Seeds, plants and trees
At the start of the COURAGE conference recently, Maurice Nightingale shared something of the vision we feel God has given us for the 50 nations of mainland Europe.
It's not enough just to make converts, or even to make disciples - God is in the business of making whole families of believers that can spread out and be fruitful across the earth.
To illustrate the phases of this journey, Maurice gave 50 people from the audience plant pots and lined them up along the front of the stage. Some pots contained plants - they represented nations where we already have an established presence. The larger plants represented nations with more than one RM church, the smaller ones just one church. In these countries, our desire is to multiply that presence and establish a network of churches that also raises up national believers gifted in all the Ephesians 4 ministries - prophets, teachers, evangelists and so on.
The pots without plants represented the remaining 40 nations, where we currently only have the earliest seeds of exploration and interest, or no presence at all.
God has told us that one day we will have a presence in every one of these 50 nations. This isn't only our responsibility, and we are far from the only believers working across this continent, but we want to play our part in the mission of God to these nations. And each of us has a role to play. You may be called to move to another nation and begin investing in a community there with a view to building a gospel plant or church plant in it. You may be called to spend part of your annual leave with a plant somewhere supporting it and encouraging the leaders and members of the plant. You may be called to invest time in dedicated prayer, or to invest financially in supporting a pioneering work.
What is God calling you to do in response to this vision? What is the part you have to play in the mission of God to the continent of Europe? If you are already doing it, may God give you the courage and strength to continue. If you already have a sense from God of what he is calling you to, may you have the courage to listen to his voice and follow wherever it leads. If you think you have no part to play - either in going to the nations, or supporting or praying for those who are called to go, may God give you the courage to listen for his promptings and to do whatever he tells you.
Watch Maurice's message (starts at 1hr 14 on this livestream video), and ask God to speak to you about how he wants to use you in his purposes for Europe.
Next steps
If you know God is calling you to go, sign up for our 'Called to go' weekend this September. All the details are on the events page of the website.
