“I expected to get something out of it spiritually. I don’t think I expected to get something out of it emotionally,” said Patrick Rascoe of his first mission trip. But after spending a week in Mzamomhle, South Africa, Pat said the relationships he built led to emotional attachments that he won’t soon forget.

More than 200 women gathered across our four campuses last weekend for a time of refreshing, refocusing, and renewing at IF:Gathering 2018. This year’s theme was Fanning the Flame based on 2 Timothy 1:6-7.

Four and a half years ago as we were walking out of LifeGroup, Chris and Theresa Imbach excitingly talked to my husband, Art, and I about the Roatan mission trip. They looked at us and said, "You guys should come!" For several years at our other church, we had talked about going on mission, but it never happened. Now that we were settling into Chets, it seemed right and we replied "Okay." I wish I could say that there was intense prayer and spiritual reflection, but it was a simple moment of an invitation extended and accepted.

During the month of April, our adult LifeGroups have been talking about the Bible. That may sound a little strange as we talk about the Bible every week in LifeGroup. But we mean the Bible as a whole book. We’ve been discussing questions like “Can I trust the Bible?” and “Why does the Bible matter?”. As we end this series, we wanted to pass on some of the amazing resources that are out there now to help you spend time in God’s word.

“We talk about living life on mission so we were trying to find something we could do,” said Debbi Hoeft. She and her husband Steve lead a LifeGroup at our Nocatee Campus. Many of their members regularly serve in ministries at the church but they wanted to find an opportunity for their whole group to regularly serve together. They wanted something that would be on-going because they knew that building relationships would take more than just a one-time event.

When we started as a church in April 1998, we committed to being a church that plants churches. Milestone Church in Natick, Massachusetts is one of the nine church plants we support in the the U.S. and Canada.

If our citizenship is in Heaven, are we immigrants here on Earth? Where is our residency? As missionaries, we must obey the regulations concerning visas and residency for Nicaragua. Fortunately, Greg and I attained one year cedula (residency) last year, but as believers, we are citizens of a heavenly kingdom. and we await our residence there.

We had an incredible time celebrating our Savior together last week!

“When I arrived, I didn’t feel that close to God but now [that] we left, I feel closer than I was before.” This is one of many testimonies from students who attended our Chets Students annual THRIVE Weekend 2018. Middle and high school students from all of our campuses met at St. Simons Island, Georgia for a weekend of discipleship, worship, and fellowship. They learned about what it means to be FEARLESS.

There are 2.6 million people who live in Las Vegas and approximately 92 percent of them don’t know Jesus. Heiden Ratner and his wife Neena, both Las Vegas natives, were a part of that statistic.

Pastor Spike interviewed Raphael Leroux this past Sunday at the Hodges Campus. Raphael is one of the pastors at la Chapelle, our new church planting partner in Montreal. You can watch the 12 minute interview below. Raphael shared about some of the challenges of leading a church in Montreal and about a unique opportunity that they have been given to share the love of Christ this Easter.

Living beyond these walls can happen right here in our own community. Whitney Touchton shares about her experience serving with Kidz Xtreme, one of our community missions partners.

An easy way for us to live beyond these walls is by sharing with others about the ways that God is working in your life and through our Chets family. Mike and Lisa Basham share their experience of inviting others to be a part of what God is doing.

One of the ways that our Chets family can live beyond these walls is through our new Southside Campus. God has given us an incredible opportunity to love and serve one of the most diverse neighborhoods of our city.

There it was. Every time I sat in church as a child – always near the front – I read the words “Do this in remembrance of me,” which were inscribed on a table that sat front and center. We called it the Communion Table.