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LAREDO—Laredo Missions is looking for more than just a few good people to continue church planting efforts in that city. Churches and ministries are encouraged to send groups for short-term mission work this spring and summer.
“Spring break, March 11-15, is already booked,” said SBTC/NAMB missionary Tom Lawton, who manages the Laredo Missions Center (LMC). “Summer would be the optimal time for groups to come.”
If you come, Tom Lawton and Antonio Negrete will train you.
Negrete recently joined the church planting ministry overseen by Lawton following Chuy Avila’s relocation to El Paso in December to lead SBTC’s church planting efforts there. Negrete, a Guadalajara native with extensive experience leading American missions groups to the interior of Mexico, has applied to become part of NAMB’s Mission Service Corps.
“Antonio has been with us six months. I am the admin guy. I talk to the churches and get people here,” Tom Lawton said. “They come and meet Antonio and love him. We make a good team.”
Lawton and Negrete anticipate hosting at least seven groups at LMC this year.
“We ask that participants be prepared to stay a minimum of 4-6 days,” Lawton explained. Planting churches involves building relationships, which takes time.
In terms of numbers, less is more, according to Lawton. Groups of 15-16 are ideal. The LMC—which shares space with an active church plant—accommodates up to 20 for overnight stays.
Out of town groups will be joined in training by bilingual Laredo Christians recruited by Lawton and Negrete through contacts with local pastors.
“We want Laredo Christians who may be sensing a call from the Lord to join us: students, young adults, even older adults willing to spend four or five days with, say, a group from Dallas,” Lawton explained.
The format of combining locals with out of town groups is new for Lawton and Negrete. They hope to build a base of area church planters, pastors, and missionaries to train alongside and build relationships with out of town visitors. All would work together to plant churches and do the work of evangelists and missionaries.
Training at the LMC involves fellowship, prayer, Bible study, and practical experience.
“We will train folks in what we need them to do,” Lawton said. “This is an active mission field.”
Groups who come to serve at LMC can expect to engage in prayer walks, personal and group evangelism, visitation, sports camps, Vacation Bible School and a host of other opportunities to initiate relationships with the unsaved. Training will be tailored to mission field needs.
Costs are kept minimal. Groups are encouraged to donate $15 per person per night for lodging and must provide their own towels, linens and air mattresses. Meals are available at nominal cost. Lawton sends comprehensive instructions to groups scheduled to come.
Lawton recommends that group leaders visit Laredo several weeks before the actual mission trip. “We will show them around so they know better what to expect. This helps us cast the vision,” Lawton said of the practice initially implemented by Avila.
“We are asking God to raise up faithful workers and churches willing to come alongside them for the harvest,” Lawton said.
God is doing just this.
As Lawton and Negrete met on the afternoon of the TEXAN interview, they prayed again for local workers. A car pulled up outside the office. They wondered if someone had mistakenly come for a Laredo Bible Institute class. Instead, Ramiro and Francisco approached. Lawton knew both men. Francisco had been recently saved and baptized.
“Brother Tom,” Ramiro said, “You asked me a few weeks ago if God was calling me to pastor. I felt then that he was, but I have been praying about it, and I am ready.”
Then it was Francisco’s turn. “Although I’ve only been saved for a short amount of time, I just have this desire to share the truth with people. I feel like I am a doctor and I have a cure for the world’s most dreaded disease. The whole world has this disease. What would I be if I held on to the cure and didn’t share it?”
“Out of the blue, two guys show up and say God is calling them to serve. They want to know how we can help them,” Lawton said.
With training through the Laredo Missions Center—and classes designed to equip new pastors offered throughout the city via the Laredo Bible Institute—Lawton and Negrete are poised to see God do an amazing work in Laredo.
“It’s a hard place. A lost place. But we are very excited,” Lawton said. “God is using us. He has given us a vision.”
They’d like some help to see it through.
For information on how your group might get involved, email Tom Lawton at Tom@LaredoMissions.com or call him at 956-286-6273.
