Tonight at our worship gathering at Vintage Faith Church, we celebrated our 2nd birthday. It has been 2 years since we launched and we spend some time tonight looking back on what God has been doing and then spent time looking ahead. My part of the night was the looking back part and reminded everyone of why we birthed Vintage Faith Church. I taught that the first words we see Jesus speaking to His disciples were about the mission he was sending them on (Matthew 4:19). The very last words we see Jesus speaking to His disciples about before He ascended to heaven was about the mission He was sending them on (Acts 1:8). I spoke about VFC being birthed for this mission.
During the time we looked back - I brought up Molly and John. They both began being part of the church community after we started it - and they have put faith in Jesus this past year. Molly prayed one night almost a year ago to trust in Jesus in one of our worship gatherings. John actually placed faith in Jesus at one of our prayer meetings. They each shared some of their story which is always amazing to me how God moves and works with drawing people to Him. After they were done sharing, we did kind of a silly, but fun thing.
We had a little cupcake with a "2" candle in it. I asked Molly to light the candle - and then I prayed and thanked God for the past two years and that He will multiply the stories of people like John and Moly. John then blew out the candle.
As I was standing there with them, I found it very fitting that it was people like Molly and John who did the lighting and blowing out of the candle. In many ways, we started the church for them - and I found it rather a beautiful symbol of them being the ones ushering us into year 3 for us a church.
We have quite a crazy year ahead, as we launch a new morning worship gathering and move everything over to the First Presbyterian church in the next few months...... But it was a sweet evening at least for me with that candle lighting part. Probably everyone else thought it was dumb, but it was meaningful for me. I am now home thinking of the night - the faces of Molly and John and the candle are what I am remembering. I am wondering what new faces and people we don't even know yet, will be there lighting the candle for year 3.........
