From day one at The Refuge, our hope in restoring relationships with God is that people would not just come to church, but that we would be the church. Our connectivity to the Head of the body, Jesus Christ, is not only necessary, but is a priority for us to be His church. And for His followers, that means that we do more than show up to church on occasion, but that we find our niche and do our part to see that others have an opportunity to encounter God’s Love and desire a relationship with Him as well. We have been working hard to launch new teams 
as the church grows that will enable us to do our best work possible. And God has been more than faithful in sending us people to work in His field.
When we found out we would be losing our worship leader, Craig Archer, back in December, we did not panic. And God blessed us with Betsy Lawrence to take another step forward and to lead the team. Betsy came to opening Sunday back in December of 2015 and has been with us ever since. The greatest part of Betsy’s leadership is the inclusion of team devotions before practices, and she has done a great job of utilizing more of her team to carry the load. It truly is a team effort!
In the same vein, we launched our Prayer team in February, and Lauren Worley has agreed to lead the team. Lauren and her husband Josh have been with us since Megan and I moved to Eudora. Lauren’s heart to see the lost get found in Christ, accompanied by her devotion to pray and seek God made her a great candidate for the role, and we are blessed to have her leadership on the prayer team.
The prayer team was a piece we had to make a priority to add. We knew that if we were going to engage the spiritual battles ahead, we needed to fuel the Refuge with more prayer and submission to God and His will. Lauren gave the majority of our sermon covering Jesus’ prayer in John 17. He prayed for unity. This is exactly what Lauren was able to experience on a recent Mission’s trip to Nicaragua.
Lauren shared that 35 individuals traveled to Nicaragua from varying denominational backgrounds, with one women who had never made a faith decision. These servants of the gospel shelved their differences in church tradition in order to share Jesus openly. Through this united prayer and united effort, even the lady who had never made a faith decision, made the commitment to begin reading her Bible. Lauren spoke to how it opened her eyes to Jesus’ prayer for unity in His body through the John 17 prayer. The prayer team meets on Sunday mornings to pray for eternal things, especially the salvation of souls before our worship services on Sundays. When we express a need, God continues to fill it. So we continue to pray, “God, send out workers into Your harvest field,” and we continue to invite people to come looking for the ones who will respond, “Here am I, send me.”