Highlights of Celebration California 2021 from Tami Boomsma:

Why would 200 people from 3 different California Sovereign Grace Churches pack their bags, load up their cars, and travel 2 hours into the mountains of the San Bernardino National Forest to spend the weekend together?

To attend our California Celebration! The purpose of this gathering was to worship and seek the Lord together, to build unity, and to be renewed in our vision, purpose, and calling as churches living in Southern California.

Sovereign Grace Church of Orange (Eric Turbedsky), Cross of Grace Santa Ana (Kyle Houlton), and Sovereign Grace Church of Pasadena (Ron Boomsma) held a weekend church retreat in October at the Tahquitz Pines Conference Center in Idyllwild, CA. Our churches are located in three disparate cities in Southern California. We have many differences between us in terms of age, style, demographics, and church culture, but we have this in common: we each possess a commitment to God’s Word, to Sovereign Grace Churches’ shared values, a desire to see the gospel preached and more churches planted in California!

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Tami Boomsma is the wife of Ron Boomsma, Senior Pastor of Sovereign Grace Church of Pasadena, where they have served together for more than 30 years.

The full post California Celebration 2021: Three Churches. Two Days. One Mission originally appeared on Nov. 6, 2021 on the Sovereign Grace Church Development blog.

One of our churches, Sovereign Grace Church of Santa Ana, created and released this video just before Easter. We were so encouraged to see the faces of members of that church–people proclaiming joy in the midst of the pandemic, looking for God’s blessing during restrictions. Take a few minutes to watch this video, thanking God for his grace to this church while things are just hard. We hope that it will lead you to rejoice in God’s goodness to each of us specifically, to Sovereign Grace Church of Santa Ana and to our small denomination of churches. Praise God from whom all blessings flow! Where can you find joy in the midst of this pandemic?

Watch the video here.

Sovereign Grace exists to advance the gospel by planting and strengthening churches throughout the world for the glory of God. For that reason, I’m excited to share with you one of our newest church plants, Sovereign Grace Church in Santa Ana, CA. Planted out of Sovereign Grace Church in Orange, CA, this small church plant is marked by a sacrificial servanthood that is committed to helping the lost in their neighborhood hear about Jesus. They are living out the Great Commission (Matt. 28) in a very real way as they seek to serve and care for their community.

This video is introduced by our recently appointed Director of Church Planting, Eric Turbedsky (Senior Pastor, Sovereign Grace Church of Orange). I am so grateful for Eric’s heart for his local community, as well as seeing church’s planted in his surrounding area, throughout the United States and in other nations. He and Kyle Houlton (Senior Pastor, Sovereign Grace Church of Santa Ana) are living out gospel partnership together and I’m excited to see how God uses them in Southern California.

Please take a few minutes to watch this video. And consider financially supporting Sovereign Grace. Opportunities like planting Kyle’s church requires money and resources. We are grateful for your consideration of partnering in our mission to advance the gospel through church planting. If you are interested in giving, you can find more information here.

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Mark Prater is the Executive Director for Sovereign Grace and serves as an elder at Covenant Fellowship Church. He and his wife, Jill, have three married daughters and a growing number of grandchildren.