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Calgary Mosaic church – New on the Block (6/7/2009)

Calgary Mosaic Church held its first service on Easter Sunday and the core group rejoiced as their prayer for 100 people was answered when even more than that number walked through their doors.

Rev Johnson Charles had been out of formal pastoral ministry for 18 months and had begun to think that perhaps his many years of pastoral work were at an end and the Lord had other avenues of Christian ministry for him to pursue. Not so. While gone from ministry in a church, he was still active hosting a multi-cultural Christian television program that airs in Calgary and area on a weekly basis. He also had continuing involvement with people with needs and spent time counselling individuals and families. In the midst of this the Lord began to lay the dream of a church plant on his mind. As he prayed and considered this, his mentors and praying friends confirmed the concept. He knew he had many contacts – many people without a church home, or unsettled. He had a database with many e-mail contacts, and it was also possible to use his own television program to invite people to come.

The new church is multicultural and people from several nationalities are meeting together to worship in the English-speaking service held in a rented Church facility in the Northeast. It is a congregation of families and they are training and encouraging one another and looking to be an effective outreach in their area of Calgary.

Each week they hold a pot luck lunch as they have found this is very well received in the ethnic communities as it breaks down cultural barriers and encourages friendship and trust (to the heart through the stomach!).

Calgary Mosaic wants to be intentionally a church of the community. It is not just a church for the believers. A look at their website, www.calgarymosaic.com reinforces this as they offer weddings and funerals for those without a church who are looking for this help. Pastor Charles sees this as an excellent way to serve and make an initial connection with families that God can use as He will.

“God is doing some phenomenal things these days,” says Pastor Charles. Recently, in conjunction with global day of prayer on a Saturday, leaders from the church took an intentional trip through the NE quadrant of city, spending three hours, driving up and down the streets praying in the neighborhoods for families and the Lord’s work in their lives. They prayed how ever they felt led for the needs of particular communities. On Sunday, after the service, just as they were packing up, one of them opened the main door and startled three people who were just about to check the door to see if the church was open. These were non-Christians but they had come because one of them had a dream saying they should go to a church to pray. The first church they tried was locked. On the way to their next choice they saw Calgary Mosaic and decided to see if it was open. The pastor had the opportunity to spend an hour with them, getting to know them, hearing their story. He called someone else from the church, of the same nationality as the visitors and together they talked some more, exchanged phone numbers, prayed for them and left with the intent of more contact. You can imagine how this encouraged those on the prayer trip the day before!

Pastor Charles and the core group have a goal of receiving 20 new believers in the church in one year and have a solid fourfold strategy in place involving prayer, preparation, preaching and practicing what is preached.

And as they go about following the Lord it is their strong intention to seize the opportunities the Lord brings their way.

Click this link to view a slide show of Calgary Mosaic’s inauguration service

Please pray for this new associate congregation of the Evangelical Missionary Church of Canada.

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