The following post is by Roger Jasper. Roger married to Jessica and they share a son and daughter, Paul and Anna. He is a graduate of Georgetown College and Baptist Seminary of Kentucky and serves as senior minister to Living Faith Baptist Fellowship in Elizabethtown, Ky.

At the 2013 CBF General Assembly in Greensboro, N.C., Roger attended the workshop of the Church Starts and Faith Sharing mission community. Below is Roger’s description of this Assembly event. Take a look:

by Roger Jasper

What does it look like to be the presence of Christ and share the Gospel with post-Christian North America?

It looks radically different depending on the place and people with which we have been embedded.

During the Mission Community break-out on new church starts, Susan Rogers, pastor of The Well in Jacksonville, Fla. introduced us to three different church starters who were giving hands and feet to the Gospel in very different ways and in very different contexts.

Being the presence of Christ to a specific people is not the kind of work that takes off over night. Linda Jones of Via Faith in Winston-Salem, N.C., whose church reaches out to artistic communities in a downtown setting, spoke of how slow the work is.

Often we hope that our worship services will simply be attractive to post-Christian America. However, there is no substitute for the deep investment of time and energy needed to form long-lasting, trusting relationships. In building these relationships of trust Linda is showing her neighbors the Christ of the Gospel. She is committed to the place and the people.

Joshua Hearn of Grace and Main in Danville, Va, spoke of this commitment to place and people. It is also a commitment to problems. You cannot choose a people without choosing to join them in their daily struggles.

Josh said, “Where the place suffers we suffer too.” Many in Josh’s church community are homeless or precariously housed. He says, however, this is where the Gospel is most faithfully lived out. “The Gospel sings where there is risk, cost and vulnerability,” Josh said.

Andy Hale of Mosaic in Clayton, N.C. pointed out that community is often built in the profoundly ordinary. Much of the relationship building he has done with the people of Mosaic has been done in homes around ordinary work and interests. He shared how every Sunday night he and others gather in his home to watch the television show, “The Walking Dead.”  When the time came for Andy and his wife to need some last minute moving help, it was this group of fellow zombie enthusiasts that were the first to respond.

Ultimately, all three of these churches were distinguished by a firm commitment to living the Gospel with a people and in a place. They are about making the Gospel local to those who need hope. Find out how you can learn more and participate in CBF efforts at faith sharing and new church starting by joining the Church Starts mission community at: missioncommunites.org/churchstarts/