The following was written by Jesse Eisenhour, who was introduced in our last newsletter through his work with a church plant in Whitley County, Indiana. As Jesse describes the groundwork that his team is doing to draw people to the new church, and ultimately to God, may you find fresh, tangible ways to pray for our church plants and those who plant them.
Every week, Garrett and I hit the streets. A while back we went to Larwill, Indiana, and met a family of 4, (soon to be 5). We were able to pray with them and share the gospel. Through talking with them, we found out that the parents had already been saved at one point in time. They had previously attended a church, but in a season of turmoil in their lives, they felt abandoned by the church. They expressed their hurt, pain, and frustration to us, and we were able to minister to them. As usual, we invited them to join us on Wednesday nights, and they said they would join us the following week. And as usual, they didn’t come.
Garrett went out of town on vacation, and I had a crew of people come and hit the streets with me. I kept thinking about revisiting that family in Larwill but was waiting on the Lord’s timing. The first week Garrett was back, we decided to go do a follow-up with all the people we had run into in Larwill.
The family was there, and this time it was a bit more awkward, because you can’t just be like, “Well you said you’d come and you didn’t!” Haha. We told them we just wanted to check and see how they were doing, that we love them, and if they needed anything, to let us know. They told us that their mother-in-law, who lives with them, had shingles, and their one-year-old had chickenpox. We were able to pray for them. That’s where we left it because it was pretty apparent they wanted to get going. So we left.
A little while later I got a text from Jaimie (the wife). She asked if our church had a daily devotional or a reading plan. I was able to refer her to my book, and reviveSCHOOL (which is the reading plan we are using with the church) and also the Bible app YouVersion. She then called and explained to Garrett and me how difficult it is to allow people to help. Garrett encouraged her with a story and explained how necessary it is to allow others to bless you, and we talked about how they will be in a place to help others, too, when they get on their feet and can be a blessing that way.
Jaimie then sent me a list of things they needed. We let her know that we wouldn’t be able to solve all their problems or make all their bills go away, but that we could help with some of the things they needed.
One immediate challenge was to wash everything in their house. Because Jaimie was 9 months pregnant and due any time, they needed to protect her and the new baby from the shingles and chickenpox infections. Her doctor had asked them to do it, but they didn’t have a washing machine or dryer in their home.
The next day she sent a message letting me know that she was out of gas and had spent the last bit of their cash trying to get to the store to get some WIC groceries so their two children could eat. However, the WIC machine at Kroger was down, so they weren’t able to get anything after all. My wife had just headed to the store anyway, so she bought them groceries and dropped them off.
There is a family we are discipling at the church plant that lives in South Whitley, so we reached out to them to see about helping with the laundry situation. They are very VERY new to sharing their faith, praying for people, and doing things for others, but they agreed to help them out and were able to help Jaimie get all her clothes washed by blessing them with resources to have it done at the laundromat.
I then sent out an email to everyone in the church plant and people who are connected, giving them a list of ways to help them out. Wednesday we were able to drop off diapers and wipes, as well as minister to them some more.
The fruit of this:
1. Jaimie and her family have been so blessed that they are telling others about the church plant. They have expressed that after the baby comes, they are open to meeting weekly with Elly (my wife) and/or Ada (Garrett’s wife) for discipleship. She has also asked if Elly would be willing to teach her about parenting!
2. Amy (who helped with the laundry) admitted afterward (I didn’t know she didn’t do stuff like this) that they never ever give cash to help people and rarely do they help people that aren’t family. This had been a real stretch for them.
3. Elly seldom gets to be a part of the church planting process, so she was really blessed to be able to talk with Jaimie and minister to her, as well as get her the groceries and some diapers.
One of the things we are trying to be intentional with is that EVERYONE needs to be meeting WITH SOMEONE. We all need to be pouring into others and have others pouring into us. Even allowing people to tag-team an individual helps them both to grow and be stretched.