We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the Gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us.   I Thessalonians 2:8

Greetings from Parakaleo!

Welcome to the Parakaleo (Church Planting Spouses Ministry) MNA informational page.

MNA Church Planting Spouses Ministry (Parakaleo) Director Shari Thomas

MNA Church Planting Spouses Ministry (Parakaleo) Associate Director Tami Resch

The name parakaleo is a Greek word meaning “coming alongside”. Having been co-laborers with our husbands in church plants and experiencing the work and frustrations of the job first hand, our desires is to strengthen the Gospel spreading impact of church planting by coming alongside church planting spouses, couples and church planting movements. We do this through coaching, connecting, caring, and celebrating in order to facilitate adequate training, encouragement, and care of spouses and couples.

We value living in light of God’s redemptive story
We are caught up into the ancient epic where God invades our story and invites us to join him in bringing transformation to a broken world. We believe this best occurs when men and women partner in this task as joint image bearers.

We value living out of our identity in Christ
We, being children of God, joined to Christ and filled with his righteousness are a delight to our Father apart from our performance. Believing that our identity is fixed firmly in Christ, instead of the success of self, spouse, or our church, we are empowered and freed to love. When we view the dynamic
context of church planting through this lens, the Gospel mends us and moves us to relate to God, spouse, and others in love.

We value living in community as kingdom building partners
We believe we more fully reflect God’s image when we are connected than when we are apart. We believe in connectionalism as a fundamental aspect of being in the Imago Dei. Therefore, we are committed to developing community: local, national, and virtual that brings awareness of available resources, other church planting movements, and broader Kingdom work.

For more information on attending a training venue, finding, or starting a parakaleo network in your area, please look at our web site parakaleo.us

You won’t be surprised to know this ministry operates on donations. If you are interested in knowing how you can support parakaleo through financial gifts, volunteering your time, or other resources please contact: sthomas@pcanet.org or tresch@pcanet.org. Parakaleo keeps all emails and email addresses confidential.