Gospel Community Stories: August 2024–July 2025
Each year at our Covenant Member BBQ, we like to share a handful of stories from the year. Sometimes these stories look like artwork or important data. Other times they’re more like traditional, written pieces. This year, we’re asking you, our Gospel Community Leaders, if you’d be interested in sharing a short, written story from the last 12 months in the life of your Gospel Community.
Our hope is that we’d have a story to share from each of our Gospel Communities. These will be published in a booklet (with some other highlights) and handed to each Covenant Member.
WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?
Although God is doing many incredible things in and among our people, most individuals don’t know about those things unless they’re close to the people involved. And how could they? With 40+ Gospel Communities and an average of 645 adults joining us each Sunday, even the most “connected” person at Park Church is missing amazing things.
While we need not try to capture everything, it’s always worth sharing what we can with one another. It’s one more way we can “encourage one another and build one another up” (1 Thess. 5:11). With this in mind, it shouldn’t be too hard to imagine something from the last year in your GC that would encourage the body.
WHAT SHOULD YOUR STORY BE ABOUT?
It’s up to you! There is really no right answer. What has God done in the life of your GC this year? Your answer can be…
- Something “normal” (“We ate together each week and took turns sharing our testimonies…”)
- Something difficult you’re enduring together, even if there’s no “resolution” to the difficulty (“We’re supporting each other in practical ways as several of our members look for work…”)
- Something relieving, encouraging, or even miraculous that God did in your Gospel Community this year (“We’re celebrating God’s gracious healing of…”)
Consider spending some time in prayer to thank God for the last year, bring the hard things to Him again, and ask what He might have you share with the church. In the likely case that there are many things to share, pick one to share now and write down the others for later!
HOW LONG SHOULD YOUR STORY BE?
These stories can be as short as a few sentences or as long as a few hundred words.
WHAT ELSE SHOULD YOU CONSIDER?
- There’s no need to “prove” anything about your group or make your group’s story sound exciting or miraculous. It’s quite fine to share about the normal rhythm of your meetings and the slow, incremental growth in Christ that marks so much of the Christian life. Many would be encouraged by this kind of story!
- If your story is about something difficult you’ve endured or are enduring together, it may include details that are more sensitive to individuals in your group. Before sending us your story, please check with these people to make sure they consent to what you’re sharing. You need not include any names.
- Lastly, if your story is a story of healing or special provision or salvation or something wonderful along these lines, don’t be deterred from sharing it with joy! Although we want to make space for the mundane and the more-difficult in our storytelling, this is not to the exclusion of the miraculous. If our hope is to share from the whole spectrum of our experience of life in Christ, we cannot do so without highlighting the ways Jesus is bringing His resurrection power to bear on our world even now. If we weep with those who weep, we surely want to rejoice with those who rejoice (Romans 12:15).
ANYTHING ELSE?
Only “thank you.” It’s a lot to lead a Gospel Community and it’s a lot to read a webpage this long. We also believe there is a lot to gain by sharing with one another what God is doing, so thank you for your work to that end. With any questions, please contact jd@parkchurch.org.