Not alone: journeying together as family

“You all have the same bricks!”

What do the cities of Lille, Brussels, Middleburg and Overschie all have in common…? That might be an answer to the question.

When you’re a small church plant or house church in Europe, it's very easy to feel as if you’re plugging away on your own. So, over the weekend of 3-4 June, four Relational Mission pioneering communities decided to meet in Brussels to encourage each other, to pray and to share the gospel.

People from church families in the Netherlands, France and Belgium gathered together, with many more languages and cultures represented between them.

Families together

The premise was simple: we are family, we love the Lord and we want to tell people about Him. So we started with prayer walking the city of Brussels. From the European Parliament, then through poorer areas to the Royal Palace, we sought the Lord for salvation and the wind of the Spirit to ignite change.

Their prayer walk took them past the European Parliament building

Then we set up a spot on the Mont des Arts to worship together and to meet people. We had a rich mixture of nationalities and languages, which meant that a Mexican could share the gospel with another Mexican, and the French and Dutch speakers could speak to the locals naturally and easily.

Sharing the gospel on the streets of Brussels

Many encouraging conversations were had with passers-by

A pilgrim mentality; a heavenly perspective.

The next day we gathered to listen to Gert Hijkoop from Rotterdam encourage us with the truth that we are ever moving forward, not settling. And just like Abraham, we don't know where we are going! Our eyes are on the city in heaven, so we keep looking ahead.

With wonderful UK volunteers helping to look after the children, we then had a powerful afternoon praying and prophesying for each location represented among us.

So… why the bricks?

A word of prophecy was shared that, from northern France to the south west of the Netherlands there are architechtural similarities, and God wants to breathe His life into the people here. As we said our goodbyes, we felt no longer alone, but ready to enjoy the journey.