Hey everybody, it's Pastor Jonathan Shelley from Steadfast Baptist Church and Pure Words
Baptist Church.
I want to make an announcement about our churches and our church plants that we have, especially
regarding leadership and changes for the future.
I'm very excited about the two church plants that we have.
We have Pure Words Baptist Church down in Houston and we also have Steadfast Baptist
Church in Oklahoma City.
Both of these churches are going really well.
They have two great evangelists that are there helping these churches to thrive.
In Oklahoma City, we have evangelist Tanner Furr who's been doing a great job and the
church is going really well.
Then we also have evangelist Duncan Urbanik down in Houston at Pure Words who's been
also doing a great job and that church has been growing.
I'm really pleased with the work that these guys have been doing in these churches.
We also have other great men that are in our churches that have a bright future.
We're actually going to be making a lot of changes in regards to the plan and vision
for these churches.
It's my goal to try and get these churches set up to be as successful as possible, not
just for the short term, but also for the long term future.
I've been praying about this and talking to a lot of different people, but we're planning
on transitioning a few different men to end up taking these two church plants and becoming
independent churches, just becoming the pastors of these churches.
I want to first start and talk about Pure Words Baptist Church.
Now, this is a church that I started a little over five years ago.
It's a great church, a lot of great people.
It would be great to see it have its own pastor separate from Steadfast to where the pastor's
attention isn't divided and he can really just run with this particular church.
Brother Duncan Urbanek, who has been an evangelist down there, has been a huge stopgap to hold
that church together and give us the opportunity to have this transition where we can have
a man of God come in there and become its pastor.
Now, of course, evangelist Duncan Urbanek would have been a great option for this church,
but we also have another guy, Salvador Alvarez in the Oklahoma City Church who has been training
to become a pastor and he's really close to getting the point where he can be ordained.
And Brother Salvador is someone who speaks Spanish fluently.
He knows the Bible really well.
He preaches great and I'm really impressed with his zeal for churches and church planting.
He's a great song leader and so I really feel like he would be a great fit in the long term
going down to Pure Words and taking that church on and becoming its full-time pastor.
And so that is the vision for the church down at Pure Words is to have Brother Salvador
come down and essentially take on the leadership of that church and to transition into becoming
its pastor and becoming completely independent.
Now just to give you some kind of a timeline, it looks like we'll probably be transitioning
him down at the beginning of next year and most likely ordaining him in the middle or
towards August of the 2024 year.
So we're really excited about this opportunity for him and his family to come down to Houston
and to take on this church.
I believe this church has a great opportunity to reach a lot of English speaking people,
a lot of Spanish speaking people and the Houston area is almost 8 million people, tons and
tons of growth potential and this church is doing great.
Evangelos Urbanik has been really just doing an excellent job.
Church has been growing, preaching great sermons and for Evangelos Urbanik, while he also
be a great candidate to be a pastor, he has a really unique opportunity having a zeal
to go to the Philippines and what we would like to do is we would like to take this opportunity
to transition him to the Philippines and give him an opportunity to help with the church
planning over there, possibly starting churches, even possibly becoming a pastor in the Philippines
and he'll be fully supported by Steadfast Baptist Church.
And so, I think that this would be a great opportunity to kind of transition these two
guys and allow Brother Salvador to come down, take on this church, become its pastor, become
completely independent and for Evangelos Urbanic to go to the Philippines to do a great and
mighty work for the Lord.
And I think just logistically, this is going to be a great opportunity for both men, for
these churches for the work of Christ and I'm really excited about that.
Additionally, we have the Oklahoma City Church with Evangelos Furr and he's been doing an
excellent job as well, really pleased with his work.
He in this time of transition has decided that he would prefer to just work for the
church rather than becoming the full-time pastor and so actually we're going to be sending
Brother Dylan Oz up to Oklahoma to end up taking on that church and becoming its pastor.
From a timeline perspective, it's most likely going to be about a year and God willing maybe
the late fall of next year, he'll be able to transition up there, be able to have work
and everything like that that he needs and then to basically take that church and become
a completely autonomous independent church as their pastor and Brother Oz has been doing
such a great job here at Steadfast Baptist Church, training, learning so much about the
ministry, going through difficult situations, also getting to experience all kinds of soul
winning, preaching, he's a great preacher, great song leader, great family and really
I think he's going to do a great job as a pastor and it's going to be a great opportunity
for him to transition to the Oklahoma City Church and to basically become their pastor.
