IMS Board Meeting Highlights
As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” — Romans 15:10
Last week the city of Boston was host to the board members of the International Mission Society (IMS) as they gathered together for their quarterly meeting. The focus of this meeting was to discuss “Operations” within the board.
The meeting was punctuated by sessions of prayer, led by various board members. This focus of prayer during the meeting was initiated by President Valdur Koha, who reminded us that although there are many things to discuss within a board meeting we need to remember that we represent the interests of God and his kingdom, and his wisdom is always needed.
A key discussion was how the IMS board functions in its responsibilities. Although this unified group of brothers and sisters strives to be effective and efficient its large size poses some challenges. To help solve this challenge Valdur proposed that the Board be divided into Committees or Service teams. These teams would work to solve challenges and propose solutions to the board. The board would then make decisions based on this information.
As part of the agenda, we heard missionary reports from the work in Eastern and Western Europe, New England and the Midwest. In this article I would like to highlight some inspiring stories from some of the countries we represent in Western Europe.
Germany
Scott and Lynne Green have now been in Berlin for nine months and are hard at work learning German and inspiring and motivating the church to greater heights. One of their main areas of focus is the youth ministry. They have launched a new Campus Revival Ministry called “Hammer”. With the support of the IMS, Beam Foundation and the Berlin disciples they have hired five interns for a One Year Challenge. Among those are Simone from Zurich, Matyi and Anna from Budapest/Kiev, David Schneider from Florida (David’s mom helped start the church in Munich) and Christen McDuffee from Boston. With the direction of the Greens, the Berlin disciples are confident that God will take this small ministry of 17 and multiply it.
Of special note, after many months of prayer, our brothers and sisters in Munich celebrated a unique milestone, with the merging of the “traditional church of Christ” and our congregation. God added to the celebration as a woman named Sarah was baptized, followed by her boyfriend Clemens three weeks later.
Geneva, Switzerland
The Geneva church hosted their eighth annual teen and preteen camps for Western Europe. This year 80 teens and 40 preteens enjoyed a full week of incredible bible studies, T-groups (transformation groups) and fun activities. This year the camps celebrated a few firsts:
- All the preteen classes were led by teens
- The teens led almost all the worship
Milan, Italy
The Milan disciples have had a year of transition with their former leaders Joe and Annie Silipo moving the lead the church in Hartford, CT and Jon and Rachel Buchholz assuming the leadership. Despite the transition God continues to work. Over the past five years the teen ministry has grown from one disciple to now 25 young men and women members with half of that number being baptized. These young disciples are excellent ambassadors of Christ and are now beginning to graduate from high school and move on to university studies. As a result there has been an infusion of renewed vision for the campus ministry. Starting with five young zealous disciples the campus ministry has dreams to win their campuses for Christ.
Paris, France
The church in Paris continues to shine under the leadership of John and Carol McGuirk. This past summer the church was host to 20 fired up young disciples from the North River church in Atlanta. The young intern group was led by Thomas and Cortney McGuirk who lead the campus ministry in the North River Church of Christ. Over the course of one month this group saw over 100 different students attend Bible talk and church, 50 Bible studies were done and three people have been baptized who were met during this month. One of those is our new brother Thibault.
Please keep the McHargue family in your prayers as new leaders of the church in Madrid, Spain. In the coming weeks, look for highlights from Eastern Europe, New England and the Midwest.
Shared from International Missions Society.
