At Mercy’s Door,
We believe that healthy things multiply.
Jesus says in John 12:24 regarding His own sacrificial death and resurrection, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
The ransomed Church of God is the fruit that Jesus spoke of. He bore the sins of His people and took them into the grave by His sacrificial death. And being joined to Him in His death, Christians are united with Him in His resurrection life! Every Christian is a result of the life-giving, multiplying work of Jesus Christ.
A theology of fruit-bearing life
Jesus taught us repeatedly that an evidence of this new life is multiplication.
Jesus Himself poured spiritual new life into the men and women who walked with Him for three years on earth, and released them in the power of the Holy Spirit to multiply the church.
In the book of Acts, we see that the early church is described as a multiplying church!
In just two years, they had “filled Jerusalem with their teaching,” (Acts 5:28).
In less than five years, the churches were multiplying rapidly (Acts 9:31).
In less than twenty years, they had “turned the world upside down.” (Acts 17:6).
And in less than thirty years, the Gospel had spread all over the world (Colossians 1:56).
Multiplication is a big deal to Jesus. Healthy things multiply.
A THEOLOGY OF FRUITfulness
Healthy trees bear fruit. In the same way, genuine faith produces a life that increasingly reflects Christ.
Jesus repeatedly uses the imagery of fruit to reveal spiritual reality. "Every healthy tree bears good fruit" (Matthew 7:17), while a tree that bears no fruit is cut down (Matthew 7:19). In Luke 13, the barren fig tree is given time to bear fruit, but it will not remain fruitless forever. In Matthew 25, the servant who failed to steward what his master entrusted to him is judged for his unfaithfulness. And during His final week, Jesus curses the barren fig tree as a picture of empty religion without genuine faith (Mark 11:12–14).
The message is clear: fruitfulness matters. While we are saved by grace alone through faith alone, saving faith is never fruitless. A life transformed by the gospel will increasingly produce obedience, love, holiness, and the making of disciples. Fruit is not the cause of our salvation—it is the evidence that Christ is at work within us.
OUR STORY
WE ARE A CHURCH PLANT
Mercy’s Door was planted in 2017.
FROM A LEGACY OF CHURCH PLANTS
But we, like every church plant, were planted as part of a legacy of multiplication. In 2000, Legacy Bible Church was planted in rural Texas. In 2009, the lead pastor departed to plant another church, The Source Church in the southwest suburbs of Chicago. In 2016, The Source Church sent out families to plant a new church together in the Metro East of St. Louis, Mercy’s Door.
WHO HAS CO-PLANTED ANOTHER CHURCH
In 2022, Mercy’s Door and our sending church partnered up again to send families and resources to plant another church north of Austin, called Redeemer Georgetown.
CHURCH PLANTS & MISSIONARIES WE SUPPORT
REDEEMER GEORGETOWN
Redeemer Georgetown is a gospel-centered missional family learning and living the way of Jesus in the suburbs of Austin. Redeemer has been committed from day one to be a church planting church. They believe that churches planting churches is the New Testament pattern for completing the great commission. Their vision is to reproduce a family of churches across central Texas and establish church-planting partnerships across the globe.
new hill church
New Hill Church is committed to H.O.P.E. Honoring God in everything. Observing all that He has commanded. Providing for the needs of others. Extending the offer that has been extended to us. They have been faithfully serving Medina, OH since 2017, and are looking to plant another church in the Cleveland area soon.
THE BALI PROJECT
The Bali Project exists to empower Indonesian Christians to plant churches across Indonesia. Through this training program, local believers are prepared to reach the lost in their own communities. Participants learn how to share the gospel in culturally meaningful ways without compromising its truth. The goal is simple: to raise up Indonesian leaders who will faithfully plant and multiply churches throughout the country.
Kostya & Bella Tustanovskyi
Are missionaries/church planters for Japan. To read their bio & support-raising document, click here.
WHY JAPAN?
Japan is the 2nd Largest Unreached People Group in the World (120 million unreached)
Only one church exists for every 17,000 people, compared to one church for every 800 people in the USA.
60% of those existing churches have fewer than 30 people.
70% of pastors are over 50 years old and nearing the end of their pastoral ministries
Missionary presence is down 34% over the past 20 years.
Christian studies indicate that Japan is less than 1% Christian and less than 0.5% of the population understands the gospel in a Biblical way.
Less than 0.2% of Japanese attend an evangelical church.
Most people in Japan have never been to a church, have never read the Bible, and have no Christian friends. It is estimated that 95% of Japanese living today may never even meet a Christian.
WAYLAND & JULIANNE cook
Are missionaries to an unreached people group in Southeast Asia. Wayland is a linguist working to translate the Scripture from the original languages into the native tongue of a group of people who do not currently have the Bible available to them in their language. For safety reasons, please contact us at info@mercysdoor.org for more information about this couple.
WHY THIS PEOPLE GROUP?
There is no existing Christian presence among this group of 250,000 people
There is no existing Bible in their native language
A decades-long effort to create a dictionary and grammar guide for their language has recently been completed, creating an opportunity for Hebrew & Greek linguists to begin the painstaking effort of translating the Bible into that language.