James Clark and Robbie Bellis are co-elders in the Eglise Protestante Evangélique de Louvain-la-Neuve, a church they both helped plant in 2020. Both Crosslinks mission partners, they work in close collaboration in their context, reaching out to French-speaking Belgians.

James and Robbie, what are some of the joys and advantages of working together closely on the mission field?

James and I have known each other since we were at university in Durham. Robbie has been in Belgium since 2011, and James since 2015. We both undertook our theological training at the Institut Biblique de Bruxelles. Robbie then became assistant pastor and church elder at the Eglise Protestante Evangélique de Bruxelles-Woluwe, working closely with the senior pastor there, Steve Orange – also a Crosslinks mission partner. When deciding on the next step in ministry, Robbie had a desire to see the unique university town of Louvain-la-Neuve served by an evangelical gospel-preaching church and reached with the good news of Jesus.

What happened next?

James proposed that he join as assistant pastor and run the student work, while Robbie would supervise the regular non-student ministry in the town. By God’s grace, this pipe dream became reality, and we are now in the fourth year of the church plant’s life! Robbie and James are the church’s two elders and very much appreciate working closely together in this way.

What are some of the advantages of missionaries working together?

There are many advantages! We share enormous theological ground in common. There are many areas where we take for granted that we share the same convictions and we do not lose much time in theological disputes or discussions. The fact that we are both serving cross-culturally helps us to be sensitive to the need to train locals for ministry.

We are aware that we are both non-native French-speakers and so we are looking to train godly local men who could lead services and home groups, who could preach and one day become elders. We would love it if our replacements were native French-speaking believers who could take on this ministry and keep preaching God’s word and loving his people and the lost. The idea of training ministry interns is well-established in the UK but it is a fairly new venture in Europe, which is hard ground for the gospel and churches are further behind.

How have you gone about training future church leaders?

From the start of the church plant, we set up a ministry training scheme with the aim of training French-speakers for the French-speaking harvest field. We are heavily involved in our local Belgian church denomination and have good relationships and links with Belgian pastors and elders in other churches. Ministry is always relational so being able to work closely with a good friend is a great joy as we serve Christ together on the mission field.

Our families also really appreciate each other being so close and our children very much enjoy playing together. Such a working relationship might not be possible or desirable in all missionary contexts, but it works well in the more pioneering nature of gospel work in French-speaking Europe. Please pray for us that we would continue to love each other and work well together for God’s glory and that he might use us to raise up native French-speakers for his harvest.