Church Highlight
Lakeland Living Water
By Pastor Mike Adams
Lakeland Living Water church has entered a new season in 2022! My wife, Patty, and I felt a call to the area, in northern Wisconsin, approximately four years before we moved. In 2015, we finally made the move with our two children, Allison and Austin. It was a sacrifice, but the Lord showed Himself faithful with each step! We experienced the miraculous and the providence of God that would be too numerous to mention here. The way the Lord worked in getting us to Wisconsin made us realize it was truly His will for us to reach that community!
When we arrived in the area, we had already begun to build relationships. In January of 2016, after just a few months of being there, we started services and were able to begin as a daughter work with the people we had. We started meeting at the local town hall; setting up and tearing down each week. Our church experienced the miraculous at work in people’s lives as there were physical healings and miracles; both during services and out in the public. There were specific people who showed up and things that happened that could only have been orchestrated by the omnipotent hand of God!
In the spring of 2017, the Lord gave me a vision of a lady running down the sidewalk in a horrible storm. In the vision, she was very desperate and visibly shaken as she was trying to find shelter from the storm. I saw her look across the street and she saw something that gave her hope. She began to run across the street and the vision abruptly ended. A few months later someone approached me, telling me of a location we could rent. He took me to the location, and it was the exact place where the lady from my vision was running to! We began renting the location and over the next couple of years, we had several ladies come to our church that fit the description of that desperate lady in my vision! They needed hope and shelter in their storms! In one way or another, the Lord had always shown Himself faithful and gave us a reason to go on and plow the field He put us in.
In December 2019, we were approved for North American Missions (NAM) status! Then, in 2020 the world turned upside down. I’m sure we all thought 2021 would be better. I thought the same thing and then it actually arrived. It was the most difficult year our family and our church had ever faced. Our family faced physical, mental, and spiritual battles that we never had before! We faced tremendous attacks that almost broke us. In addition, we also lost the building we were renting for church.
I was reminded of 1 Peter 4:12-13 where it says, “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you: But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when His glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.” I prayed for that glory to be revealed and for that joy to return. I began to remember the faithful God that provided the means to bring us to our city! I began to remember the faithful God who showed up in our services and out in public! I decided, at the minimum, to just wait and be faithful until the Lord showed up. In November 2021, the Lord began to move. Let me just say, if we are faithful to God when we are “able”, God will be faithful to us when we are “unable”!
For a few years, we had been looking for a building we could purchase in order to facilitate the mission and ministry God had called us to. Soon, our realtor called us and told us there was a building that was going on the market in a few days. It was an actual church building that was a perfect size at a great price! We later found out that it was about $75,000 under value, which is unheard of in the current real estate market! Over the years, we had checked out a few different banks, but no one would loan us money for a building. We contacted the UPCI Loan Fund and began to inquire into a loan for the building. As we began to work through the process with Brother Rick Lovall, we were approved for the loan we needed for the building! Everything worked out and on January 18th, 2022, we closed on the building and moved into our new church home! I’m glad we didn’t give up when circumstances looked hopeless. We need to realize that when the going gets rough, Jesus gets going! God is faithful! I am forever thankful to Jesus, to the UPCI Loan Fund, and to our national and district NAM departments! We could not have done it without all of them! God is truly a good God!
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