What makes a church great? At times, we are tempted to think that personalities and leadership, mission statements and visions, strategies and ministries are the primary means by which a church thrives. Don’t get me wrong. I am all for leadership. I am all for a clear vision and an aggressive strategy to be about the mission, but those are not what make a church great. What makes a church great? A great God makes a great church.

As we look back at 2011 and look out over the next year of our existence, I believe the wisdom, truth, and tone of Psalm 111 will help Redemption Hill push forward in the mission God has for us. Psalm 111 is first and foremost a hymn in praise of God for his great works, and we have many reasons to give God praise for what he did in 2011. Here are five highlights:

1.    Launch of Sunday Worship: On April 10, 2011, we witnessed the culmination of thousands of prayers as Redemption Hill started weekly worship in an awesome facility the Lord provided. The huge turnout and representation from different backgrounds were evidence of his grace.

2.    People Serving & Growing: Dozens of people were discipled and went deeper with Christ and one another. Additionally, our core group served with excellence on Sundays, at our community outreach efforts, and special events.

3.    Opportunities to Serve our Community: This one probably has surprised us the most! God has opened up more doors for us to serve our community than we have the ability to walk through. We have strategically served our city by volunteering at the Boys & Girls Club and hosting Soccer Nights (a free soccer clinic for kids in our city). We also helped run a Day Camp through the Medford Housing Authority, cleaned and helped renovated five parks in Medford, put on a Community Fun Night, gave away Thanksgiving Turkeys, and held a Christmas Dinner for 15 local families. Our serve efforts have opened up many spiritual conversations and relational doors in the community. 

4.    God forming our church family: We have 25 members, over 50 involved in Community Groups and roughly 80 attending on Sundays! Jesus is building his church.

5.    Great Partnerships: We have been the beneficiaries of many partners. We would not be where we are today apart from the generosity of individuals and churches that have said, “We want to see a gospel-centered church planted in Greater Boston.” Partners from all over America are praying, sending, and supporting us with teams and financial gifts until we can become self-sustaining. This is a kingdom effort, and that is why we are so grateful for the NACPF.

As great as 2011 was, we pray and expect that 2012 will be even better. We can look back to God’s past grace and find exceeding confidence for future grace. There is an atmosphere of expectation in our church, and the following are some of our goals and prayers for 2012.

1.    Grow in the gospel through passionately pursuing God in his Word and Prayer. The addition of Equipping Classes and implementing our Counseling Ministry are a couple of ways we want to build on what God has already done.

2.    Increase the number of weekly worship attendees and Sunday Serve Teams members. As God sends more and more people to RHC, we need more people ready to serve. We would love to see God increase our worship attendance to 125 by Easter & 175 by the year’s end.

3.    Develop leaders for our Community Groups and tweak our approach. We want 100% of our members and regulars involved in a CG. We are praying for 7-9 CGs by the end of 2012. That means new leaders will continue to be identified and equipped.

4.    See God continue to make our church more of a thumbprint of our community. This is a huge prayer point for us in 2012. Greater generational and ethnic diversity will not happen unless we pray. Period.

5.    Add new members to the church regularly. As people buy into the mission and vision of RHC, we will add to our church family. The goal is 60-80 members by the end of the year.

6.    Make disciples who make disciples.  That’s our mission. Each person is going to have to see their spheres of influence as mission fields. We are asking God to bring at least 20 people to faith in him this year through our collective witness.

7.    Continue Serving People in our Community. We want to build on all that God did in 2011. We are also going to establish our benevolence fund that will go toward mercy ministry.

8.    Continue Spreading the Mission. We do not exist for ourselves! We plan to take our first mission trip, implement a church planting strategy to reach Charlestown with the gospel, and help launch the Boston Church Planting Equipping Center 

Now, that’s a lot to accomplish by God’s grace in the next 11 ½ months, but our God is a great God. His resources for his church are exhaustless. We have the opportunity to be a great church, but we will be a great church only so far as we fear, obey, and worship God (Psalm 111:10). Our pastoral strategy for reaching these goals is to cultivate disciples who fear, obey, and worship, and who live with a confident expectation in the great works of the Lord. Everything else, including the numbers above, is really inconsequential. So, let's make a commitment to...

1. Go deeper with God than ever before.
2. Get more involved in the life of Redemption Hill.
3. Live like a missionary: pray. display. declare.

“Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them” (Psalm 111:2). That’s our mantra. Join us in prayer. Let’s get to work! 

For the 2012 vision for Redemption Hill, listen to Tanner’s sermon on Psalm 111 from this past Sunday:http://www.redemptionhillchurch.com/resources/sermons/