Church planting is a stretching process. It means taking big leaps of faith, like moving to a new place and meeting new people. It also means taking little leaps of faith, like singing extra loud in church because the singers are few, and doing Sabbath school at home because there isn’t classroom space at church—or enough kids and teachers.

We want to share with you some of the big leaps and little leaps we’ve taken in our work here, as women involved in starting a new church in Providence, R.I. A lot of our experiences are doubtless similar to those of many young women in RP congregations.

God is steadfast in building His church. We’ve seen that in the history of our home congregation, our family, and our own lives. And we’ve been encouraged to see that God’s faithfulness is still a “shield and buckler” (Ps. 91:4) as we’ve begun this work.

God’s Call to His Providence

We are sisters who grew up in the Cambridge, Mass., RPC. When our parents, Chris and Carol Wright, moved there with two-year-old Esther and Maureen in utero, the congregation was desperately in need of revitalization. We were the only children in a congregation that was rapidly dying out. During our growing-up years, we had the blessing of seeing our congregation slowly begin to look outward and to grow. Through the faithful preaching of the Word and the hospitality and fellowship of the congregation, the Lord grew our little congregation into a thriving body that now oversees our church plant and the Berkshires mission work as well.

The faithful example of our parents’ church involvement has made our lives in a new church much easier. Though they had grown up in faraway Japan and Northern Ireland, they devoted themselves to understanding the people in and around Cambridge and pointing them to Christ. They showed an undying energy for hospitality, a love for theology, and a balanced perspective on the demanding work of the church.

As we grew older, the Lord continued to use our life experiences to turn our hearts toward the home mission field. Maureen witnessed the fierce devotion of the Japanese Christians to their Savior during the five summers she spent in Kobe, and she felt the dangers of the lukewarm church during a semester spent in once-Christian England. Esther married a man headed for the pastoral ministry, and Daniel’s internships in Oswego, N.Y. (a fairly recent church plant now planting new churches) and the Cambridge congregation served to cement their common desire to see new churches founded and people saved in the secular Northeast.

God provided opportunities in Providence for both our families. Maureen and her husband, Alastair, found work in the Providence area, and the school where Daniel taught prior to his call to the pastorate moved to the southern end of Boston, making a commute from Rhode Island possible.

What We’re Learning in God’s Providence

God has been teaching us to depend solely on Him. We had enjoyed the rich life of a large and busy church in Cambridge, and moving to Providence disconnected us from many of the friendships and activities we had treasured. We love to spend time with members of our church group in Providence, but, with fewer people, opportunities are fewer too. Yet God has used this to remind us that He alone is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think” (Eph. 3:20).

Our sense of more spiritual isolation has given us greater urgency to look for opportunities to share our faith with those around us. We feel keenly that “the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few” (Matt. 9:37). We have begun to be more intentional in seeking friendships with non-Christians. While attending the Desiring God Conference with Daniel in 2006, Esther was reminded that evangelism cannot simply be a program in which we participate now and then. She was convicted that sharing our lives with unbelievers so that they see our frailties and Christ’s perfection is an essential part of the Christian walk with God.

Beyond these spiritual lessons, we quickly found out just how much goes into the practical reality of keeping a church running smoothly. Have you ever stopped to think about how things get done in your church? In a fledgling church, there is ample room for the development of existing gifts, but also, by necessity, quick growth of gifts you never knew you had. For example, Esther designs and types the bulletin each week and organizes our monthly fellowship meals. Maureen takes a turn leading the singing, writes updates to the Cambridge and Berkshire congregations, and purchases cookies for after-worship fellowship time, for which she sets up prior to church each week.

Everyone in our group, particularly the women, has grown in skills relating to hospitality. We are learning how to make a newcomer feel at home, which meals travel well to homes that need them, and how to be sure that everyone has a ride. We’re learning that an apartment doesn’t need to be large or spotless in order to welcome a guest for a meal or overnight. We’ve been encouraged by learning that even when the work feels heavy and sometimes overwhelming, God’s “grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). Moreover, our brothers and sisters in Christ are always ready to help us when we ask.

At the back of our minds is always the knowledge that there are “church things to be done,” in the same way that there are “home things to be done.” On a recent visit to the Cambridge RPC, Maureen sank into the pews with the weightless realization that all we had needed to do for this worship service was arrive; we were not putting psalters in the pews or folding bulletins. What would it be like to feel that way every week? Would we like it or not?

When a church group consistently works together, relies on one another and is not disappointed, there is a sweetness to those relationships that is hard to develop in any other way. God has knit together our hearts. The only downside to this is how deeply we feel it when anyone in the group must leave the church plant. It hurts to lose someone who is so close, from a cause that we hold so dear.

Almost entirely, being a part of a church plant has had a great effect on family dynamics. For one thing, it produces a common mission in husband and wife. Working shoulder-to-shoulder with one’s spouse in a fresh, new church is exciting and unifying. Of course, having a husband who is involved in a church plant can mean giving up a little family time. When there are fewer men to lead a Bible study, one’s husband’s turn comes around more frequently, as does his turn to move someone’s furniture or talk to someone who just needs to talk. But we are blessed to be relatively young married people, so we can get into the lifelong habit of working together in the church.

Raising Our Children in God’s Providence

We were raised with virtually no other children in our home church, so naturally we worry about the possibility of rearing our kids with few young people at church. So far, God has blessed us with six children in the group (and another on the way) who see one another two or three times a week. We love seeing our kids look forward to their times together. We trust that as God blesses our church over the years, He will add to that number, giving our kids other meaningful Christian friendships.

Our children get to experience the work of the church firsthand. Whether it is a church cleaning day or a meeting with our mother church an hour away, we put the kids into the car and go. Every Thursday evening our kids stay up past their bedtimes to attend Bible study. Sometimes it has been hard on our schedules, particularly for the kids, who show signs of wear the day after a late night at church. But it has brought rewards: We have had times to discuss ministry opportunities, to invest in one another’s lives and to build a greater commitment to the Lord’s work.

Outside of church, we have again been thankful for our children; they have been a remarkably effective means of meeting people and have led to several good friendships for us as moms. We have been able to meet people at the playground, at mothers’ groups and at library story hour, simply because we have kids the same age as someone next to us. As our children near schooling age, we look forward to ways to connect with non-Christian homeschoolers.

Best of all, like we did as children, our kids watch their parents and other adults being up to their elbows in the work of the church, and for that we are grateful. As we pray for our kids to grow in the Lord, we cling to God’s covenant blessings evidenced both in Scripture and in our lives. By His grace, despite our tiny home church of our childhood, our parents’ six kids have all made professions of faith and three of us are involved in RP church plants.

God has tested and encouraged us by putting us to work in this little church. We are holding fast to His promise that “[My Word] shall not return to Me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (Isa. 55:11).

Esther and Maureen are members of the Cambridge, Mass., RPC, which oversees Christ (East Providence, R.I.) RP Mission Church. Esther’s husband, Daniel, is pastor of the mission church.