Time is going so fast.

It has been a busy month for us as a family. Allison turned six on the sixth; Tracy and I celebrated our eight year anniversary on the eighth; Tracy celebrated her birthday on the seventeenth and of course there was father’s day in there as well. Yes, we even had time to help another couple from Arizona get settled in here, have a Launch Team service and Launch Team training, and to conduct a survey of our community.

I am encouraged as our Launch Team continues to grow. We have twenty-five adults and five kids committed to Portico Church. Through relationships that the team have with co-workers we have another twenty-five people who have said they will attend the Launch of the church. Also, on the eleventh of July we will have our first Baptism of our young church.

On June 12th we went door-to-door in Northeast Portland and conducted a survey and gave away gardening tools. Fiskars donated 800 pieces of gardening tools for us to hand out to our community (they love gardening). We also asked a few questions about the felt needs of the community. It was a very eyeopening experience for the team. Many people were standoffish with the survey and a few people were even angry at us for bringing “religion” to their door, but the vast majority of people were blown away that a church would give them a free gift, no strings attached. We checked our website over the next few days, there were almost two hundred more hits.

Our Sunday services start in six weeks. We’ve been slowed down in the process of receiving our matching funds. As it stands, we may not receive them in time to get our sound equipment by our first Sunday service. I’m thinking the same thing, that is a problem. Please keep that in prayer. We’d also ask you to continue to pray that God breaks up the fallow ground of NE Portland so that we can plant in good soil. Pray that we raise enough money to pay for our lease for the first year. Also, pray that God continues to bring people to Portico Church. Please continue to pray for us also for strength & wisdom & finances. Thank you.

As always, thank you for all of your support. Keep in mind that our public launch is September 19th. If you were able to attend we’d be greatly honored.