What can God do with $9.22?

Dear friends – Grace and peace to you from the Easton family. Many of you have walked with us, prayed with us, and labored beside us in the Crossway Network for years. I think many of you knew about what God was doing with our hearts and Pueblo way before we were ready to admit it so thank you for your patience with us.

An Update: The Plant Is Underway!

I grew up in Pueblo, Colorado, and left twenty years ago convinced I didn’t need that town — and convinced I didn’t need God. It took about six months to realize just how lost I was. The only direction I was going was down, in every way. Then the kindness of the Gospel found me. I’ve spent the last twenty years in ministry, and now God is sending our family back to the very city I once couldn’t wait to leave.

We never imagined we’d live in Pueblo again. Now we can’t wait to get to the “Steel City.” And God is already moving. After three vision trips, five couples and five singles have committed to relocate with us, and three solid families already living in Pueblo have joined the core team. We are praying for a launch team of forty and hoping to begin services before the end of the year.

One story captures the season we’re in. Before a recent prayer meeting, a friend handed me a small plastic bag. Inside was his nine-year-old son’s allowance — $9.22 in change and a few small bills — saved up so he could give it to the church plant. It was the very first offering given to the Pueblo church. Not exactly the war chest you’d want for reaching one of the most violent cities in the country. But God has been making big things out of small things for His glory since the beginning.

That night we asked one question: “What can God do with $9.22?”

We’ve set that offering aside in its own account, and Lord willing, when the church in Pueblo someday plants a church of its own, that $9.22 will go with it — a token of what God does with small beginnings.

Why Pueblo?

I sometimes call Pueblo the “Lo-Debar” of Colorado (2 Samuel 9) — the place of nothing, the town people drive past on their way somewhere else. But the King’s decree goes out to forgotten people in forgotten cities, and there are Mephibosheths in Pueblo: people who feel disqualified by their past and don’t yet know there’s a seat for them at the King’s table. If you know Colorado, you know how people feel about Pueblo. In most cases the. rumors are true.

#1

Highest violent crime rate of any large city in Colorado — roughly 3x the national average.

~2 in 3

Pueblo County residents have no connection to any church (2020 U.S. Religion Census).

$56K

Median household income — far below Colorado’s ~$97K, with poverty nearly double the state rate.

Add to that a college-degree rate roughly half the state average, and you have a picture. of a hard working, blue-collar city that Colorado’s prosperity drove right past. Pueblo doesn’t need a program. It needs the Gospel — and Gospel-centered churches that will stay.

But Pueblo is more than just the news clips and desert brown landscape. It’s one of the oldest cities in the state with a deep small town tradition. It’s beautiful and simple and so community oriented. In Pueblo, the people have your back because no one else will. It’s a place where it will be hard to get one but once you do, all their aunties and uncles and neighbors will follow. Think of a city that is spiritually dry. We want to be the spark that God uses to start a fire.

Three Ways Your Church Can Stand With Us

We are not writing first to ask for money (though the fund link is below for those so led). We’re asking for something we believe is worth even more. Would your church consider three things?

• Pray — every staff meeting, for one year. Would your staff or elder team commit to praying for the Pueblo plant at every staff meeting for the next twelve months? Pray for the gathering of the forty, for the soil of the city, and for our family’s transition.
• Platform — let us share the story. This feels forward, but we’re family, right? I would love to come preach and share the vision with your church in person — or, if that’s not workable, to send a short video update your congregation can watch in a service or members’ meeting. Either way, your people get a front-row seat to what’s happening in Pueblo, and can connect with what the network is doing.
• Pass it on — share our newsletter. Would you send our newsletter link out to your church family? It’s the simplest way for your people to follow the story, pray specifically, and watch God answer in real time.

If it would serve you, I’m glad to meet with your leadership team, jump on a call, or just talk over a cup of coffee. Pueblo has been waiting a long time. We don’t want to go alone — and in the Crossway Network, we never have. Planting and building churches together!

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