Dear church family – I am writing to you with great rejoicing in my heart for your faithful giving to the work of the Lord here at WLAC and through us out into the world.  As you may recall, shortly after our government asked us to close our doors in March to assist in the battle against COVID-19, we posted 3 blogs asking that those who were able to give generously, do so in order to continue our ministries and we entrusted ourselves to our gracious God.

Many of you responded, those of you who have been faithful for many years, and those of you who are new to us.   Thank you for your faithfulness.   Our General Fund offerings have consistently been above 95% since April and are averaging 100% of target since the beginning of October.  By God’s grace your giving has been better than previous years.  

You know that this is a very unique year in so many different ways, and that has certainly been the case in terms of our ministry expenses.    Our costs for our building and our staff have generally been the same, but our direct costs for our ministries have been much less than expected.   This along with a number of other changes has led to a significantly higher General Fund Balance than we would normally have at this time of year. 

Whereas back in March we were wondering how God would provide and how much He would provide, we now have the delightful responsibility to seek God’s face as to what He would like us to do with the resources that He has given into His hands.   We do not know if God has blessed us as He did in the days of Joseph in the good years to prepare for the bad years, or if He has other purposes in mind that will make known His greatness.

We, your Elders, have made use of some of these resources by hiring Rhys Plant, on a part time basis, as our Church Plant Apprentice in August, whereas the plan had been to hire him to start on January 1^st, 2021.     We have made an additional principle payment of $30,000 towards our mortgage.  We intend to repay the CEBA loan that we received (a loan to small businesses offered by the federal government in response to COVID-19) by December 31^st.

As we pray we see a number of possible ways that we could use the balance of the resources if our God would be pleased to provide for our regular needs in 2021.

• To fund our Church Plant expenses for 2021 and 2022 along with designated funds that we have received.  The result will be that we would not expect to draw any additional resources from our General Fund for our Church Plant initiative over the next two years.

• To top up and/or exceed your traditional giving to our Global Advance and to our District Ministries Funds.  Giving has been consistent to these funds this year but less than at this time in previous years. 

• To complete our commitment to support Mike and Nikki Howell by December 31, 2020.  Our target is $34,000 which represents 1/3 of their costs of going to the mission field for the next two years.  Praise the Lord: we have $22k of the $34k as of October 31^st.

• We are considering the possibility or wisdom of making another payment towards the principle this year in anticipation that as you continue to give as in past years towards our paying down our principle over 2021 and 2022 we will be able to pay off our mortgage by December 2022.   This would free us from significant future expenses around the time our Church Plant takes up its ministry at 76 Jacqueline Street.

We are prayerfully seeking the Lord to direct us as we consider other opportunities where we might make known the greatness of God both here in London and around the world.  

Our desire is to continue with the ministries that our God has given us to do, however that may look like as we continue under the restrictions due to COVID-19 until we return to ‘normal’.    Thank you for your faithful support.    Pray for us, as your elders and your staff, as we continue to serve and plan for 2021.  Together we entrust ourselves to our God.

All this to say that “ …God loves a cheerful giver.  And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.”  (2 Cor 9:7c,8).  To Him be all the glory and honour and praise.