We have just been through a wonderful, yet brief season of home visitation at Grace and Peace through our Time 2 Build Campaign. Those who were making the visits as well as those being visited were abundantly blessed as the Church visited the Church. This has been the most successful home visitation effort in the history of our church. We definitely want to see this continue, but on a higher level and hopefully with much more fruit wrought in our midst.

In January 2005, we will have the beginnings of a new Home Visitation thrust at Grace and Peace. Our focus will be on prayer visitation and helping our congregation mature in Christ to World Class Christianity! When we do visitation, we first want to introduce the congregation to our newly developed “Pathway to World Class Christianity.” Our Elders have developed this pathway to help the saints attain to the mature stature that is in Christ. (I only wish this had existed when I received Christ in the 1970’s!) Our December Benchmark highlighted this ‘pathway’ with an article by Pastor Walt. When we make visits, we will be bringing questionnaires to help people assess for themselves where they need to progress in their walk with Christ. By gathering this information, we are better able to plan the educational and discipleship presentations we offer during the calendar year. Our main reason for doing visitation is to offer prayer and encouragement in Christ. We want to pray with folks and help them see the promises of God made manifest in their lives. Prayer, touching the lives of the brethren and demonstrating the love that is in Christ, is our real motivating purpose for our visits. People matter. People are important. Our emphasis is on people, not on programs. Home visitation is one avenue by which the love of Christ can be shown in a real and meaningful way.

The benefits of home visitation are boundless! We expect much fruit and many blessings as a result. If you would like a home visit, please call the church office and leave your name and phone number so we can contact you. We are expecting great things in the days ahead!

-Pastor Ralph Freda, Senior Associate Pastor