Hi Friends,

We’ve had a beautiful week weather-wise and I’m hoping to take Pam to one of our favorite places Saturday, Longwood Gardens—somewhere we’ve not been since Christmas. And, because they’re just so darn cute and growing fast, I’ve included a recent pic of the grandkids above.

Here’s a few highlights from our latest:

Personal: We’re grateful that we’re on the other side of our vaccinations, that the numbers keep going down, and that we’re all starting to get back to “normal.” It was a joy to see my mom in FL April 22-27and visit safely. She was feeling well enough to fully enjoy our visit and had enough strength to walk 1-2 miles every day. Again, I so appreciate your ongoing prayers for her as she undergoes chemo.

Care Net: Things have been very busy with Care Net since the beginning of the year. Lots of exciting things but they are all time-consuming, especially to get off the ground. We are doing a lot of innovative things to engage fathers in pregnancy center ministry, as well as connect them with local church discipleship. Additionally, we’re planning a Pro-life men’s conference (NOT political but focused on practical ministry) in Dallas for the Spring of 2022. We’re also in the process of updating Making Life Disciples (MLD), our signature program for churches, and hope to have MLD 2.0 ready by August.

Writing: I just finished a booklet on Baptism and Its Significance. It’s available on Amazon and I will be using it for discipleship with a few individuals this summer. Also, after finishing updates to How I Became a Christian Despite the Church, I’m working steadily on a book on fatherhood that I hope will be available by the Fall. Many of the blogs I’ve done in recent months are related to this project.

Church Plant:

Recently, these two quotes have been influencing our prayers and interactions with others:

• “May a merciful God preserve me from a Christian Church in which everyone is ‘good.’ I want to be in a church of the fainthearted, the failed, the feeble and the ailing… who believe in the forgiveness of sins.” – Martin Luther
• “What kind of church would we become if we simply allowed broken people to gather, and did not try to ‘fix’ them but simply to love and behold them, contemplating the shapes that broken pieces can inspire?” — Makoto Fujimura, Art and Faith: A Theology of Making

And, as a reminder, here are our priorities for 2021 with updates (I’ve bolded the ones we’re currently focused on):

• Continue prayer, leadership development, one-on-one mentoring, and small groups
  • Our core group (6 adults and 5 children) are now meeting live for a meal & devotional once a month. The adults have been meeting weekly for the last several months over Zoom but now we’re all vaccinated. We have found ourselves ministering to several broken individuals and families.
  • My goal over the summer and in prep for a new “phase” in Sept. is to have our core group prioritize three things:
    • strong marriages
    • weekly habits of meeting for worship 
    • getting to know and loving each other’s families well
  • We’re continuing to get-to-know and identify ways to reach out to our neighbors; however, I’ve continually emphasized the three priorities above so we’ll have integrity in what we are inviting others into. 
  • I continue to meet bi-weekly with one gentleman for discipleship, another for weekly prayer, as well as lead a weekly “Constructive Conversations” group with some millennial guys.
• Have a retreat in March for our key partners- Done
• Choose name for the church
  • We now have a geographic name for the church, Mantua Creek (more on that in coming days), and I’m in the process of meeting with the EPC’s consultant regarding the details of the legal startup and articles of incorporation, as well as securing an attorney to help with those details.
• Populate a church website with content and make useable for sharing with friends
  • I will be meeting with a web developer this month to start working on a church website that will interface to the carpentertheologian.com site.
• Take our core group through Christianity Explored so we’re equipped to do this in our neighborhoods- we hope to start this in June
• Identify 2-3 tangible ways to connect to students at Rowan University- in process
• Launch a simple weekly digital “Sunday” service by January 2022
  • As you may remember, we are preparing for a model that prioritizes the digital first in 2022 and then adds physical expressions in 2023. 
  • If you’d like to begin giving to this work, you can do so here. This particular fund is restricted and managed by our “Mother Church,” Ashland EPC, and will not be accessed until we begin weekly physical gatherings.

Thank you so much for caring about our ministry efforts and praying!!! And please drop me a note about how you’re doing-especially if you have not done so in a while. It means a lot to hear from you.

In His Love,

Greg