Family and friends,

We can hardly believe that the year 2022 is almost over! This year, Emily and I celebrated our fifth anniversary of living in Boston and our church celebrated its third anniversary since planting in 2019.

Here is a small glimpse of a few amazing things that have happened in our ministry this past year:

  1. We found a new meeting space in Brighton! As many of you may remember, our church was displaced from its original meeting location and had to temporarily move to a neighboring area called Newton due to COVID. We were working hard to find a new location in our target neighborhood of Brighton and finally found a spot and moved in at the end of August. It is a great location that allows for lots of growth, a CoaH Kids space, is right off of the T with ease of access for public transportation, is right next door to Boston College, and has been a huge blessing to our congregation!

  2. We affirmed 9 new members this year and have at least 3 more of our regular attenders planning to attend our next Weekender (our membership course) in February. We currently have 41 members at our church! We also baptized 2 people this year and have at least 1 other person interested in baptism for the new year.

  3. We have over 100 people that call our church “home” with an average attendance each Sunday of approximately 70 people.

  4. Since moving to our new location in Brighton on August 21, 2022, we have had 62 NEW guests attend our church, several of them getting plugged into our weekly Community Groups and worship gatherings.

  5. Two of our Community Groups are large enough to multiply. Pray with us as we maneuver next steps to best make that happen as we grow!

  6. Our church gave almost $2,000 worth of gift cards to students without homes at our local high school and is giving away 10% of all tithes/offerings in the month of December to The Foster Box, a local nonprofit organization that helps foster families in the Greater Boston area to get all the supplies they need for placements. Through the generous partnership of SendRelief, our church also gave hundreds of winter coats, shoes, and socks to Catie’s Closet at Brighton High School (a place where students that lack essential resources like food and clothing can “shop” for themselves and their families while at school).

  7. We hosted 5 movie nights this summer and, over the course of those 5 movie nights, had approximately 1,000 people attend who all heard the gospel shared during our movie night introduction. At the movie nights, we also had over 80 people express interest in having a spiritual conversation via our raffle card.

  8. We hosted a GenSend team this summer, who supported the different ministries of the church including our newest ministry outreach, Upward Brighton! Upward Brighton was a 4-week basketball camp that we hosted for the children in our neighborhood and was a great success. We had the opportunity to speak to many children and their families about the good news of Jesus and look forward to making Upward Brighton a regular part of our summer outreach.

Below are ministry pictures from this past year:

Specific ways you can pray for us in 2023:

  1. New Pastoral Development Track

    Aaron will be bringing two men through a pastoral development track starting in January 2023. As our church has grown so has the need for additional pastors at our church. Brandon helped plant CoaH Brighton and he and his family have been faithful members since our launch in 2019. Kyle and his wife, Alex, moved from Hickory Grove to Boston in order for Kyle to become the church’s Ministry Associate starting in August 2021 and they have been invaluable since moving here.

    Please pray for Brandon and Kyle as they enter this pastoral development track, which will be an intensive time of study, testing, and equipping to make sure these men are prepared, equipped, and the right fit to be pastors one day at CoaH Brighton. Pray for our church to receive additional godly leadership well, for Brandon and Kyle to be well equipped through this track, and for Aaron as he pours hours of investment into these men for the health and betterment of CoaH Brighton’s future.

  2. Summer Outreach

    Summer seems far off but, for us, the planning has already begun! Pray for us as we plan the many details that go into the following outreaches:

    -GenSend: A mission team of college students that will serve CoaH Brighton for a portion of their summer

    -Upward Brighton: A basketball camp for local children that teaches fundamentals of basketball but also allows us to talk about the gospel and some key character traits we learn from Jesus

    -Community Nights: These nights are for our church family to gather at a local park to spend time together and invite unbelieving friends, neighbors, and co-workers (many unbelievers in our area are unwilling to attend a church gathering on a Sunday morning but would attend a park gathering with the church)

    -Movie Nights: We will have 4 movie nights each Friday in July and 1 in September (during The Big Move — see below). Movie nights have been a great way for us to grow our reputation in the neighborhood, to share the gospel on a big scale with those in our area, and to engage with the families in our community.

    -Kids Summer Adventure: Our version of Vacation Bible School! This past year we had approximately 50 kids learn about Jesus for an entire week through crafts, songs, Bible lessons, and much more.

    -The Big Move: Each year, 30% of Boston turns over. We live in a very transient city! The vast majority of rental leases for apartments begin on September 1 every year so there are a lot people that need help moving on that date, which our church provides for free to those we come across in Brighton.

  3. Community Group Multiplication

    Our church family meets weekly in Community Groups that gather throughout Brighton on different nights of the week. These Community Groups dive deeper into the passage of Scripture preached on Sunday mornings and live on intentional mission together for a particular pocket of people in the neighborhood (for example: a local non-profit or a nearby low-income housing authority — seeking to find ways to love, support, care, and share the gospel with the pocket of people each Community Group chooses to focus on). Two of our Community Groups are getting to be too big, which is a great problem to have! We are almost ready to multiply those groups so please pray for more leaders to be raised up, for each group to continue thriving and growing, and for the multiplication process to go smoothly.

  4. Personal Family Update

    As a quick update regarding our family, we are busy but doing well! Our oldest daughter, Kiana, is attending Kindergarten at a university model school (part private Christian school and part homeschool), which has been an immeasurable blessing to our family. Emily teaches Kiana during the home days and allows us to have additional family time since weeknights and weekends can be filled with counseling meetings, Community Group coaching times, and sermon preparation for Aaron. We are also about to celebrate Shacerra’s 4th birthday right before Christmas!

    We have the privilege of going on a one-month sabbatical soon, which will allow us additional uninterrupted time with our girls and lots of rest after a busy 5 years. The City on a Hill Church Network has been great to set up policies for lead planters and their families to take a one-month break after the third year of planting and our family is greatly looking forward to the time away. Please pray for rest, rejuvenation, and for lots of family time during our one-month sabbatical.

    We also ask that you pray for us as we consider what it looks like to continue expanding our family through foster care and adoption. Pray for best next steps and an abundance of wisdom as we work with our social worker about the possibility of fostering another kiddo in the fall or winter of next year.

As always, we are deeply grateful for each of you, for your prayer, care, and financial support. We know that you are interceding on our behalf and on behalf of our church and those prayers are needed and very felt. If you’d like to give a one-time gift to support our ministry in Boston, you can click the button provided below (and choose the Aaron Peters Church Planting Fund in the dropdown menu).

Thank you again!

-The Peters Family