Elder Update

GENERAL MINISTRY UPDATE

• We have entered another fall ministry season and are thankful to God for His continued provision for our 22nd year.
• We never would have thought 22 years ago, of all that God has done in His church, so all the praise and glory go to Him.
• As Philippians 4:4 says, we are to “rejoice in the Lord always; again, I will say, rejoice!” So, we rejoice in the Lord even in this season of the continuing pandemic.
• We rejoice with all that God is doing, both in our Sunday services and our mid-week ministries, as we seek to fulfill the Great Commission mission!

Pandemic Update:

• Many of you have asked what our current maximum capacity restriction is. The answer is that there is no hard number for our capacity limit. The wording of the restriction on religious service capacity is “indoor and outdoor capacity limited to permit physical distancing of 2 metres”.
• So, we can fit as many as we can get in, with physical distancing. We don’t have assigned seating each week, and we don’t know how many groups will come, which impacts our capacity – the more groups that can sit together, the more people we can get in.
• Our registration numbers are based on an estimate of how many we can get in with physical distancing.
• So, we would ask you to continue registering before attending, sit with people who are in your “social bubble”, and please continue to wear your mask as long as you are inside the building.
• We are starting to sense more of a return to normal, so please be praying with us that this would continue through the new year.
• We would urge you through this season to think according to Acts 20:24, “But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”

The 5G Life:

• We kicked off our fall ministry with the introduction of “The 5G Life”. A Christ follower Abides (God Time), Connects (Gather Time, Group Time), and Shares (Give Time, Go Time).
• We are excited not just about this Sunday sermon series, but about how we hope and pray “The 5G Life” will permeate all our ministries and everything we do.
• We urge all of you to live “The 5G Life” – be a true follower of Christ!
• We are looking forward to our mixed small groups starting back in January, but there are plenty of other opportunities to connect in Group time before then through various other ministries; or, just reach out to someone!

SOUL CARE UPDATE

• Over the past few years, we have been planning and working on starting a Soul Care ministry in our church.
• This started with some introductory training in February of 2019 with Ken Gentzler. 
• We had approximately 180 people attend this training, and from that, a group of about 50 continued with Phase 1/introductory training to Biblical Counselling.
• Many completed Phase 1, and about a dozen from that group have continued to pursue full certification with ACBC (Association of Certified Biblical Counselors). 
• That brings us to today. We currently have three people in our church who are fully certified with ACBC as biblical counsellors. There are 3-4 more who are in the final phase of certification, which involves supervised counselling under the direction of an ACBC “fellow”. Then we have a few more who are in the process or writing their exams, and even more still in the training phase.  
• We have been receiving many requests for biblical counselling – so many that we cannot keep up with our current counsellors, so have had to put some on a waiting list for a few weeks until we have space.
• We are excited that this ministry is growing so quickly, but there is much to figure out, so please be patient with us. We hope that within a year we will have a fully functioning Biblical Soul Care ministry, but until that time, availability of counsellors may be sparse.  
• Our vision is to have the Soul Care ministry integrated into all other ministries of the church, as biblical counselling is just providing focused, one-on-one discipleship for a season of more intense trials or suffering.

FACILITY UPDATE

• We are excited to announce that plans are underway to have a new, larger lobby for gathering!
• Over the past few years, we have been looking at and praying about what our most pressing needs are with our facility. We had determined that the most crucial areas of need for our facility are: 1) A bigger lobby/gathering space, 2) More classrooms, and 3) More office space.
• We have been through a few ideas and plan revisions, including at one point, looking at converting the gym to two levels of classrooms. However, this option is very costly.
• Instead, we have decided to purchase a portable to place in our parking lot and move our Market out to that location. We will then open up the lower level by the back doors – removing the Market and three classrooms, each side of the back door, and convert that space into an open lobby.
• This will satisfy our need for a larger lobby, and to adjust for the loss of the three classrooms, we are looking at purchasing portable/dividing walls for our two largest classrooms (103 and 104).
• In addition, we have been working on soundproofing our gym so it too can be used as classroom space on Sundays while the service is going on upstairs.  
• We are expecting that the portable will be delivered sometime in the next few weeks, so you may see it in our parking lot. We need to do a bit of clean up in the portable and build an access ramp, as well as run hydro out to it. 
• The next step inside is to have an asbestos abatement done in our lower level where the new lobby will be. We are expecting this work to take place sometime mid-fall.
• We have savings from the sale of our property a few years ago that we can use to finance these facility projects.

