To All our Friends and Sponsors

– A Few Headlines From Winter Quarter 2010 –

We’re thankful for an opportunity to bring this update as we begin the fifth year of our work. The first three months of 2010 have brought a boost of encouragement! Here are a few recent headlines:

– We’re meeting greater numbers of people who hunger to be intentional disciples of Jesus Christ; they seek involvement in practical / hands-on ways of making disciples of others! Example: A 56 year old brother in Christ recently said this to me, “I’ve been attending church all my life, but something is missing. No one ever discipled me. I want more.” Our particular niche’ is to help this brother (and others like him) grow in Christ and equip him to reach others who will, in turn, also become disciple makers.

– Men like Christopher Brown get it! We met Chris two years ago shortly after he professed Christ and was baptized. He understood his conversion as the beginning of a process with the life-time goal of living as an intentional disciple of Christ. He was hungry for someone to come along-side to mentor and help him mature. Jeff McKeand, a brother who has been a part of our work since its early days, filled the role of discipling Chris and has been meeting with him since 2008. Chris writes encouragement notes to brothers in his discipling group on a regular basis. He’s passionate about maturing as a Christ-follower, and he already wants to encourage and help others grow. Chris will be married in April. He’s taken a job with Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama. I have no doubt God will use him to be a multiplying disciple maker wherever he goes.

– Four more discipling / equipping groups have formed since January, including our first group for “older” adult men.

– February’s Winter Retreat at Whispering Pines provided a time of encouragement and further training for twenty-three of our leaders and disciplers. Steve Grubbs, from Tullahoma, and Nick Horton served as resource teachers. The couples discipling group took care of meal preparation for the weekend, while other members helped lead devotionals and break-out discussions.

– Timothy Network was recently awarded a generous grant by the Betenbough Charitable Foundation (Lubbock, TX). We are extremely encouraged and thankful for this new partnership! Although the Betenbough Company is known as a major home-builder in west Texas, their co-mission is to help fund evangelistic and other ministry projects. My February visit with them was a refreshing time!

– A new discipling group is scheduled to begin on March 31 with five men at Greenhouse Ministries. We’re thrilled and look forward to teaming with Cliff and Jane Sharp in the multi-faceted outreach work they’ve been doing for the past several years.

– Nick Horton and I are now completing a year-long series entitled “The Disciple Making Church” (four quarterly installents with different age groups) at the North Boulevard congregation. Sessions have focused on intentional discipleship and practical ways Christians can be involved in disciple making. It’s been a good tie-in with our work.

– John King (Board President of Timothy Network and minister at Stones River) recently completed a mini-series on “The Three Column Bible Study” with a cross-section of Timothy Network people. John has traveled to Sierra Leone and more recently to China in teaching these same principles of evangelistic Bible study to mission workers. He also serves as a stateside leader / trainer for C.P.M. (a church planting organization). We hope to have John help us in this capacity on a regular basis.

We remain indebted and thankful for your continuing prayers, gifts and words of encouragement. Thank you.

Persevere!

Mike