In this member meeting:
- Gilles shares his testimony
- Philosophy of Ministry Discussion: Discipleship
- Prayer for one another
- Buget 2026 intro
- Update on Counselling Ministry and expenses
- Prayer
A Legacy Worth Leaving: Fatherhood, Brotherhood, and Multi-Generational Faithfulness
Title: A Legacy Worth Leaving: Fatherhood, Brotherhood, and Multi-Generational Faithfulness
Text: Psalm 78:5–7; 2 Timothy 2:2
We are going to be talking about the only legacy that truly matters in eternity: passing the faith on to the next generation.
Psalm 78:5-7: “He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments.”
1. Legacy Begins with being Faithful Fathers
we are the ones that set the spiritual thermostat in our homes
what does it mean to be a faithful Father?
- we are, first, those who love the Lord our God with all of our hearts, mind, soul and strength: it’s not merely the elder’s job to teach your wife and your children good theology; no, good elders assist you in this task, helping remind you that you are the shepherd of your family.
brothers, you are leaving a legacy. The only question is: what kind of legacy is it?
Application: Are you leading your family in the Word? Do your children know more of your hobbies and sports loyalties than your love for Christ? What do you need to commit yourself to doing when you head back home?
2. Legacy is Sustained by Brotherhood in the Church
being a man does not mean that we are self sufficient; no, men recognize that there are some things that we just can’t do ourselves, that we have limits, because we are not the Lord.
Christian brothers are such a gift - Proverbs 27:17: “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another.”
Men, we won’t be the godly men that God would have us be and that our families, church and culture need, on our own.
Application: Do you have brothers who know your battles, your temptations, and your fears? Or are you walking alone? Who knows you? Who can speak in?
3. Legacy Requires Courage to Swim Against the Current
men who live for temporary applause will leave no eternal legacy. However, men who live for Christ will leave ripples for generations.
Application: How’s your legacy? What are you handing down to your children or those younger in the faith around you? Compromise, comfort, cultural conformity? Or conviction, courage, and Christ?
Conclusion
See, Legacy is not built in a moment — it’s built daily, in faithfulness.
Brothers, let me remind you that our church needs your masculinity, your grit, and your leadership — we need it now - for today - and we need that kind of legacy for the generations yet to come.
Call to Action: Decide tonight what legacy you want to leave. Will you be remembered as a man who stood for Christ? Who taught his children the Scriptures? Who strengthened his brothers? And who lives with courage?
Brothers, Leave a legacy worth following.
Saturday Morning Session 2 — Integrity in the Inner Life: Fighting Sin, Building Holiness
Title: Integrity in the Inner Life: Fighting Sin, Building Holiness
Text: 1 Thessalonians 4:3–8; Galatians 5:22–23
God’s will for you: your sanctification.
1. Personal holiness with our bodies: Glorifying God with your body
Application: Do you understand that your sexual urges and desires are a gift given to you by God to steward? How have you been stewarding this gift? What sin is in your life that you need to confess to someone today?
2. Masculinity Without Holiness is Destructive
Application: Where are you flirting with compromise? Is there a thought or hidden sin that you need to confess today and seek help from another Christian brother so that you can put this sin to death? Is there an area where sin promises comfort or success but you know it will ultimately destroy your witness?
3. We can only live this way through the Spirit’s Empowerment
Application: And so, our last moment to write something down is this: What secret sin do I have ring now the I’m giving myself to that I need to confess and repent of to God, privately? And then, the second question is: at what point today are you going to confess that sin to a brother around you?
Conclusion
Brothers, Integrity starts in our inner lives - in our hearts and heads - and it makes its way out into our hands and through our words. Let us not be men who stand courageously against the sins of our culture while harbouring the same kinds of sins in our hearts and minds. No, let us go to battle, together, fighting against sin so that we might grow in sanctification, for this is His will, that we:
Brothers, courage in the culture must be matched with holiness in the heart. If we will not stand here, we cannot stand out there.
Call to Action:
This week you may not face a fiery furnace like David, but you will face the subtle fire of temptation — on your screen, in your workplace, in your private life. Decide now: Will you bow, or will you fight? Will you compromise, or will you stand holy before the Lord?
Stand firm. Be strong. Let all you do — even in secret — be done in love, for the glory of Christ.
Saturday Morning Session 1 — Strength with Purpose: Courage in a Culture of Compromise
Title: Strength with Purpose: Courage in a Culture of Compromise
Texts: 1 Corinthians 16:13; Daniel 3:16–18; Acts 4:13
1. Courage Means Standing Firm When Pressured by Culture
Application: Where are you tempted to keep silent out of fear? Are you bowing to the idol of approval at work, in your family, or online?
2. Real Courage is Not Bravado — It’s Paying the Cost of Faithfulness
Application: What cost are you willing to pay for courage? Would you risk being labeled, losing your job, or suffering ridicule for Christ’s sake?
3. Boldness in the Public Square Flows from Rootedness in God’s Promises
Application: Are you daily rooting yourself in God’s Word and prayer so that you’re strong when the moment of testing comes? Men without deep roots will bow under pressure.