FINANCIAL UPDATE

• Our current YTD giving is approximately $90,000 behind our YTD budget.
• While it is not abnormal to be behind in our budgeted giving at this time of the year, this is a significant shortfall.
• We normally play “catch up” in December, as December is historically our highest giving month of the year.
• God is always good, always kind, and always faithful, so we are trusting Him in all of this.
• Please continue with your “Give time” – putting God first in all areas of your life.
• Copies of our audited financial statements are available at the Welcome Desk for anyone who would like one.

CHURCH PLANTING UPDATE

Red Deer, Alberta

• The Red Deer church plant had a great summer going through the Psalms, with new families coming each week – current attendance is just over 100!  
• Please be praying for a Worship Leader and Youth Leader for this young, but growing congregation.
• The Planting Pastor, Chris Girvan, is working with some men to do some elder training.
• In addition, small groups are starting this fall.
• The church does not yet have a place to meet on Sunday mornings, so please be praying that God would provide a location that would fit their ministry needs.

Sibiu, Romania

• God is at work in Romania! The Sibiu church plant has continued to show steady growth, even in this pandemic.
• The Planting Pastor, Betuel, and his wife Sanda have been living with Betuel’s parents for many years. This has made it difficult for them to show hospitality to their growing congregation. 
• They own a small property to build a home, but their finances have not allowed them to complete the build.
• They were recently able to complete the shell of the home and are hoping to get the roof on before the cold weather comes.
• Please be praying that God would provide the means for Betuel and Sanda to be able to finish their home and move in as well as for continued health for the church.  

Belize

• The pandemic has hit Belize hard, including the area where this church plant is located.
• They have been locked down, unable to have services since mid-August. Thankfully, those in their congregation who had COVID-19 were able to recover, but they are still under very strict restrictions, including the closure of churches and a 7:00pm curfew.
• The church and Pedro Reyes, the Planting Pastor, are still encouraging one another through various technology, but it has been a difficult time for this church plant.
• Prior to the current lockdown, there was a lot of encouraging activity at the church, with child dedications, Evangelism classes, and baptisms. There is a strong desire with their people to be able to start meeting again.
• Also, prior to the lockdown, the church was able to run a Vacation Bible School (VBS) program with the children, with the theme being “The Fruit of the Spirit”. The VBS was a great success, and the kids were able to do a presentation/graduation to their parents on the Sunday.
• The Youth ministry has also been growing with over 20 youth attending prior to the lockdown.
• Please be praying that restrictions would soon ease up in Belize, allowing this young church to meet in person once again.

MINISTRY UPDATE

• First, we want to give all glory to God for His sustaining power and presence through not only the last 16 months, but the last 21 years as a church. God is faithful. God is good. God is kind.
• At the time of writing this update, Ontario is currently in Step 1 of the re-opening plan. Step 1 allows for indoor worship services at 15% of room capacity, so we have been having indoor worship services under these restrictions. It has been wonderful to see so many of you back at church!
• It looks promising that by July 2, Ontario will move into Step 2, which allows for larger indoor worship services, but still with a reduced capacity. We are looking forward to being able to take another step towards normalcy.
• Under Step 3 of the re-opening plan, the overarching strategy, according to the government website, is to “expand indoors where face coverings can’t always be worn”. The restrictions under Step 3 are vague, so we are unsure at this point what this will look like, but if things continue progressing as they are, we would be in Step 3 by late July.
• Our hope and prayer is that we can have a kick-off in September that is somewhat “normal”, including all our mid-week ministries. Please join with us in praying to this end, but that God would be glorified in our response to whatever restrictions lie ahead.

