Newsletter

Dear Friends and Supporters,

We are so grateful to all who follow and support our shared ‘Relational Mission’ to the great continent of Europe. Please enjoy this update with reflections, encouragements and challenges from how the mission has progressed over the past year.

We hope you find this helpful and inspiring!

Every blessing,

Maurice and Rachel

INTRODUCTION

It’s not just the destination, it’s the journey

For this reason I have sent to you Timothy, my son whom I love, who is faithful in the Lord. He will remind you of my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in every church.
- 1 Corinthians 4: 17

It’s not just the destination, it’s the journey. It’s not just what we do, it’s how we do it. Simple statements, but so incredibly important.

Relational Mission is not simply about achieving mission objectives – how these objectives are achieved is of paramount importance. We’re not simply trying to tick off a list of aims and goals, we’re trying to create and propagate a culture of what it means to be a family of churches on mission together.

How we go about this is just as important to God as what we achieve for him – remembering that he is quite capable of doing this without us! But it really does matter to God that we represent his family well wherever we go. Each year we are invited to contribute to the European Leadership Forum, a forum of hundreds of senior leaders drawn from across the nations of Europe, and each year they ask us to reflect upon and teach into how to create this culture of relationships that permeates our leadership and church life together as Relational Mission. It’s hard to exaggerate how precious and special this is, and how frequently this is commented upon by others looking in on us.

Paul draws a distinction between what he teaches and also his ‘way of life’ – it’s not just about the values, it is also about the culture that grows up around these values, our ‘way of life’. Mike Betts did a great job in summarising and presenting these in his book, Relational Mission – a Way of Life (known universally as ‘the orange book’). A culture of mothers and fathers, a deeply family-flavoured relational culture, a teeming and thriving apostolic and prophetic environment, and much more besides.

This was brought home to us recently at our RM Globally Fruitful conference where we gathered together many of our spiritual mothers and fathers who move among our churches and serve and support our leaders. Their work is often unseen and un-noted, but vital to perpetuating this relational culture and representing our way of life in every context. They are too many to name and number here (and I will probably overlook some if I tried to do so!) but their work is vital to creating the culture that we prize and long for among us, not simply delivering our mission goals, but creating the beautifully rich culture of the family that is precious to us, and dear to God‘s heart.

Šibenik, Croatia: Partnering for Mission

Recently God spoke to us about gold-detecting – that, as well as raising up key translocal ministries in other nations, he would also connect us with ministries that are already established in their context, but who resonate with our values and vision, and God joins our heart with them.

Once such example would be Bernard and Nada Mikulić, in Šibenik, Croatia, who are very experienced missioners and leaders with such a heart to create a rich Ephesians 4 local environment in their province of Dalmatia. One of the big challenges for them has been simply creating the right resource model that would enable them to be released to serve this mission, and we have been delighted to support them in creating some local business opportunities that enable them to be released to minister among leaders and churches across Croatia.

In the photo: Food with Friends - Catching up with Bernard and Nada on a recent visit

Called to Go: Pursuing Mission

We are into our fourth RM Called to Go cohort, which is a gathering of people who know they have been called to mission in a context or culture other than their own. Since this program started, over 100 people have been part of this process, and a quite significant number of them have been sent, either short term or long-term, into many mission contexts in Europe and beyond. Called to Go provides a context of coaching and mentoring, but above all connection and community for people exploring their call to serve the mission of God in a culture other than their own.

Is this of interest to you? Whether you have a clear idea of where God is calling you, or whether you are in the very early stages of trying to figure out a nudge from God, we would love to hear from you – whether this is for Europe or any other continent, for short term or long term, we would love to support and help you in anyway we can.

You can find more details at
relationalmission.org/calledtogo

In the photo: The 2024 outgoing and 2025 incoming cohorts gather at our Called to Go launch weekend in January 2025

Niš, Serbia: Expanding the Mission

Well, it’s been a super exciting year for our friends out in Serbia. Many of you will be aware that Martin and Irena Fairchild (Called to Go alumni!) have relocated to Serbia to support Vlada and Sonja Stojanovic at the Good News Church in Niš, which has coincided with a surge of growth in the church there after many years of diligent and patient sowing, such that now the gatherings are full to overflowing their current premises and they are looking to extend and expand.

On this front, you may also be aware that the church in Niš has often hoped to secure a particular building adjacent to their current premises, and by remarkable circumstances this was achieved earlier this year. This creates many fresh opportunities and options for their expanding church family. Vlada has also been busy nurturing and coaching a small group of leaders in other churches across south Serbia, which has been a great encouragement.

In the photos: Praying before a baptism, and Vlada and Sonja’s son Miloš translates for Martin Fairchild (right).

Globally Fruitful: Strengthening the Mission

Recently we held our RM Globally Fruitful conference, an opportunity to inspire and encourage the many men and women in ministry who selflessly serve among the churches of the Relational Mission family, travelling often at their own expense to spend time simply supporting, strengthening, and encouraging our leaders and churches in the various nations where we are represented. Sometimes ‘being’ is just as important as ‘doing’, and having mature and godly men and women who exemplify our values and our ‘way of life’ and are able to travel to visit friends in far-flung places is more valuable than can easily be expressed in a few words. Mothering, fathering, strengthening, faith-building, encouraging their children, taking the strain, so much more besides.

We are so blessed to have so many who serve in this way, and it really is a precious thing and so deeply significant for the development of our mission culture. We bless you and thank you all from the bottom of our hearts and give each one of you a spiritual hug, if there is such a thing.

