‘We do not lose heart’: Reflections from a church planting pastor’s wife
Lois Franks works alongside her husband church planting in the Rhondda valley of South Wales. Here, she shares some of the joys and challenges of being a church planting pastor’s wife.
It has now been 10 years since my husband, Ben, and I set out on the journey of planting Hope Church Rhondda here in South Wales.
As a young couple, full of faith, plenty of naivety and a fair dose of idealism, we really had no idea just what an adventure we would be embarking on! It has been a journey of many highs and lows, full of excitement and fulfilment but also marked by tears, disappointments and pain. And yet, 10 years later we have the joy of leading a healthy, vibrant, local church in a town called Tonypandy in the heart of the post-industrial Welsh Valleys.
God has been incredibly kind to us here in the Rhondda. He has allowed us the privilege of leading a church that we love, full of people that we love, who are pouring out their lives to see Jesus lifted high in a valley that we love. Our context is a fairly typical post-industrial region, with the most beautiful rolling hills and incredible community spirit, coupled with high rates of unemployment and substance abuse, and where less than 1% of people attend a church of any kind each week.
Beautifully, we have seen the Lord breaking through the hardest of hearts and we count it a real joy being a part of His mission here. Our heart is to see a Gospel-centred and Spirit-filled church in every community here in the Rhondda Valleys, and we are currently working towards the next two in Trebanog and Treorchy. It’s exciting, exhausting and exceptionally challenging!
Beautifully, we have seen the Lord breaking through the hardest of hearts and we count it a real joy being a part of His mission here.
Some verses the Lord spoke to me through before starting out as a Pastor’s wife were in 2 Corinthians 4:
Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart…For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake…But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
There have been some tough times, both personally and for us as a church family, but the hope of the Gospel has brought incredible strength as we seek to make Jesus famous in our valley. Spurgeon once said, ‘When we cannot trace His hand, we must learn to trust His heart’ and I have found that to be true in life and ministry over and over again.
There have been some tough times, both personally and for us as a church family, but the hope of the Gospel has brought incredible strength as we seek to make Jesus famous in our valley.
We had felt called to plant a second congregation in Treorchy in 2018 following several people from that area coming to faith in Jesus. We made steps to that end, buying a house in the area, starting our boys in the local school and beginning to gather; running an Alpha course and eventually launching on Sundays just prior to the Covid-19 pandemic. It was an amazing time, seeing people giving their lives to the Lord and even talking about how their lives had been transformed to the local shopkeepers after leaving our times together!
But unfortunately, our house needed much more building work than expected and we were unable to move in. Then the pandemic hit. Our fledgling little community of new believers took a battering and ultimately fell apart. We lost the building we had been using and many who had been exploring faith with us bunkered down and have failed to re-emerge. Some joined in with things during the lockdowns, but many are yet to connect in with church life post-pandemic. I’m often left wondering what the Lord’s plans and purposes were in it all. Why did we see such momentum and what seemed to be fruit, for it all to be stalled and come to nothing? We were stepping out in obedience, uprooting our lives to follow the Lord’s leading…Shouldn’t that mean things go smoothly?! (Note my tongue in cheek!) It can be sad, disappointing and confusing. Yet ‘having this ministry by the mercy of God we do not lose heart’.
We finally moved into our house just before Christmas 2022 and we’re now in the process of looking ahead to replant the congregation. We’ve been gathering in our home midweek with others from the area and we’re trusting the Lord to lead us when the time is right. I don’t understand everything, but I’m trusting my Saviour. I know the Lord has a plan for our community. I know He loves the lost more than I ever could. I know that He is good and faithful. I know that I can trust Him. His way of doing things will be far better than anything I could conjure up!
I have found again and again on this church planting adventure that things don’t always go to my plan, but He who has called us is faithful (1 Thessalonians 5:24)! So I’m encouraged to keep going, to not lose heart and to trust Him. And I hope in me sharing a little of our story, you will be too.
Please give to enable us to support and encourage church planters like the Franks, and to see new church planters trained and sent out.