STAFF UPDATE

Staff Send Offs

• As we announced earlier this year, Jake and Danielle Van Gelderen have been working hard with us and with their sending organization, Pioneers, to raise the needed support to head off to mission field training in August.
• We are thrilled to report that Jake and Danielle have reached their fundraising goal, so they will be proceeding with their training and departing London in August. This will be an intensive 11-month training course in another country, providing rigorous and in-depth preparation for their planned mission work after successful completion of their training, Lord willing. 
• We join them in giving thanks to God for the generous and needed financial support for this year of training, from family and friends and our wonderful church family.  
• This means Danielle will be leaving her staff role with us as Receptionist/Administrative Assistant. Please join with us in wishing Jake and Danielle all God’s best as they prepare to leave for this training.
• We also wanted to update you that our Kids Ministry Assistant, Julie Hunsberger, transitioned off our staff, discerning that God was leading her in this direction, so she resigned as of June 11th. 
• Julie has been part-time on our staff team since 2017 and has done a wonderful job supporting our Kids Ministry in countless ways, for which we are truly grateful. Julie and her husband Jay and their kids will continue being an active part of our church, and this is just a transition off staff for Julie. Please join us in thanking Julie for her many contributions over the past four years.

Welcome Aboard!

• We are thrilled to welcome Raquel Meza to our staff team. Raquel will be starting on July 19 in the role of Ministry Support.
• This is a new role on staff, and Raquel will be working to support our ministry leaders, providing administrative support for all our mid-week ministries and Hispanic Ministry, as we have done a bit of a mini restructuring in our administrative department. 
• Raquel previously worked at Compassion Canada for 11 years, and has been involved in our Youth, Women’s, and Small Group Ministries, so she is joining us with a proven record of experience and service to the kingdom.
• Raquel brings many skills to this role, with a deep heart to help and serve others, using her administrative experience at Compassion to help further the ministries of our ministry leaders and their areas of responsibility.  
• Raquel also has a degree in literature and significant writing skills so will be helping us using these skills in various areas as well.  
• Plus, an added bonus, she is fluent in Spanish! So, we are finally able to provide some much-needed administrative support for Hernando and our thriving Hispanic ministry! 
• We are also pleased to announce that Chris Wood will be joining our staff team effective July 5 for a 10-month internship.
• This internship is a requirement for Chris to complete his MDiv at Heritage Seminary, so Chris and Heritage requested that we consider this and our elders where happy to be able to help provide Chris this temporary training vehicle to help complete his work on his MDiv degree.
• Chris will be developing and teaching in the area of Evangelism, something he is very experienced in as well as helping shepherd a small group of men, and teaching occasionally, as opportunities arise, in some of our mid-week ministries.
• Chris and his wife, Filomena, and their two kids have been long-time members of Redemption, and we are excited to have him join our team as an intern. We know he will be a blessing to our church and team.
• Finally, we are grateful to God for the provision of two new weekend Custodians – Adriana Arias and Angelica Gomez. Adriana and Angelica will be rotating working on Sundays, keeping our building clean and sanitized. 
• We are very thankful for Adriana and Angelica, and their willingness to serve in this role. Our building is kept in impeccable shape, and it is due to the hard work of Adriana and Angelica, as well as David Steele (our mid-week custodian). If you see them on Sunday, please say “hi”, thank them, and welcome them to the team.

FINANCIAL UPDATE

• Redemption was incorporated towards the end of 2019. This was a prudent and long overdue step required to provide extra legal and financial protection to our elders, staff, and congregation. One of the requirements of incorporations in Ontario is that an external, professional financial audit is now required on an annual basis, so 2020 was our first fiscal year with an audit.
• The audit process began in the fall to prepare for our first audit, and the actual audit was conducted in the spring and finished early in June. 
• The process is very detailed (hundreds of hours combined between our staff and our accounting firm), with all areas of our financial processes looked at. In the end, our auditor needs to be able to say with confidence that our financial statements fairly represent the financial position of the church.
• At the end of the audit, our elders were presented with the audited financial statements, as well as an auditor report. These documents were reviewed at our Annual General Meeting (for members) on June 27, 2021.
• The results of the audit were very favourable for Redemption. There are always processes to improve and refine, but we are thankful to God for our staff, our bookkeeper, Fil Wood, and our Treasurer, Brad Young Sr. who are above reproach in their handling of church finances. We are also thankful for our auditor, Grant Thornton, who was a pleasure to deal with and very helpful throughout the whole process.
• If you would like copies of our audited financial statements, you can pick one up at the Welcome Desk. 
• We continue to thank God for His provision, and for all of you and your faithful giving, as it reflects a healthy statement about the spiritual vitality of our mission and ministry.  

