2023 Evangel Gathering - Friendship and Flourishing for Missions

Welcome

Greetings, dear friends and fellow warriors, in the strong name of Jesus Christ! Welcome to the Friendship and Flourishing for Missions: Sacred Roots Thriving in Ministry Conference ! We are partnering with our dear colleagues, Dr. Hank Voss and his friends at Taylor University, to challenge you with crucial insights regarding the power of friendship in the Gospel and its wide-ranging impact on spiritual nourishment, flourishing, and fruitfulness for the Great Commission among the unreached. God is forming strategic networks of fellow disciples and disciple-makers worldwide to spur fresh church planting and formation initiatives for his glory’s sake. This conference will detail why and how to build new networks of deepening friendships for missions through the ongoing engagement of our spiritual classics collection. In the short time of our collaboration, the cohorts who have engaged the spiritual classics have proven to be both spiritually refreshing and missionally significant. During this conference we turn our attention to our partners who work with disciples of Jesus who are inside-the-walls, and those who are returning citizens. The early fathers and mothers of the Church have much to share with this remarkable community of saints, whose lives and testimonies mirror much of the critical lessons of the apostolic age. Creating befriending friendships among this unique group of valiant servants of Christ can provide us with a cache of new laborers of the Gospel, men and women fully equipped for every good work. We welcome you here this week! Our dear leader, Rev. Bob Engel, will oversee our time of worship, fellowship, and interactions together, and we look forward to hearing from Dr. Voss and his remarkable team of scholars and leaders from Taylor University. We have prayed fervently for months for you personally and this conference, and we are convinced God will meet us here in Atascadero as we learn together from the ancients how God wants our friendships to spawn transformative missions efforts among the poor around the world! Pray that God will so meet us here that we are all moved to seek deeper friendships that cause our discipleship to grow and new outreaches to occur as we are equipped through dialogue with our spiritual classics! May God transform us all! Apprenticed by the ancient church of old for lasting impact today, Rev. Dr. Don Davis

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