Conclusion
So what does courage look like in Canada in 2025?
Brothers, we don’t need men who blend in. We need men who stand out. Men who are willing to be misunderstood, maligned, and even mistreated because Christ is worth it.
Call to Action:
When the pressure comes — when you’re asked to compromise your convictions, to stay silent about Christ, to affirm what God forbids — will you bow or will you stand? Decide now. Stand firm. Be strong. And let all you do be done in love.
This weekend, our men are at Camp Cedarwood.
This recording is from session 1
In this member meeting, we have a lot going on that is super exciting:
- Philosophy of Ministry Document Item: Church Multiplication and how we mean to go about this
- Financial Update
- New Deacons
- Update about Japan (Mark Schroeder)
We all struggle with degrees of worry and can feel overwhelmed during different seasons of our lives.
This talk delves into what anxiety can look like, the criteria for a diagnosable anxiety disorder, how the Bible describes anxiety (thus bringing hope for anxious sufferers), and lastly, encouragement for those who struggle with intense worry.
Understanding our identity in Christ really does help us when we are in distress.
In this episode, we discuss raising leaders in the church with Nino Marques from Knox Church Calgary.
Nino is in town for our Supporting the Sent event happening on Sunday at 6:30 pm, which is a church planting awareness, prayer, and fundraising evening as we desire to continue supporting those sent from our church to help advance the Gospel across Canada.
This roundtable is with a few different ministry leaders here in Winnipeg who are curious about Nino's experience and asking questions about his ministry to learn more about what God is doing in Calgary.
As Christians, one of the great challenges of our journey with God is times of waiting.
We often default to misidentifying ourselves as the sovereign of our life and desire for all of existence to arrange itself to our will and timetable.
When it doesn't, we tend to respond with anger, anxiety and apathy. Scripture gives us an accurate depiction of just who God says we are in those times.
When we're there, responding in accordance to who we are in Christ is God's design in ensuring that those gap times become some of our most fruitful seasons of sanctification.
In this episode, Chris Wold shares with us how our church is going to be fasting and praying as we prepare for the Supporting the Sent event on June 29.
In this time, we want to particularly praying for Renaissance Church Montreal, Knox Baptist, and our own desire as a church to see more churches planted nationally and internationally as a church family.
We believe that we have a very direct call as a church to train, equip and mobilize church planters, church planting team members, missionaries, pastors and ministry leaders from our church. If we are going to see this happen, we are going to need the Lord to move and respond in BIG ways.
Join us in listening along and join us in prayer and fasting as we prepare for this special time as a ministry.
In this special episode of Basecamp, Pastor Aaron interviewed his mom, Patti Boswell, about raising kids, creating an environment where the Gospel is rehearsed and lived out, and the beauty of motherhood.
For more information about The Trails, please visit: trailschurch.ca
You can tell from this title that this Member Meeting was PACKED.
One of the first things we discussed in this meeting was the sharing of our Philosophy of Ministry. If you are newer to seeing a document like this, a philosophy of ministry is a framework that informs how a church teaches, leads, grows, disciplines, and sends. We wanted to share this document with our members to let them know some of this framework so that we might also field any questions about it in July's Member Meeting. This document is one that we pray will be helpful for our church to know how we go about ministry as a church and also as a helpful tool as we seek to meaningfully partner with like-minded churches and organizations.
As we continue to think through meaningful partnership, we also introduced our membership to a network that we created through which we can meaningfully partner for church planting and revitalization (The True North Network).
We also heard an exciting update from Mark about his acceptance as a missionary with Reaching and Teaching International. He will be fundraising until December and then head to Japan, Lord willing, in January.
We've also known that our pastors have been training and assessing some potential new elders this past year and they brought one of these men forward to our church for consideration (Rory Friesen).
We also let our members know about a home church that is going to be starting in the next few months. We will be giving more information about this in July's Member Meeting as we will be praying over this team together.
In exploring Ephesians 1, how do we wrestle through topics like "Free Will" and Predestination?
In this question, our pastors are asked about the context of 1 Corinthians 5 where an individual is brought under church discipline because of his sin. The question is: is there ever restoration for this man? And, secondarily, what is the purpose of church discipline in the life of the Christian?
His "pre-Christian" life?
His "ongoing Christian experience"?
In this question, our elders explore some of the context of Romans 7 so that we might understand the nature of sin and the necessity of going to war against sin in the life of the Christian.
In this question from our Q&A, we explore the topic of the office/place of honour of widows from 1 Timothy. The specific question is: is someone prohibited from being supported financially from the church before the age of 60? How do we view this as elders?
In this sermon, Brad Williams from CityLight church preaches from Philippians 2 about the importance of Good Friday in showing the great humility of Jesus.
We held a Pastors Q&A recently and this was one of the questions posed.
For more information about The Trails, please visit: trailschurch.ca
We recently held a Pastor's Q&A and this was one of the questions posed.
For more information about the trails, please visit: trailschurch.ca
We recently held a Pastors Q&A and this was one of the questions asked.
For more information about the trails, please visit: trailschurch.ca