Stephen & Tyler Meeting with Arlington City Pastor

Meeting with John for the first time in 5 years was such a blessing. (Mosaic had asked to rent space from IBCA during the pandemic, but it didn’t work out). The meeting with Tyler and John had gone great, and now the 3 of us would come together to learn more about our churches and to pray. 

And I was hoping to work out a potential rental agreement. 

But God had other plans. 

As we talked about life, family, ministry, churches, our city, and other things, the vision of Crossroads and Mosaic coming together as a potential merger/replant was shared extensively. I was thinking John just wanted to know the “in’s and out’s” of all we had going on, so he could be in know of who was coming onto his campus. 

But then out of Left Field, John asked us if we would consider IBCA as a potential 3rd church in this conversation. 

My mind immediately raced to Ephesians 4, and a conversation I had with my prayer mentor, Clyde Hodson. We were discussing how weak I saw Mosaic in as it pertained to the gift of evangelism, and what I could do as a pastor to strengthen us in that area. “Besides prayer, Stephen, you need to share your faith, and pray God would send you evangelists.” And sitting here to my right was a man who loved Jesus and loved to shared his faith, and has led a church in sharing their faith with our city. They have a host of evangelists!

I wanted to jump out of my seat and say “John, let’s do it! Today!!” But that’s my flesh speaking, I know. 

Thankfully Tyler is here to keep us calm, and he led us in a way to ask some healthy questions. ;-) 

Then I asked John about his polity. (Crossroads and Mosaic are both led by elders, but IBCA is a Congregational led church) In my mind, this would be the biggest hurdle for John to “jump” in the coming days as he discussed this potential opportunity with his leadership team. The other things (our heart for Jesus, our heart for the Gospel, our heart for the World) all aligned. And the fact all three churches were sponsored by the Southern Baptist Convention was a blessing.
It seemed the LORD was bringing some churches together who were weaker in some areas, other churches who were stronger, and vice versa. 

This truly was beginning to shape up a “God size work” and it was getting harder and harder to NOT see his hand of providence in it. 

But John cautioned us to remain confidential in our discussions of his interest. He had many leaders he had to discuss this with and it would take a few weeks. We committed to keep this between the 3 of us (and our wives). We did get his permission to allow our intercessors a chance to begin to pray for him and his church (as long as we didn’t reveal his identity, just yet). 

Just when you think you are coming to a meeting to discuss renting a building, God smiles on you and brings you a potential Gospel partner.

He’s funny, like that, isn’t he? 

-Stephen Hammond