Rodney and Susan Henderson

And we’re on the move …. again!   A year ago, as God made it clear that our time serving in Colorado was drawing to a close, we asked God “what’s next?” He brought to us the realization that July 2024 would mark 20 years in full-time ministry. Following His leading, we are spending our last 2 years (2023 and 2024) serving in three of the churches that have supported us for our entire missionary journey. Two years out of 20 - a tithe - giving back to those who have so generously given to us.   We have said our goodbyes to our Calvary Family in Sault Ste. Marie and have made the move to Kalamazoo, MI to serve in our sending church, Northeastern Baptist Church . We’ve been a part of Northeastern’s Church Family for 35 years and count it a great privilege to have been their first “home-grown” commissioned missionaries, serving first in Portugal, then Colorado, and now back in Michigan. We’ve come full circle back where our journey began.   We covet your prayers as we settle in our next ap

God's Gifts in Sault Ste. Marie During our time of ministry in Sault Ste. Marie, God has given us these gifts: participating in and pouring into existing small groups presenting a church-wide training on becoming a more welcoming church, including the restructure and enhancement of our existing greeting team an enriching time in Ladies Ministries, as Susan has the privilege to lead the Ladies Group the deepening of mentoring relationships the completion of Phase 1 of a church survey of Calvary’s ministries continuing opportunities to love and pour into our Calvary Family building new and deepening existing relationships four Ladies Brunches - ladies who call Calvary “home” were invited to a time of fellowship - a whopping 75% of our ladies attended one or more of the brunches opportunities to freshen up, repair, and paint several areas in the church building continuing in ministry as we seek to finish strong impacting others for the cause of Christ Looking ahead: We have a few mor

Northbridge Church—Kalamazoo, MI What a blessing to “brag on God” and rehearse His many blessings as Rod presented our missionary journey to Northbridge on July 23. It was a joy to see some long-time friends and celebrate God’s blessings with God’s people. Read More.....

 Settled in the Soo ...  As of February 1, we were officially settled in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. God granted our desire to integrate quickly with our new church family. Our goal was to love them and love them well - and love them we do! In our short time here, God has also allowed us to: learn the ministries of the church serve Pastor Dave and his wife, Teresa meet with the elders and their wives and hear their hearts for ministry provide a “fresh set of eyes” towards the current church paradigms help the church leadership develop or evaluate methods and procedures currently not in place interview ministry leaders and document current methods and procedures suggest and help implement a new bulletin design implement a new church website (click HERE ) implement a new church database, mobile app, and more serve on the Worship Team help prepare Easter Music assist (boots on the ground) as needed Read MORE ....

First - the GREAT News! You may remember our last prayer letter outlined the amazing ways God is using grief to draw people to Himself. We are excited to give you the AWESOME news that Lady #3 (from our October letter) is now a follower of Jesus ! In her words, “I feel lighter, I feel fuller than I ever have”. Praising God once again! Next - the SURPRISING News! There was a song that became popular in churches about 20 years ago called “Trust His Heart”. As we were thinking about writing this news, these lyrics came to mind: God is too wise to be mistaken God is too good to be unkind So when you don't understand When you don't see His plan When you can't trace His hand Trust His Heart God is leading us to leave South Holly Church - soon. We will finish our responsibilities here by Christmas, have our farewell dinner and say our goodbyes on January 8, and then be done serving at South Holly Church. This was not in our plan, nor was this our timing, but it is

God uses grief. In fact, God uses LOTS of things to bring others to Himself! We (Rod and Susan) are currently facilitating their 7th full cycle of GriefShare at South Holly. Each cycle is 13 weeks in length, which allows time to get to know each of the participants and walk their grief journey with them. For various reasons, we considered canceling the fall cycle of GriefShare and waiting until January to resume. God did not let us - and here’s why…… Read MORE......  

 Let us tell you about a guy - we’ll call him “Peter”. Some back story first - In March, the management of our church’s website volleyed back to Susan, who, with her eye for detail, got on the back door of the website to see what needed to be updated, if anything. God showed her that there was a problem with the “Contact Us” card, meaning that there were individuals that had filled it out, hoping and expecting to hear a response from South Holly. The link was broken, so South Holly never received those emails. None of us knew….. The South Holly Staff reached out to those individuals, apologizing for the delay in response, as they had all requested information 2 months earlier. Pastor Shannon sent a message to “Peter”. “Peter” attended Men’s Group the next day, and the week after that, and so on. The next month, his whole family came for Easter, and they continue to come. “Peter” actually showed up to help with set up that Easter morning - before they had ever attended a Morning Worshi

