It feels like it has been a long time since we sent out an update. Things have been very busy here with an expanding sphere of influence, growing ministries and our addition to our family (our niece).

Here are some quick bullet point updates on the last 3+ months:

Ministry with World Impact

Ø  Trained 13 teams in our Evangel School of Church Planting representing 17 US cities and other nations.  Their combined vision is to plant 1,200 over the next 3 years.

 Ø  Coaching 9 people in church planting and ministry development.

 Ø  Led 2 workshops with 12 ministries/churches involved on helping churches integrate the formerly incarcerated in their churches.

 Ø  200 men at men’s retreat (Interpreted all sessions into Spanish).

 Ø  150 women at women’s retreat. (Fabiola helped with interpretation.)

 Ø  We just handed out over 300 turkeys & food boxes to 25 church/ministries ministering amongst the urban poor. Thanks to all the churches and individuals that donated towards this and prayer for God’s provision!!

 Ø  Chad was invited to preach at a local church’s Cultural Unity Day.

 Ø  Successful deputation time visiting supporting churches, friends and family this summer:  Currently 92% funded.

Ministry with Fuente para las Naciones

Ø  Launching an English service (pilot for the first 3 months of 2020).

Pray for our launch day, January 12)

Ø  Church-wide Serve Day leading up to Thanksgiving.

We went out to the streets and handed out 100 meals to the homeless and most needy in our community.

Ø  Christmas Banquet & Toy Store and other outreaches coming up in the next few weeks.

There has been an increase in visitors checking out our church, being invited by friends. During times like Christmas these events give us more time and opportunity to build relationships and share about Jesus and our church.

Christmas Toys Needed

Are you willing to help us with our Toy Store? 

This annual event gives families from our church and community the opportunity to come buy a gift or two at deeply discounted prices (up to 75% off). This makes getting a special gift for their children more attainable, but still allows for them to feel the ownership and dignity of choosing and buying the gift themselves. There is a real special feel as our church really makes the space festive and hospitable and a group from our church does all the follow-up afterwards to help make a deeper connection for these families.

We need 100+ toys and gifts for boys and girls from 2 years – 18 years old. You can send or drop off gifts, order them online and have them delivered directly to us or send us a check and we’ll do the shopping. Please have money or gifts to us by December 14^th at the very latest.

If you are able to give towards this special event, please send your gift to our church: FUENTE PARA LAS NACIONES (note this is different than our normal support giving sent to World Impact):

Fuente para las Naciones

C/O Chad & Fabiola Wolyn   

2001 S. Vermont Ave.                        

Los Angeles, CA 90007

Family Life

Ø  Rebecca is absolutely loving high school. Thank you to all who helped pray and give to make this possible. She is on the volleyball team and a student ambassador. She loves her Bible, art and theater classes.

 
 Ø  Our niece Angela has slowly been adapting to living her life in Los Angeles with us, she is in 8^th grade. There is a lot more laughter and activity with her in the house. 

 Ø  Justice has been creating short animated videos with his Legos and is doing great in 7^th grade.

 Ø  Beniah started Kindergarten and claims preschool had better toys but has new friends and is doing great…and getting ready for his first Christmas Pageant. 

 Ø  Fabiola is busier than ever with home, school, extra-curricular and church activities. She loves finding a few moments for coffee time in the mornings. 😊

Thank you for standing with us in prayer. We are grateful to you and our God for how we’ve been sustained and able to minister here in the city. It isn’t always easy, but the need and move of God to meet that need is undeniable.

We hope you have a great Thanksgiving and blessed Christmas!

Chad, Fabiola, Rebecca, Angela, Justice and Beniah

Church Planting Amonst the Marginalized

Our heart beats for those that are underrepresented and forgotten, marginalized and abused. We also love the church and know that through the church people will come to know of the hope, love and transformative power of Jesus, will grow as disciples of Christ and leaders can be developed and deployed. That is why it is so exciting to be part of a ministry where we train, equip, empower and walk with so many leaders that share that same burden and calling to the dark corners of society.

