Answered Prayer (follow up on today's Twitter/Facebook update)

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Earlier today, I wrote this on Twitter/Facebook: "Today, God answered a prayer I've been praying for 2-3 years! And he answered it big! 3pm mtg. today that I welcome prayer for. More later."


Here's the story:

I have been on Staff at CCF for five and a half years. I have been serving in the role of Lead Pastor for four years and a month. About 3-4 years ago I began to feel the need and desire to know more about our community and context. At the time, I longed to know about our "new" mission field of Greenbelt, Lanham, Seabrook, Glenn Dale, etc. I thought that what I wanted was statistics, numbers, data and demographic information. I now (after today) know that what I actually want is psychograpic information.

Anyway, back to my story. Over the last several years, my desire to know more about this area has just kept increasing. In fact, since returning from my sabbatical I have tried (key word) to do some research on my own, I've asked several different people to do some research for me, and I even twittered it and facebooked it to tell the world about this desire. All of this yielded no results. Nothing.

I have prayed this prayer many times: "Lord, help me to know the people, the needs of the people and the best way to love and reach the people of our neighborhood! Lord, help us to learn of the problems in our neighborhood so that we can be an answer to them. Lord, help us to see what you are already doing in our mission field so that we can join you in it."

OK, so what happened? The Lord answered my prayer today and sent me JUST the person for the job!

Last night, a local friend in ministry (some of you know Ben Rainey) emailed me and introduced me to a man (Scott) who he thought might "help me understand my community in order to better fulfill the great commission"! Turns out, the guy is:
  • A demographer with decades of commercial experience
  • A wealth of information about the Washington-Baltimore Corridor
  • A seminary grad
  • A credentialled minister
  • Knowledgeable about PG County
  • Passionate about Jesus
  • Was open to meet with me immediately
  • Ready and willing to dive in and help us gain all the info we need to be more missional
  • Hungry to use his training and experience for the kingdom of God
  • Loaded with wisdom for ministry
Today, I was in his home LESS than FIVE hours after my first email from him. We met for over 2 hours this afternoon and will be getting back together again soon. God is at work. He is answering prayer. And I am thankful to him tonight for this gift of grace!