CHURCH PLANTING UPDATE

St. Thomas

• In the fall of 2019, it was our joy and privilege to launch Redemption Bible Chapel, St. Thomas. 
• Since then, we have been closely involved, providing oversight to our St. Thomas plant.
• After giving some financial support in 2019 for some renovation needs, we are thankful to God as they have needed virtually no other financial support since then, as they have been self-sustaining. Praise God!
• Our elders have decided to move RBC St. Thomas to be fully independent. They have a wonderful and experienced elder team, a wonderful staff team who is gaining experience with every month, and a healthy church body. 
• This means they will be completely governed by their own elder team by the end of the summer (while they are still a part of the Great Commission Collective, as are we). 
• Please join us in continuing to pray for the elders, staff, and congregation of RBC St. Thomas, as well as to thank God for the amazing work He has done and is doing in that ministry.  

Red Deer, Alberta

• The Red Deer, Alberta church plant launched this spring. There were about 80 attendees (adults and kids), and this was without advertising due to pandemic restrictions, so a gracious provision and startup by God! 
• The Planting Pastor, Chris Girvan, started preaching from Colossians for their first series as a church.
• Since their launch, they have had more families visit, and have also found a new place to gather until the fall. 
• Please be praying for the right place for them to meet in the future, and that their capacity for ministry would expand as more people are added, as this is a difficult season to be planting (due to COVID restrictions). 
• Please also be praying that God would provide a worship leader to join the team.

Sibiu, Romania

• The church plant in Sibiu, Romania, celebrated their second anniversary this spring. We are thanking God for the growth and work He is doing in this church plant, and we are thankful to be a key partner church with them. 
• Redemption’s financial support has been vital for their senior pastor, for their church ministries, and even for a new and growing Biblical Counselling ministry God has begun this year.  
• We count it a privilege to be partnered with such a godly, gifted, and committed pastor and church.
• Lord willing, as restrictions allow, we hope to be able to begin having small, short-term teams visit them, and have their pastor/wife and key leaders visit us, from time-to-time and as it helps advance the ministry and build relationships.  
• For more information and to see a great video of the church, visit www.deogloriasibiu.ro/.

Belize

• We are seeing wonderful progress with the church plant in Belize, under the leadership of Pedro Reyes. The church was able to complete its registration as a charity in Belize, which is a huge step for them.
• The church is grateful to have an enclosed structure to worship and gather. It is a very basic structure, but they are very thankful to have these needs met.
• They are currently meeting Sunday evenings, and each week they are seeing more and more people come, to the point where they do not all fit in the building they have! 
• They have already had five people baptized this year, ten others recommit their lives to Christ, and many more God-At-Work stories in people’s lives all just in 2021, under all the same type of restrictions due to COVID we have had. God is at work in Belize!
• God has also been growing their Kids Ministry, Youth Ministry, and Worship Ministry. Please continue to pray for Pedro, his family, and their young and growing church. 

MINISTRY RE-OPENING UPDATE

• Here we are at the start of another year and reflecting on 2020. What a year that was! It is safe to say that a year ago, none of us could imagine all that 2020 would hold.
• As you reflect on the past year, we would encourage you all to thank God for the many blessings of 2020, as there are many. God is good, faithful, and kind, and He has shown this to us again in 2020.
• As a leadership team, we are very grateful for all of you. We are grateful for the way our people have persevered through the storm (and continue to persevere), embraced inconveniences, and been an encouragement to our staff and elders.
• We are also very thankful that we have been able to have in-person services since June, with no outbreaks of the COVID-19 virus.
• We have seen God at Work again in 2020, even in and through this pandemic. There have been baptisms, families growing, marriages restored, new people coming, and growth in our ministries, staff, and leadership team. We indeed have much to be thankful for!
• As we begin 2021, we now find ourselves in the midst of another lockdown. In the words of Stephen Yuille, “this too shall pass.” Let us remember that the church is not a building, but it is all of you, and all believers world-wide. Please continue to be praying for one another and connecting online, by phone, with an email, etc.
• For the duration of the lockdown, we will be holding our Sunday services online only. Please join us at live.rbclondon.ca at 9:00am or 11:15am.
• Our mid-week ministries will move to online until we can resume in-person meetings. While online is certainly not as good as in-person, we would urge you to try to plug in and join these ministries, to the best of your ability.
• When allowed, we will plan to re-open our ministries (both Sunday services and mid-week) as much as we can, and as soon as we can, while following all the mandated restrictions, and discerning any recommendations.
• We are expecting that this will look very similar to what we have had through the summer and fall, with a maximum capacity in place, and requiring pre-registration for services.
• We are sure all of you are with us in your eager anticipation of being able to meet in person again, but until that time comes, let us glorify God in our current circumstances.

