the youth groups I led were larger than the young church I’d just planted.
God used Santa Fe to teach me more than I can possibly articulate in this short summary. One of the biggest lessons was about faith. I had to learn to trust God completely. There were times when we did not know if the church could pay our salary. When the socially liberal people of Santa Fe would insult and assault our way of life and ministry, I had to trust God for His approval rather than seeking it from others. I learned to truly rejoice in the lives who were changed! I’ll never forget the names, faces and stories behind every salvation and baptism in our little Santa Fe church. Those people will forever be precious to me!
I learned what it takes to preach week in and week out. I learned why it’s important for a pastor to take breaks! One year I preached 50 of 52 weekends and that was too much! I learned how to love people as they are while loving them too much to leave them that way. We frequently had homosexuals, lesbians, Jews, agnostics, and skeptics come to our church and I became their friends. Some were saved and changed while others rejected our message. However, to this day we still have friendships with several of these unbelieving people in Santa Fe and pray that God will use us to reach them with the message of Christ.
I learned what it means to let go. My wife and I felt God calling us back to Oklahoma City when her mother was diagnosed with stage 4 lung and liver cancer, but it took us 8 months to make the move. I was afraid of letting our young church go. I feared what would happen if I left. Much of my salary came from the organizations that helped plant the church. I knew that in leaving, the church would lose that income and would not be able to afford another full-time pastor. It was hard to let go, but eventually I did. We moved back to Oklahoma City to care for Stacey’s dying mother. One of our elders, Curtis Young, became the next pastor of the church, but eventually the fledgling church closed its doors.
Santa Fe was without question the most difficult ministry experience I’ve ever had. The joys were many but the difficulties were more. I learned how NOT to plant a church and left Santa Fe spiritually and emotionally exhausted. Although it was hard, I would not trade my time there for anything.
Does anybody know where Curtis Young is?
Sure. I can get you in touch with him. He’s planting a church in Kansas. Send me your name, contact info, and reason for contacting Curtis via my contact page on this site and I’ll send it on to Curtis.
Thanks for sharing, Alan. It reminds me of my first ministry assignment in Africa. It was very hard. It was one of those experiencing that was worth a million dollars and that I would not want to give a nickel to repeat. God seemed working more in me than through me, a very important step at that point in my life.