Update From Pastor Josh Tancordo

This past month has been filled with examples of God's goodness and grace in our lives. One of the highlights of the month was being able to travel down to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, for the annual True Church Conference sponsored by Anchored in Truth and hosted by Grace Life Church of the Shoals. At this conference, I gave a brief report about how the work is going here in Pittsburgh. I was also refreshed by wonderful preaching and fellowship - and got to meet many of you reading this email. The entire conference was food for the soul. 

In addition, as you can see pictured above, we kicked off the next semester of our Redeeming Grace Institute. It is taught by Kevin, one of our church elders, and is focusing on the Psalms this semester. Participants are learning how to interpret the Psalms as well as how to improve their prayer life through the Psalms. It is quite rigorous, with 2-3 hours of homework each week and discussions that address the same topics a seminary class would typically cover. The goal is to equip the saints and raise up leaders. Please pray that God would bless these efforts. 

In addition to that, we'd also greatly appreciate your prayers as we search for a more permanent meeting space for our church. Unfortunately, school districts in our area are becoming increasingly unfriendly to the idea of churches using their facilities. Just this past month, one neighboring school district quadrupled the $2000/month rent it was charging to churches, in addition to prohibiting them from using any classroom space. Thankfully, our school district continues to be courteous to us, but it's hard to escape the feeling that our days there are limited. 

With this mind, we've been in discussions off and on with an established church in our area that has less than a dozen people actively attending. Their building would be very suitable for our needs and is in a great location. However, the amount of money they currently want for it is too high for us. Just this past week, we offered $300K (with another $100K written into the loan for renovations), but they remain firm at $500K. Please pray that God would provide a way forward in his timing and according to his will. We believe this building would be a tremendously valuable tool for ministry. 

And finally, God continues to bless our evangelistic efforts. All of the evangelistic Bible studies I mentioned last month are still going very well. We also plan on baptizing three people this upcoming Sunday, two of them being the fruit of previous evangelism efforts through these kinds of home-based studies. God is indeed mighty to save! Please pray that he would continue working in people's hearts, showing them the glory of Christ and the truth of the gospel. 

Serving Him,
Josh & Becky Tancordo