Planting 10 churches in 10 years sounds pretty amazing, especially for a church that has just reached about 100 in attendance, but that’s the plan. Our lead pastor of 2 years, Shannon Popp, has a heart for planting churches, and with some ABWE help, we are on track to plant a church by Easter of 2023. The pastor for the first church plant, Table Fellowship Church, is currently South Holly’s Worship Leader, Pastor Arick Graham and his wife, Rachel. We are working hard at growing South Holly, developing the processes to prepare not only for our growth but also for the sending of a significant percentage of our church families to assist in planting Table Fellowship. Additionally, a fellowship of Telegu-speaking families from India are using South Holly as their church home location. They have their own pastor, who has recently joined South Holly, along with his family, for emigration reasons. They will at some point plant their own church in the community near us, which makes another chur

  “A” …. is a 25-year-old business professional with a winning, outgoing personality and with whom Rod has developed a good friendship. “A” owns his own business and has a background in marketing. Unless God changes his path, we fully expect him to be a millionaire at a young age. He is that good at what he does, which makes him the perfect person to assist Rod in his plan to present the Gospel to one million hearers. “S” …. is a 50-something woman who Rod and Susan met through GriefShare. Susan continues to pour into her life, meeting her for lunches. While she was quite open to hearing about Christ for a time, she is now more resistant to the possibility of a relationship with Christ. Still, God continues to place this woman on Susan’s heart, and their relationship continues to deepen. “G” …. is a 21-year-old intern at South Holly. “G” has an awesome testimony of how God turned his life around in a very dramatic fashion. He not only interns with Pastor Shannon, he is Rod’s “ri

"The Gospel in front of one million people" - that is the desire as expressed by Pastor Popp, our lead pastor at South Holly Church. Please remember that although South Holly has grown and has made huge strides in the last year, it is still relatively small, with an average attendance of 76.5 people per Sunday in the month of February. But rushing in where angels fear to tread, I (Rod) put together a “brainstorming session” on how to reach one million people - and not just touches - but presenting the Gospel to one million people. After collecting many ideas from the eight of us in attendance, we categorized them into one of four quadrants representing differing levels of “Value” and “Do-ability”. Taking these categorized ideas, and looking at skill-sets as well as the church calendar, we now have a preliminary sequence of Action Items that are ranked as high value and high do-ability. Here’s the ringer, a few days before the Brainstorming Session, I was chatting with

Rod and I met S through a South Holly Church member who knew she had recently lost her mother. At our first encounter with S, we knew she was struggling – a lot – in her grief, but also recognized that she did not know the only One who could truly heal her grief, and that’s Jesus. Within the first couple of weeks, I offered to meet with S for coffee – which we did. I just listened. I asked if she’d like to meet again, which she accepted, and we met for lunch. I just listened. That grew into meeting S for lunch every Tuesday, which we continue to do. I still listen WAY more than I talk. As I listened to her story, she told me she went to Catholic school all throughout her life. She didn’t “get” religion class and was so frustrating to the nuns that they told her, “You are doomed to hell”, kicked her out of religion class and told her to work in the kitchen instead. She became very adept in the kitchen tasks as she apparently spent lots of time there - instead of in religion cla

"I think we're there. Our prayers have been answered!" The words we had longed to hear from Dr. Yakes had been spoken. As of Friday, July 24, Rod's ongoing medical treatments are finished! Yet as we reflect on this journey, we have MUCH to Praise God for! God allowed us to have a significant ministry with many, many medical personnel. Rod would often be asked - "What do you have to tell me about the Bible today?" One day, a nurse liaison said to us, "We were talking about you before you came in this morning. Why are you always so patient? Why do you never get frustrated with all the schedule changes and long wait times?" Rod's answer - It's God. At one point in the course of treatments, Rod asked if he could pray with Dr. Yakes before his treatment, which he gladly accepted.  As a beloved pastor used to tell us, "You can get a lot of gospel in a prayer!" From then on, before every treatment, Dr. Yakes called all the medical person

We want to publicly THANK GOD for all He is doing here in Centennial!  God has called a new pastor to join us at South Holly! We are thrilled to announce that Pastor Shannon Popp has joined the pastoral staff as our new Lead Pastor.  South Holly hosted our first Christmas by Candlelight , a ladies outreach event. We had 37 ladies in attendance, of which 19 were non-South Holly ladies. Many of these were unsaved. Rod had the opportunity to preach from one of his favorite Bible passages, Isaiah 43. South Holly is just finishing its first cycle of GriefShare - a Christian-based grief-recovery support group, which has been a blessing to many! Rod's main doctor told us just this week that "we are almost done" with his ongoing medical treatments. Click here to read more.......

