WEEK OF PRAYER: A journey planned in advance

Editor’s note: This year’s Week of Prayer for North American Missions is March 2 – March 9 and is focused on the theme: Step into the Story (“For they have gone out for the sake of the name. … Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.” 3 John 1:7-8, ESV). The emphasis spotlights the spiritual needs and ministry taking place on the North American mission field leading up to the annual Annie Armstrong Easter Offering (AAEO) for North American Missions®. All gifts given to the offering go to support missionaries and resources on the mission field. The AAEO provides half of the annual funding for the North American Mission Board. Gifts to the Annie offering can be given through local Southern Baptist churches or online at give.anniearmstrong.com. This year’s goal is $78 million.

LANGLEY, British Columbia – “You must be out of your mind.” No one said it. But it had to be what most reasonable people were thinking when they heard what Christian and Laura Rowland had decided to do.

When Christian and Laura Rowland moved to the Vancouver suburb of Langley to plant a church, they didn’t realize just how perfectly they would fit in. But as it turns out, young families just like them were also moving to Langley. “You wouldn’t believe how many people we met at the playground,” Laura says. “We didn’t expect it to happen this way, but that’s really how our new church began.” NAMB photo by Ben Rollins

“When our church in Texas announced God was leading them to send someone to plant a church in metro Vancouver,” Christian says, “I hadn’t finished seminary and we were pregnant with our first child. We knew no one in Canada, but that didn’t matter. We’d been praying for a while after the Vancouver City Missionary came to our church to preach, and we knew right then – the Lord said, ‘Now is the time.’”

Christian and Laura were most definitely not out of their mind. When, six months later, they packed up all their worldly possessions and drove 2,167 miles – or as the Canadians would say, 3,487 kilometers – to their new home in the Vancouver suburb of Langley, they knew this was a journey God had been preparing them for their entire lives.

“We moved to Canada when our first child was six months old,” Laura says, “and all we had was a dream and a history of experiences that, even though we didn’t realize it at the time, in some ways began to prepare us to plant a church in place like Langley.”

Experience No. 1 on their church plant resume was GenSend, a North American Mission Board program that puts young people on the mission field alongside church planters. Several years earlier, both Christian and Laura had served with GenSend in Vancouver.

“We got to see what church planters here really go through,” Laura says. “And the whole time we were here, Christian was saying over and over again how he would never attempt to plant a church in Vancouver because it was just too hard. And I remember thinking that God must be calling this man to church planting because I’ve never seen anyone so convinced that that’s the last thing they’ll ever do. We weren’t even dating at the time, but I kind of wanted to just sit back and see what God would do with him. Little did I know.”

Experience No. 2 on the Rowlands’ church plant resume actually came much earlier, when both Christian and Laura were children.

Preach the Gospel. Christian Rowland is now more certain than ever that that is what he was born to do. “Coming to Canada to plant a church, there was certainly some anxiety,” he says. “There were so many lost people here and at first my wife and I were just trying to figure out, ‘where do we start?’ But now we can connect the dots and see how God had prepared us for this all along.” NAMB photo by Ben Rollins

“We both grew up overseas” Laura says. “Christian’s dad was a military contractor, and so he grew up in South Korea and Japan. And my parents were International Mission Board (IMB) missionaries in Guinea which is a country in West Africa. That means we understand culture shock, and we know what it’s like to live somewhere where you don’t quite fit in. And since Vancouver is one of the most multicultural cities in the world and people have come here from all over, that meant we were able to connect with people really quickly when we got here.”

The Rowlands first connections came on the playground. That was, as it turns out, the best place to meet young couples just like them who’d immigrated to Canada from many countries and cultures.

“People from all over the world who came to Vancouver move out to Langley,” Laura says, “because the cost of living is somewhat cheaper and it’s the kind of place you want to raise kids. So we were surrounded by young families with children, and when we took our kids to the playground, we’d meet Russians and South Asians and Koreans. It’s amazing how many people we met. We identified with them, they identified with us, and we were able to connect with them. And the next thing you know, we were in their homes sharing the Gospel.”

The Rowlands began a weekly Bible study with people they met at the playground and as God began to grow their group, Christian and Laura finally began to understand how they were uniquely equipped to make Jesus known in Langley – not just because of their past experiences, but because of the gifts they received from the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering.

New Song Community Church in Langley, British Columbia, planted by missionaries Christian and Laura Rowland, is one of the first-ever multiplying, multi-ethnic churches in Langley. Now, in one of the fastest-growing and most ethnically diverse communities in all of Canada, the Rowlands are sharing the Gospel with people from all over the world. NAMB photo by Ben Rollins

“There’s no other way we could’ve financially done this,” Christian says. “We knew no one. We had nothing. But there were all these churches giving to Annie Armstrong that made our being here physically possible. They didn’t even know us, and yet we could be here because of them. We essentially collaborated together and that’s a big reason we are where we are now.”

It took several years, but their small neighborhood Bible study is now a growing, multicultural church. And when Christian and Laura see new believers from many nations who are now a part of New Song Community Church, they realize what God called them to do wasn’t crazy at all.

“Coming here, yeah, there was anxiety,” Christian says. “There were so many lost people here and we were just trying to figure out, ‘where in the world do we start?’ But now, we can connect the dots and see how God was preparing us for this all along. This was His sovereign, unfolding plan.”