In the photo: Vinu Paul greatly encouragement us as we dreamed about fruitful increase in the future

Málaga, Spain: Advancing the Mission

Mission is tough, and a couple of years ago Martin and Sarah Lazenby were seriously considering whether it was time for them to return back to the UK after a number of years working hard for the gospel in Malaga but in the face of many very demanding challenges. After prayer and deliberation and consultation, they decided to continue with the mission, bought a house in the city and got their heads down with the work.

Now two years later, their small church in Malaga is starting to gain traction, and their influence and reputation across Andalusia has developed and grown such that recently they hosted a gathering of 80 or so people representing 9 different churches for a day of training and coaching in apostolic and prophetic ministry. Adrian and Koreen Horner and John Putman served this event so well and it was a thrill to see some of the fruit of Martin and Sarah‘s perseverance. It’s still early days and small beginnings, but it’s such an encouraging development. Please continue to pray for them.

In the photos: Praying before a baptism, and Vlada and Sonja’s son Miloš translates for Martin Fairchild (right).

NEXT STEPS

The Journey Continues

Finding Gold

Luke tells us that in the church at Antioch there were ‘prophets and teachers’ (Acts 13: 1), and it’s such a joy to work with the many differently gifted men and women in God’s family.

Recently at the Globally Fruitful conference, God spoke through the teachers about the importance of watering the seed, and through the prophets about detecting gold. Over the years, Relational Mission has invested so much effort sowing seeds in the Nordic and Baltic nations and yet, apart from the beautiful work in Stockholm, there seems to be little to show for this, even a sense that some of our inheritance there has been misappropriated.

So it was a great encouragement to us to consider re-watering some of this region in faithfulness and obedience, and trusting God that some of this seed may yet bear fruit for us in the coming season. Along with this, a prophetic word about metal-detecting for gold in the nations – we have a clear strategy to plant model churches in other cultures and multiply these in order to create the environment where translocal ministries can be tested and raised up; but this prophetic word encourages us also to be on the lookout for men and women of ministry that God has already raised up in different nations, but who are longing for connection with others that share their values and that can help them outwork this in their context – this is the gold we are looking for!

Please pray with us as we revisit some nations where we have laboured but have yet to see much fruit in the Nordic and the Baltics, such as Norway and Denmark and Finland and Lithuania, but also some other nations where God may lead us and help us connect with people already on the ground that we can get along side and serve, such as Spain and Hungary and Slovakia and Ukraine.

Igniting Momentum for Mission

A key context for empowering our seed-watering and gold-detecting is our Pioneer Europe Conference in Málaga, which takes place each September. This conference has emerged as such a significant and helpful environment where we can gather leaders for a time of deep immersion in our richly relational apostolic and prophetic culture as a family of churches and as friends on a mission together.

Please pray with us that in the coming weeks and months we will be able to draw in a significant number of men and women that represent these seed-watering and gold-detecting promises, from among these nations we referred to earlier. Particularly connections we may have made through the European Leadership Forum over recent years, and historic connections in nations where things may have lost some momentum. We are praying that Pioneer Europe will be a re-catalysing of faith and a kick-starting of momentum for mission in a number of nations where we long to see apostolic and prophetic advance and Ephesians 4 maturity established.

Fruitful Multiplication

An overriding imperative for any authentic apostolic and prophetic mission is to be fruitful and to multiply. We long to multiply whole apostolic families of churches as we raise up spiritual sons and daughters in the nations.

Recently at our excellent Globally Fruitful conference, we were honoured to have Vinu and Julie Paul with us, who oversee hundreds of churches in India as well as many other nations, as part of their role overseeing the Commission family of churches. Vinu spoke about a time when God challenged him to believe him for a doubling of the work for which he is responsible. As he said this I felt such a kick in my spirit of boldness to ask God for the same for our Relational Mission family – a doubling of churches in the family, and a doubling of the resources of leaders and money required to achieve this. A prophetic picture shared at the conference spoke about a second rank of leadership men and women who needed to start moving forward alongside the first rank of existing leaders and eventually to take the responsibility for the future of our family of churches.

We have many such men and women among us, and the time is upon us for them to be given more and more a share of the responsibility for our mission. How we do this, how we transition locally and translocally, how we raise the resources and capacity to make this possible, are all the challenges that we need to address in order to make this possible. Please pray for breakthroughs in these areas.

Join the mission

Go

Has God spoken to you in any way about being part of God’s community in another nation or locality?. It may just have been the name of a nation that has captured your heart or you feel stirred to plant a church.

We run the Called to Go programme to help people explore and begin to outwork this calling.

Learn more and register at relationalmission.org/calledtogo

If we are to see 20 churches in each nation of Europe by 2050 then we need many to step forward and get involved. Here are some ways you can join the mission.

Pray

Standing with us in prayer is like standing shoulder to shoulder next to us on the ground in a nation.

Please pray for the next steps mentioned and join our Whatsapp Channel to learn more.

Give

Over the next 5 years we are looking to raise in excess of £1 million to specifically invest in the mission in Europe. Will you stand with us and help?

Directly support the wider mission to Europe

Share

If you know someone who you feel will be interested in this update then please pass it on, the more people we can keep informed the more momentum we can build.

Questions?

Simply email pioneer@relationalmission.com

Look out for the next update coming your way in Autumn 2025

Thank you for your support