And that affords evangelists for the opportunity to continue being an evangelist, doing the
work of the Lord.
We believe that after that transition he has expressed desire to continue working for Steadfast
and doing evangelism and doing work for them.
So we look forward to that as well.
Of course when we talk about plans and we talk about a year from now, things could obviously
evolve or change, but I want to at least cast a vision for the future, let these churches
know the plan that we have for them and to allow these men to make these transitions,
God willing, so that we can do even more work for the Lord.
You know, it is our vision to see men ordained, churches started, for them to become independent
and autonomous and for those men to do the same thing, to also send out men, to ordain
men, to start churches, to do their own soul winning trips and have their own conferences
and to basically break out and to just do even more for the Lord.
And I'm really excited about these transitions.
I've spoken with all of these men.
I've spoken with several of our church members about these men, about their opportunities
and what they think.
And honestly, everyone is really excited about these opportunities.
I think it's going to be a really great transition for the long term.
I think Brother Oz is going to do a great job in the Oklahoma City area.
I think that Brother Salvador is going to do a great job in the Houston area.
And I'm really excited about the work that Evangelist Urbanic is going to be able to
do in the Philippines.
Of course, you know, we want to be sensitive to the spirit and where he moves us.
You know, I had planned on living in Houston my entire life and basically being a pastor
of Pure Words Baptist Church for the rest of my life.
And it's very hard for me to think about the idea of giving that church to someone else.
But I think what's best for Pure Words Baptist Church is to have a separate pastor who can
lead them.
And you know, I really want that person to be someone I think is going to do a great
job.
And I really feel like Brother Salvador is a great fit for that church, for their future.
And of course, we're all going to still be friends and of course, I'm sure we'll coordinate
and work together as much as possible.
But it'd be great to see these churches go out and have the ability to do as much work
as they possibly can.
And you know, as we go through this transition, please pray for these men.
Please help these men.
We're going to set up a Give Sin Go for Evangelos Urbanic going to the Philippines as we are
going to be supporting him out there and to make that transition definitely can be a little
bit difficult.
But if you would like to help Evangelos Urbanic on his journey out there, we would love for
you to support him.
He's planning on making a trip in January and I'm also planning on traveling out to
the Philippines just to scout the area and to meet with the people there.
We're going to be going to Manila where Pastor Stuckey is there and we'll be kind of joining
his work a little bit.
And so in January, I'll give you the date that way if you wanted to know, essentially
January 14th, I and Evangelos Urbanic are going to be out in Manila at Pastor Stuckey's
church out there and we're going to be scouting the area and eventually Evangelos Urbanic
is going to be moving his whole family over there.
We're not sure exactly if they're going to move at that time or move a little bit after
that portion of time, maybe later January or February but essentially that is the goal
is for Evangelos Urbanic and his family to move out there and to do that work.
While I'm out there, I'm also going to be visiting Pastor Kevin Sepulveda at New Life
Baptist Church in Australia and I'll be out there for their Wednesday night service the
week before so I'm really excited to go to that part of the country, see these other
pastors and see their work.
We're excited about sending Evangelos Urbanic over into the Philippines to do a big work
for the Lord.
I'm really excited about these church plants and God willing in about a year's time or
by the end of next year, it should be that these churches are independent and steadfast
is no longer has church plants.
They'll be looking forward to their next adventure and our next mission, but I hope that you
just pray for us.
Steadfast Baptist Church is going great.
We're adding new people regularly.
We're growing and we have lots of other trips and things planned for the future, but I want
you to get excited for these men.
Pray for them, encourage them, and we look forward to these transitions as they happen.
I'll give you more information as we get closer.
We also are planning for Brother Oz to come out and preach in the Oklahoma City Church
soon as well as having Brother Salvador come down to Houston and preach for them very soon
as well.
So, make sure to congratulate these men, please pray for our work, and if you are anywhere
in these areas, you need to get plugged into one of these churches.
This is a great work, great people, and I'm really excited about what the Lord has been
doing and we look forward to what he'll do in the future.
Well God bless you.
You have a great day.