Over the last two months we have had two Evangel School of Urban Church Planting events where we have been able to train and send out church planters and movement leaders all over the US and world. Here is an example of where new churches will be planted soon through these leaders: New York, Orlando, Oklahoma, Phoenix, Riverside (Calif.), San Bernardino (Calif.), San Diego, Houston, Seattle, Wichita, Mexico City, Guadalajara (Mexico), Cuba, Ghana, Kenya, India, Bangladesh and various in the Los Angeles metro area. Looking over the next 1-3 years these leaders are projecting around 205 new churches. Isn’t that exciting?! 

Chad (in middle of back row) with a group of commissioned church planters and their coaches from one of our most recent Evangel School of Urban Church Planting events.

Evangel isn’t just about a school or training, but about a relationship and partnership with these urban leaders.  We have the honor and privilege to walk with the leaders in a coaching relationship for at least a year holding each team accountable and encouraging them along the challenging process of starting new Gospel communities in the cities of the US and world.

So please keep these new churches, the leaders, their communities and our coaching relationship in your prayers this month. 

Strategic planning for another Evangel to train up more church planters in San Bernardino through Pastor Harold Hines church and network.

We would also appreciate your prayers for the Spanish Evangel October 11-12 & 18-19 (an opportunity to train and send out more church plant teams!) as well as our Women’s Retreat October 25-27.

Chad is pictured here with this team of Bengali pastors who have a vision to plant over 150 churches. (In the last year they have already planted 3 new churches.) 

Thank you so much for partnering with us to reach more people with the Good News here in the cities of the US and beyond!

 

Upcoming Ministry

We are just returning from a wonderful trip that took us to Oregon and Northern California. Thank you for your prayers. It was great seeing so many friends that we haven’t seen in a long time. It was sad to not be able to connect with everyone though. If you missed us, maybe it is time to come visit us in Los Angeles! We’d love that!

 

The months of August and September are packed full of ministry. Please join us in prayer for these events:

Evangel: School of Church Planting (English)

 

Evangel: School of Church Planting (Spanish)

 

Dean Training in Wichita

Chad will be teaching classes and coaching/mentoring teams at these 3-4 day intensive schools as pastor and leaders are trained and sent out to plant churches. The Dean Training is to get more training to be able to expand our reach and impact in multiplying the planting of more urban churches.

 

Recording of church planting videos (Spanish)

We hope these recording will give us a larger reach to train church plant teams throughout the US and the rest of the Spanish speaking world.

 

Onesimus Workshop (Long Beach, CA)

 

Onesimus Workshop (Moreno Valley, CA)

Working with the local church in these cities, Chad has organized all-day training workshops where we are training representatives from various local churches to welcome and incorporate former prisoners into the life and ministry of the church.

 

City Leaders Conference

 

Regional Men’s Retreat

Chad will be teaching workshops at these events and helping organize and run them. The Men’s Retreat was a powerful time for the men at our church (as well as many other churches) last year and we hope to bring even more men and see a greater impact this year.

Other family things you can keep in your prayers and celebrate with us:

·        Rebecca’s start to High School (Aug)

·        Beniah’s start to Kindergarten (Aug)

·        Chad & Fabiola’s 15^th Anniversary (Aug)

·        Chad’s Birthday (Sept)

We sincerely appreciate all your prayers and financial support.

May God continue to use us to transform communities together and empower urban leaders!

Walking with Pastors

We all go through tough times from time to time in our life. We are so thankful for you - friends and family who lift our hands up, pray for us and support us. Sadly, not everyone has such a rich support system. We work with people, many of them pastors and leaders, who have very few people to turn to for support.

One of the privileges of our job is to be able to take time to walk with people through their hard times – in life or ministry or whatever. These might be emerging leaders in the church we started out of our home years ago or the new network of pastors and church leaders we are pouring into now.

 

After a very hard day, we walked through an area riddled with drug dealers, prostitutes and people without homes. We were walking to invite people to a job fair for the formerly incarcerated. But the time walking together was more than just ministry to those on the street – we were able to minister to one another. Soon after leaving the church property, we ran into a colorful group of individuals in front of a local drug home. They were initially intimidated by us, but once they heard we were from a local church they dropped their guard and shared their stories with us.  As we continued on our walk, we shared our stories – leader to leader, pastor to pastor, person to person. We walked through a city full of hurt and pain and yet we were able to share our own burdens and encourage one another in this tough journey of serving the least of these. On a day when you may feel like you just can’t go on any longer, having somebody walk with you and speak life can make all of the difference. We want to see every leader flourish and accomplish the mission God has given them.  

