WELS Home Missions authorized funding for one new mission in 2019—Hope, Houston, Texas. A dedicated group of core members from other WELS churches around Houston are starting this mission in an urban neighborhood that is seeing a resurgence in popularity as people are looking to be closer to the city center. Rev. Andrew Nemmers, a 2019 graduate of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, was assigned to serve as Hope’s home missionary. Pictured are some members of Hope’s core group as well as a group from Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary who helped the new mission in January 2019.

Did you know?

WELS Home Missions supports 18 cross-cultural missions. Either the mission is serving a certain people group such as Hispanics, Vietnamese, or Hmong, or there is a multi-ethnic membership. Ten of those 18 are Hispanic ministries, reaching out with the gospel to the largest ministry people group in the United States.

Qiang Wang (pictured standing reading) is a recent graduate of the Pastoral Studies Institute. “My happiest thing,” says Wang, “is to share the gospel with others.” The Conference of Presidents has called him to be a missionary to the Chinese population of Coquitlam, a growing suburb of Vancouver. City planners believe 30,000 more Chinese people will move to Coquitlam in the next decade, and the city is already underserved for Chinese churches. Wang’s outreach in Coquitlam is a mission partnership between WELS Joint Missions; WELS Canada; and Saviour of the Nations, Vancouver.

His body language spoke loud and clear. Arms crossed. Slouched down. A toothpick pursed between his lips as he stared at the floor. Avoiding any sort of conversation. Refusing a bulletin. He didn’t want to be there, but his girlfriend had convinced him to join her in church that morning.

Then he came back the next week, this time looking up a couple of times during the sermon. The next week, he followed along in the bulletin. The week after that, he left the toothpick in the car. A few months later, he asked about classes where he could learn more about the Bible and ask some questions that have been on his mind.

Fast forward to mid-November 2019. His brother is on life support, making it hard to finish up his classes for church membership. He asks his other two brothers if it would be okay for him to invite the pastor to stop in at the hospital for a visit and prayer. It takes a week of convincing, but they finally give in. Their body language was speaking loud and clear. They didn’t really see the need or want this Spanish-speaking white guy in their brother’s hospital room. It seemed like they were paying more attention to their phones than to this stranger in the room. The conversation was short, and God’s Word was shared.

On the way home, I got a message: “Thanks. They’d like you to come again soon.”

“For the word of God is alive and active” (Hebrews 4:12).

Written by Rev. Paul Biedenbender, home missionary at Christ, Denver