The importance of not knowing

A few years back I spoke to some people that were going to move to a new city to plant a church. They were excited and told me that they had a whole wall full of the planning for this plant, the various stages, checkpoints and so on. A year later they told me that almost nothing in their plan had worked. I could identify with that, because exactly the same thing had happened to me: good plan according to the latest book, and no luck in seeing it realised.

I have come to believe that it can be quite dangerous entering a situation thinking that you know how it should be. Because that very conviction can blind us to the new realities, new opportunities and to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. Having the attitude of "I don't know yet" instead forces us to be curious, open and vulnerable, a great place to be if you want to hear from God.

Of course we should not just blunder in without thinking ahead, when we do that we will just do what we've always done, not being open at all. And in some cultures you really need to sit down and think ahead to avoid being fooled by tradition. But at least the western world thinking really likes planning, and tries to master the world through it.

We're in the immersion stage at the moment (yes we are in a stage :-) Which means that we are getting to know, asking questions, being curious, praying prophetically, listening with all kinds of ears that we have. And I am trying very hard to hold fast to this: We don't know yet how God wants to do things.

Welcome to the blog "2½ years"! 

Behind this maybe a bit cryptic name  is a very down to earth situation. We are working as missionaries in Paraguay and have just entered into a new work situation.

In a small town north of Asuncion the Baptist convention we are working with used to have a church. Well, in fact they do still have the church, plus the old church hall and a pastors house, but they don't have a congregation any more. During the last years a faithful few have been keeping up the work until there was only literally a handful left.

Enter us. Our challenge is to restart, resuscitate, plant again or however we can put it, this church. But not only that, there is some special circumstances that gives this challenge an edge.

One. We know when we're leaving. Most pastors don't know that when they enter a new place. We will leave Paraguay in 2½ years, due to our contract and Swedish laws (i.e.. we don't plan to emigrate)

Two. We don't know if there will come anyone after us. The convention suffers from a lack of pastors and workers. Perhaps there will come someone after us, perhaps there will be someone local who can take over with some financial support, or perhaps there will be none.

So this is the challenge:

Build up a church which can be self-sustaining in 2½ years. 

And in this blog I would like to write about the thinking behind this work. It will not be a more traditional missionary blog with photos and regular reports, but reflections, discussions and materials as the work progresses. This blog has a sister in Spanish, which is kind of cheeky as I only speak Spanish since 1½ years, but I would like to share with my Paraguayan friends as well.

So welcome! Feel very free to comment and question, that what this blog is all about and hope that you would like to share a part of this journey!