 

The very next day the setting changed completely, the smells and sights improved. I got to meet with another leader, not on the streets this time, but in a nice café in a different part of the city. There sipping our drinks we were able to talk about the ups and downs of life and ministry. We strategized and put some resources together for future church planting efforts that will reach more people than either of us could ever do on our own. We then lifted one another up in prayer leaving each other encouraged and ready for the next challenge to come our way.

 

A couple mornings later, as we sat around the makeshift table eating a Salvadorian breakfast, we introduced ourselves and began to share about our ministries. In no time we discovered our similar passion to reach the lost in our city and empower the people in our communities. This mission coupled with an understanding for the need for encouragement, relationship, accountability and resourcing is really at the core of our Urban Church Associations. While we are involved in many aspects of ministry here at World Impact pouring into future and current leaders and helping them be more healthy and fruitful is a big and important part.

 

Please keep us and these other leaders in your prayers…we all go through tough times from time to time.

Please be in prayer for the following:

• Our family as we drive up to Oregon/Northern California for a few weeks to connect with friends and supporting churches and continue to raise funds for our mission work.
• Our Men’s & Women’s Retreats (in September and October).

We are so grateful to have you in our life and excited to share what God is doing now!  Ten years ago, we left our home and job to come live in the inner city of South Central Los Angeles as missionaries with World Impact. This happened because of partners like you and we are so grateful for all the prayers, financial support, encouragement, and great friendships that have been a part of our journey!

When we started, we had two small children not even in preschool yet and now Rebecca is in going to High School, Justice is entering 7^th grade and our youngest is entering Kindergarten. We came to Los Angeles as missionaries to plant churches, to evangelize the lost and train up leaders… and that is what we have done by God's grace. We've started a church from simply engaging with our community and sharing the beautiful story of Jesus with people - letting them know there is hope from their pain and despair. Our ministry has been changing over the last few years as World Impact focuses more on empowering urban leaders – so while we continue to be on the ground, pastoring and involved in the community we are doing a lot more training, equipping and empowering of other church leaders helping them be successful in ministry and life.

As we look forward to what God will do in the coming years, we’re excited that we are able to take a trip to Oregon and the Bay Area to strengthen our support team, reconnect with many of our faithful partners, form new friendships as well get some rest. 

This will be our first time back ‘home’ in four years (and only 2^nd trip in 10 years!) We are excited to spend some time visiting with as many friends and catch up and share about what God is doing in Los Angeles. If you will be in Oregon between June 21-July11 or in the Bay Area from July 12-July 15 and would like to connect please let us know!

Our goal for this trip is to raise $1,200/month in new or increased support. This would allow us to be fully funded and be able to focus 100% of our energies on the mission!

We’ll then return home ready to minister again in all that God has called us to do with World Impact in Los Angeles, which we believe is plant more churches, invite many more people to know Jesus and continually train and mentor more leaders. In fact, upon our return we will run 2 church planting schools, 2 workshops helping churches receive ex-prisoners, officiate 2 Quinceañeras, travel to Wichita for a church planter catalyst training and record a church planting workshop video in Spanish that will be used all over the US and world to train new church planters (along with all the other 'normal' stuff)…all before starting our kids back into school.

To make this trip possible to raise support to get fully funded we need to raise special gifts to cover the cost of the trip. We're projecting the cost to be about $1/mile (for gas, food and other expenses for our 4-week trip). We’ll be logging nearly 5,000 miles for our trip this summer… Would you consider “BUYING-SOME-MILES" to help fund a portion of this trip? We're hoping to get all the funds in before we leave in the middle of June, so if you can respond by then that would be great...

            A gift of $50 would cover 50 miles, $100 would cover 100 miles, etc.

