Survey Day 4

The last few weeks we have been busy with camps and have not been able to continue our survey.  Yesterday, we finally were back at it.  Of the nine homes we visited, only three people came to the door, but each visit was interesting.

The first person we talked to did not actually live at the home.  She was visiting her son, she lives in Delaware.  Even though she did not live there she was able to give some observations that were helpful.  She said that the greatest needs for the community was greater police presence and schools.  When we asked if the church had addressed these needs, she said, “no, I haven’t.  No one knocks on doors.  You are the only ones that I know of.”

Next we talked to John.  John has lived here in Highland Gardens for a long time and had an interesting perspective.  When we asked him what the greatest need in this community was, he said he had a long list.  Education seemed to be at the top.  He said that without education, people make bad choices and have dreams crushed before they are able to be realized.  Tom shared with John the dream God has given us for planting simple house churches here in Highland Gardens.  He said that was good, but he wasn’t sure that we would be successful.  He did not seem to believe that people here can change.

Our most encouraging conversation was our last one of the day with Darrel and Jen.  When we got to the house Jen was sitting in their car.  We began asking her our survey questions.   She said the greatest need in the community is something for the kids, probably the most common need that we hear.  When we asked her if the church has addressed this need, she said, “no, the nearest church doesn’t even enter this community.”  A keen observation that showed us she had an idea of what the church should be doing.  When we asked her if she would attend a church that met this need and was involved in the community, she said yes.  At that point Darrel came out and seemed very interested in our conversation.  Tom began to share with them the dream God has given us for planting churches here in Highland Gardens.  Darrel showed interest in in what we were sharing.  When we asked if they would be interested having a Bible study in their house, they said yes.  

This was a very encouraging conversation on a number of levels.  First, Tom has been praying that this house would be one that would become a church.  Second, Darrel seems to have good relationships with many of the guys here in Highland Gardens, some of whom Tom has met through Sunday night basketball.  Finally, they both were very observant about how the church has not been involved in the community and seemed to understand the need for small reproducible churches.  We would like to continue to follow up with them.  We want to start by developing a friendship with their family.  It is easy to get so excited and jump too quickly into focusing on developing a church.  We need to start with the individual family first, get to know them and really find out whether God is preparing their hearts to serve Him here.

Each time we finish our surveys we are encouraged.  We are hoping to have a barbecue over labor day.  Our desire is to invite families that we have met through doing the survey and begin to get to know them better.