Multiplication is the heartbeat of Fellowship Pickering. The 4-year-old church plant located in Pickering, Ontario, is reaching a highly diverse, densely populated and widely unchurched area in North America. Matt and Arrica Hess first planted Fellowship Pickering in October of 2013 and by October of 2016, the church multiplied to plant Fellowship Church Rouge Park and Fellowship Oshawa.
Matt grew up near Tulsa, Oklahoma, and felt called to ministry as a 12-year-old. He joined the Marine Corp when he was 19 and again felt called to pastor a church. He began preaching, but still felt like something was missing. After moving churches and starting seminary, he realized that he had never truly given his life to Christ. After surrendering to follow Christ, he and Arrica started to feel called to church planting. When they learned of the need in Toronto, they knew God was calling them to plant Fellowship Pickering. Their family moved to Toronto and began knocking on doors and starting Gospel-centered conversations.
Fellowship Pickering is primarily made up of young families that gather in an elementary school building. They encourage their members to attend the church gathering time, invest in a small group, grow in a community, and give everything to God. Matt wants Fellowship Pickering to look to the harvest in their community. “People have to see that Jesus can’t be a hobby,” he says, “The call to salvation, the call to a life with Christ, is not ‘Hey, when you feel like it, follow me.’”
Matt trains and mentors church planters to fulfill their vision of multiplication. Although they have already planted three churches in the Toronto area, they hope to see nine more planted by 2023. Their goal is to follow where the Holy Spirit has already started to work in the lives of those in their community and raise them up in evangelism and discipleship. “We teach our church planters how to get in to the harvest early and often…to have a mentality to multiply from the very beginning,” Matt says. In the future, they hope to have a permanent space where they can gather to worship together and train believers to plant new churches in their community.
Matt and Arrica hope that more believers can join in their vision to see the Gospel spread and churches multiplied throughout Toronto. Churches can join them by praying, giving financially, and sending teams to serve at Fellowship Pickering. “We really believe in the power of prayer,” Matt says, “And we need people to come up and catch the vision.”