            A gift of any amount will be appreciated and help keep us moving forward in ministry… J

There are two ways to donate if you'd like to send a gift:

1.     Online:  tinyurl.com/wolyns 

2.     Check:  Write a check to World Impact and send it to the following address:  2001 S Vermont Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90007.  Memo Line:  “Wolyn Support Trip”

Thanks for your partnership with us in ministry!  We are looking forward to this next season of ministry, and this trip will help launch us forward into God's plans for us. Please be praying for our safety and that our time away from the city would be fruitful and provide a little rest and renewed vision as well.

Chad, Fabiola, Rebecca, Justice and Beniah

Personal contact info:                                                                                                                                                                    mail: Chad & Fabiola Wolyn / 2001 S. Vermont Ave. / Los Angeles, CA 90007 / email: heart4thecity@gmail.com / ph:  503 475-5548 (C) /  web: heart4thecity.blogspot.com

Please send regular financial support to:

World Impact / 2001 S. Vermont Ave. / Los Angeles, CA 90007 

(Please make check payable to “World Impact” and designate “WOLYN” on the memo) 

OR  

You may also GIVE ONLINE HERE. 

UPDATE (Review)

We are celebrating 10 years as missionaries to the hardened streets of South Central Los Angeles.

While we have been in Los Angeles we have:

Planted and continue to pastor a church amongst the poor, specifically Spanish-speaking immigrants (the church’s name is “Fuente”).

We have baptized over 50 people.

 We have put on over 50 camps or retreats involving 1000s of individuals.

Missions and Church planting is a priority. We empower and train leaders so that together we can reach more people for Jesus transforming communities, people groups and nations. Since we started the church, we have faithfully given 20% of our budget to missions and church planting, regardless of our own need. 

Run programs such as a job training & leadership development internships - of which we have trained 18 interns in ministry or job-related skills.

Organized and taught at 4 church planting schools. Which had teams from numerous countries, states and cities represented.

Coached 9 other pastors and leaders (and their teams) in helping them establish a new church or ministry.

Help lead/run 2 Urban Church Association’s (monthly meetings and regular connection for fellowship, resourcing and training for pastors).

Taught at Los Angeles Christian School, a mission-focused school giving a Christian education to children K-8 in the community.

The Onesimus Workshop

We are passionate about intentionally empowering and releasing leaders. We have recently begun working with other pastors and leaders to help churches welcome former prisoners into the life of their church for the building up of the body of Christ. Chad helped lead The Onesimus Workshop which equips these churches with the beginning steps towards effectively incorporating former prisoners into the church community.

We had 40 pastors, leaders, and students from our TUMI (The Urban Ministry Institute) that were former prisoners who participated in this workshop. TUMI students start their ministry study in prison through our partnership with Prison Fellowship and can either graduate there or can continue their study when they are released at one of our satellite locations. Our workshop was a powerful time bringing people together with the desire to make a larger impact in one of the more underrepresented populations in churches. 

 

Since the initial workshop we are working with churches in the Los Angeles area and at least 4 other counties that are preparing to launch this workshop to either start or support a ministry to returning citizens (formerly incarcerated) in their church/ministry context. Please join us in prayer for these ministry leaders.

 

At the church we planted, Fuente para las Naciones, one requirement of our leadership intern program is to lead a ministry project. Hugo was really impacted when we have gone out and fed and prayed with the homeless near our church. So, he organized a group from our church to do something similar. When we had just about run out of food, drinks and hygiene packs one of the ladies in our group recognized one of the homeless as the daughter of her friend and asked permission to ‘knock’ on one of the tent structures. A couple of us walked over there and what ensued was a lot of crying and deep ministry through hugs, prayer and words of affirmation. We just never know who will be affected by homelessness, addiction, incarceration, loneliness, depression, or poverty. Sometimes we just need a hug and to know that somebody loves us. God does that for us; we want to do that for others.

 

Thank you for loving us well, so that we can continue day in and day out hitting the streets to minister to the least of these all the while encouraging and empowering other leaders in the city to do the same.

 

Please be in prayer for the following:

Our 2 church planting schools coming up (in English and Spanish)

Our Easter outreaches

Protection, provision, wisdom and grace for our family as we minister in the city