Michael Tyler, AGWM personnel in Germany, relates the following amazing story. “I used to lead a Bible study group with 8 atheists. Every week I had the joy of sharing life with 7 young men, and one young lady for about 2 hours. We would eat lunch together and talk about life. Talking about life turned into reading a book by the Author of Life - the Bible. It’s amazing how hungry these young people were for the truth.

“Over the course of about 2 years several of these young people decided to become followers of Jesus. Some other young people migrated into the group. A few migrated out. But there was one young man who was with me for the entire two years…Lars. He was always ready to listen, but never ready to take the message to heart. I continued meeting with him until we moved away from that city. If nothing else, I knew I was planting a seed.

“At the same time I was meeting with Lars and the others, my family and I were also helping to plant two churches in Dresden; one in a neighborhood near Lars’ apartment, and another on the other side of town. That was almost four years ago.

“Last spring I got an unexpected email - it was from Lars. He wrote to tell me that he had decided to follow Jesus, and to thank me. That news gave me a reason to smile for days. Later that week I was meeting with the leadership team from our former church plant in Dresden (the one that was across town from Lars). We were rejoicing over the things God was doing among us, and I started sharing Lars’ story. Suddenly, they started laughing. One of them said, ‘We know Lars. Did Lars tell you who he prayed with when he decided to follow Jesus? We’ll be baptizing him next week.’

“That’s what church planting is like. The roots of that church we helped plant have grown deep enough to spread across the city, to reach the roots of the seed we planted in Lars four years ago, and they have become intertwined.”

Michael Tyler, AGWM personnel in Germany, relates the following amazing story.

“I used to lead a Bible study group with 8 atheists. Every week I had the joy of sharing life with 7 young men, and one young lady for about 2 hours. We would eat lunch together and talk about life. Talking about life turned into reading a book by the Author of Life - the Bible. It’s amazing how hungry these young people were for the truth.

“Over the course of about 2 years several of these young people decided to become followers of Jesus. Some other young people migrated into the group. A few migrated out. But there was one young man who was with me for the entire two years…Lars. He was always ready to listen, but never ready to take the message to heart. I continued meeting with him until we moved away from that city. If nothing else, I knew I was planting a seed.

“At the same time I was meeting with Lars and the others, my family and I were also helping to plant two churches in Dresden; one in a neighborhood near Lars’ apartment, and another on the other side of town. That was almost four years ago.

“Last spring I got an unexpected email - it was from Lars. He wrote to tell me that he had decided to follow Jesus, and to thank me. That news gave me a reason to smile for days. Later that week I was meeting with the leadership team from our former church plant in Dresden (the one that was across town from Lars). We were rejoicing over the things God was doing among us, and I started sharing Lars’ story. Suddenly, they started laughing. One of them said, ‘We know Lars. Did Lars tell you who he prayed with when he decided to follow Jesus? We’ll be baptizing him next week.’

“That’s what church planting is like. The roots of that church we helped plant have grown deep enough to spread across the city, to reach the roots of the seed we planted in Lars four years ago, and they have become intertwined.”