STAFF UPDATE

New Associate Pastor

• We are thankful to God for His provision of a new addition to our pastoral team, Ian Havercroft.
• Ian will join our team as an Associate Pastor on February 1, 2021, as they are in the process of relocating from Hamilton.
• To read more about Ian and his family, and his role on staff, read the News post on our website here.
• Ian and his family joined our services on December 13, and Ian shared their story. If you missed this, check it out here. You can fast forward to 27:30 on the recording to listen to this portion of the service.

Elder Team Update

• We announced in December that Ben Tucker is in the process of being added as an elder at Redemption.
• A handout was distributed in our December 20 services with more information on Ben and the process. If you missed this, have a look on our website here. This also has information about your part in this process, of examining Ben according to the qualifications for an elder in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1.

FINANCIAL UPDATE

• As mentioned earlier in this update, we have much to thank God for, and the area of Finances is certainly one of them!
• God has been immensely kind to us in 2020. In a year of uncertainty, and a time when many people are personally taking a hit in their finances, God has abundantly provided through your generosity.
• While our year-end financials won’t be finalized for a few weeks, we are looking to finish out the year with a surplus – thank you God!
• Back in the spring, we made cuts to our budget of almost $200,000, not knowing how the pandemic would affect us or our finances. We are thankful for the stewardship our staff have shown by being very careful with expenditures, enabling us to finish the year well under our budgeted expenses.
• We have also finished the year with our income above what was projected (to a reduced budget).
• With the pandemic not going away any time soon, there is still a lot of uncertainty as to what 2021 will look like. We are concerned about our church family and what impact further shutdowns may have on each one, on their jobs, income, families, etc. So, we are thinking we should set aside some of the 2020 surplus, to help out where needed, should things get bad this next year.
• Redemption was incorporated at the end of 2019, and as a corporation, we are now required to have an annual audit done. Since 2020 was our first fiscal year as an incorporation, we are currently in the beginning stages of performing this, our first audit. This is a lot of work for our team, but things are looking smooth as we begin.
• We had scheduled a Town Hall meeting for January 31 (this is not our Annual General Meeting as that will be late spring). We are still planning to hold this meeting (may be done virtually) for any who wish to join in. We will present some updates, including a financial update, and have a time of Q&A at the end.
• Thanks to your generosity, we were able to collect a total of $23,582 towards our Christmas offering. Praise God for allowing us to bless other ministries with a financial gift during this time.

FACILITY UPDATE

• In our last update, we mentioned a project we were looking at to cover the rotting wood on our front peaked roof with metal flashing, to protect it from further damage. We are looking to complete this project early this year.
• We have also recently re-done our baptism tank, to make it safer (slip-proof). As any of you who have been baptized in this building can attest, the stairs going into the baptism tank were very slippery when wet, so we had it sanded down to the cement and had a professional company come in and apply a special paint and coating to make the stairs and tank slip-proof.
• Many of you may not know this, but in the summer when we started live-streaming our services, we had to set up a “livestream” room in our only available office for our operator to sit and control the stream and sound.
• With Ian joining our team, we require the use of this office, so our livestream room will be moving to a small room (that was previously used for storage) to the right of our stage, behind the screen.
• We will make this change with as little interruption to our livestream as possible, and as little construction “mess” as possible, but wanted to let you know in case you see the work being done, or we have a week where this change affects our livestream.