Moving Forward! Exciting things are happening here at South Holly! Our congregation is discussing whether or not to call a younger pastor to join the Farlows and the Hendersons on staff here at South Holly. An important part of a church-planter's job is to bring the church to a point where they both need and can financially support a full-time pastor. Pastor Sam and Pastor Rod plan to remain on staff, as missionaries, to assist with the  transition. We are earnestly seeking God's direction in this decision, and we covet your prayers for our church. We have had a month-long season of praying and fasting, asking God for wisdom regarding our future. God has a plan, and His plan is good. We're looking forward to what He will do in the coming months. Rod's Treatments Rod continues to have regular medical treatments for his birth defect. We recently received some very encouraging news from his main surgeon. The doctor said, "We know we're getting close,  be

We are very excited to share our new life and ministries that God has given us in Colorado. Despite the many changes for us in the last 1.5 years, we are rejoicing at all God is doing in our church, our family and in our personal lives. Ministry Update What a blessing to enjoy the ministries God has called us to here in Colorado! He has allowed us to transition well and we have been blessed by the gracious welcome from the South Holly Baptist Church congregation. Rod is serving as Associate Pastor, focusing on Outreach and Evangelism. His health has drastically improved from 2 years ago, so this allows him to return to ministry the day after his treatments. Praise God, he is able to serve full-time (usually 6 days a week). Susan is serving primarily in the areas of mentoring women and music; she also has taken on administrative responsibilities for the church, relieving Pastor Sam Farlow, the senior pastor. She is enjoying ministering with and to the church members as God allows.

We come to you this Christmas Season to wish you great joy in Jesus as you share Him with those around you. May He bless your days and your hearts as you continue to serve Him in your part of the world. We invite you to read snippets of our lives in ministry as well as our personal lives below. We rejoice in all that God is doing on our behalf. As always, we THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH for your continued prayers, your love and your support as we transition to our new Denver ministries. May God continue to bless you richly for them. To read more of our recent Prayer Letter, click here .

As you may recall, I (Rod) am receiving treatments for a birth defect which was asymptomatic until after we arrived in Portugal. Although it grew substantially during our first term, it was not until our second term that it became problematic. After being told in Portugal that my problem is so rare that not even 1 in 10 million have this and that no one in Europe could treat it, my Portuguese Vascular Surgeon found the world’s expert on these conditions in Denver, Colorado. Since January, I have been receiving treatments, and they are going well. I can feel the difference as I now have breath to sing the hymns and am physically better and stronger. I feel blessed to have found this doctor since my prognosis for growing old had become very grim should I elect not to have the treatments. After my April treatments, my doctor informed me that my treatments will last through all of 2019 and possibly longer. If I pause the treatments to return to Portugal, there is a 30% chance it wi

God’s Clear Hand We know that God moves and guides and directs our lives every day, but it is a special blessing when we see Him clearing   obstacles from our path during   difficult times. He has been doing that for me (Rod) recently. I was born with a birth defect (it never turns cancerous) which had been asymptomatic until a few years after   arriving in Portugal. At first the changes were not much more than a curiosity to me, as it seemed to be making no difference in how I felt.  These last few years it has become problematic. After seeking medical treatment for 1.5 years in Europe and being unable to find anyone to treat it because my condition is extremely rare, my Portuguese surgeon directed me to the "world's best" provider of the treatments I need. God has opened doors and greatly expedited the application process, as well as providing various types of assistance far beyond any expectations I could have hoped for. On January 29, I began a series of tre

During the Christmas season, we often see signs and cards wishing one a nother peace, joy, or love.  A nice sentiment - but as believers, we know these emotions - in their true and lasting form - come only as we enter into relationship with Him and become true Jesus-followers.  It is a pleasure to share with you the true joy we felt when we received word from Portugal of another woman, "C" who recently trusted Christ as her Savior! She now has not only the promise of eternal life, but the promise of Him walking with her daily. We pray that she will experience Christmas in a new and fresh way this year as she celebrates her first Christmas with Jesus as her Savior. May each of you know this true peace - His true peace - as you walk through this season celebrating His birth.  A Very Merry Christmas to you all!  Rod and Susan Read MORE .........

      As missionaries, we live our lives on both sides of the ocean. We tell  people that we have a "divided heart" - when we are Stateside, we miss our family and friends in Portugal, and when we are in Portugal, we miss our  family and friends in the States. While we consider it a great blessing to have loved ones in both locations, it is not an easy thing to know we will always be missing out on life events and fellowship in one place or the other. As much as we do our best to stay connected, there is an inevitable distance that  happens in relationships when we are not in one place full-time. As a  missionary colleague recently shared with me, "The train keeps rolling along when you get off, and others are at a different location when you get back on." Still, we are grateful for technology and for the connection that loving someone brings - we are never far apart when we are joined at the heart.       Yet without a goodbye, there can be no hello. Part of li