Leaders and pastors from Kansas City gathered earlier this year with hearts united around a common cause—spiritual revival across Kansas City. Impassioned to see every individual, family, and community in their city encounter Jesus, they made a bold decision.

This past spring, more than 100 diverse church congregations began working together to adopt all the neighborhoods in Kansas City in an initiative called, “What if the Church Loves KC?”

Gary Kendall, Director of the Love KC initiative, believes the church is called to love beyond its four walls. “We don’t go to church. We are the church. Discipleship isn’t about attending a small group in our church building as much as it is about leading our friends and neighbors to Jesus in our neighborhoods.”

Since mid-May, pastors have been enlisting, empowering, and equipping congregants to boldly live out Jesus’s words in Mark 12:30-31, which call us to love God and love our neighbor.

The churches meet weekly to worship, pray, and serve together. Congregants have been working through two resources provided by American Bible Society. One is a thirty-day devotional journey through God’s Word, highlighting Biblical examples of loving others. The other is a step-by-step field guide with practical instructions on how to live like Jesus in your own neighborhood.

The goal is that by mid-June, 10,000 individuals and families will be loving the people in their neighborhoods through prayer and other acts of kindness. Gary shared this hope for their city: “We are praying for the day when everyone who wakes up in Kansas City would have a neighbor who is praying for them by name, sharing with them, and caring for them as the Bible calls us to love our neighbors.”

Will you join us in praying that Kansas City will be transformed by God’s love as it is lived out through every believer?

Pray for:

• Pray for more churches across Kansas City to join the Love KC initiative and encounter God’s love through his Word.
• Ask God to empower every believer by his Holy Spirit to become a messenger of hope to those in need.
• Pray for all involved in creating, printing, and distributing the resources. Ask God to guide their efforts so the fruit of their labor will empower believers to reach out to their communities.