OHIO: Forty Anglican Churches Join in Pan-Jurisdictional Church Planting Event

By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org
July 2, 2007

TOLEDO, OH. -- Sixty leaders representing forty churches from a dozen Anglican jurisdictions met here recently to examine new methods of church planting in the U.S. and Canada. Two plenary teachings included African and organic church planting styles.

Meeting under the auspices of the Great Lakes Anglican Network (GLAN) the family of churches met to consider strategies "to win the lost for Christ and to feed His sheep," said Doc Loomis, one of the coordinators for the event. This was the second such annual conference drawing together likeminded congregations from emerging Anglican families as well as from non-aligned sacramental churches and individuals seeking to do God's work.


"This work is being accomplished through regular regional networking meetings, and by providing assistance in church-planting, leadership development, and legal resourcing, as we face a diminishing Episcopal Church driven by a different concept of mission. We came together for fellowship, instruction, and for mutual support," Loomis told VOL.

The Network of churches, which includes the Anglican Mission in the Americas (AMiA) and the Heart of North America Network in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, Ontario, and Quebec, all came together for the second annual conference of the pan-jurisdictional Great Lakes Anglican Network. Also present were representative clergy and seminarians from The Anglican Episcopal Church of Bolivia, The Charismatic Episcopal Church, The Apostles Anglican Church, The Great Lakes Fellowship, The Anglican Church of Kenya, The Anglican Coalition in Canada, The Episcopal Church of Rwanda, The United Methodist Church, The International Communion of Charismatic Episcopal Churches, Trinity School for Ministry, and other Great Lakes area regional ministries.

With 40 churches at this church-planting and discipleship training event, co-chair Roger Ames said it was a magnificent place to see the body of Christ in all of its variety of learning and ministering to a common cause.

InJesus co-founder and AMiA Winter Conference presenter David Moore and the President of InJesus Global Missions, The Rev. Dr. Clark Miller, directed sessions focused on church planting. "Their teachings brought into sharp focus the desperate need to plant churches and to effectively disciple those whom God gives us not only in Africa where InJesus ministers, but especially in this country," said Ames. InJesus is currently developing discipleship training schools in over 20 countries in Africa, Asia, and Europe."

How to plant a church teaching came from Chicagoan Mike Niebauer, who witnessed his work as a Lay Catechist by planting a mission on the campus of Illinois Northwestern University. He is also a member of the AMiA Church of the Redeemer Family of Churches in Chicago. He spotlighted the need for campus ministry and the role of the Lay Catechist as a church planter.

Conference moderator Joe Boysel was ordained to the Diaconate by the Rt. Rev. Thaddeus Barnum of the AMiA to serve Chillicothe Anglican Fellowship in Ohio. At the same service, The Rev. Ken Bieber was received as Presbyter in the AMiA serving as an Associate at Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Hudson, OH.

"Bishop Barnum brought the Word of God with special authority and power in a message of confession for our sin of division," said Ames.

Loomis said he was especially encouraged with the denominational diversity and the number of new relationships formed during the two-day conference. "The re-emerging church in America must be a healthy, growing church dedicated to the Gospel, committed to the lost, and willing to put long-held divisions behind us for the sake of this greater purpose. That is what God is asking us to do, and we are making ourselves ready for the harvest by pulling our boats alongside one another and putting our hands to the nets," summarized Loomis. "We are excited to pull together in our ministry to the lost."

More information about GLAN is available at http://www.hudsonanglican.com/hoan/HOAN.html