The Church That Follows the Lost: Rebecca’s Story

When I first met Rebecca, she was fighting to stay alive.

Not spiritually—physically.

Years of exposure to mold and environmental toxins had sent her immune system into chaos. Her body reacted to normal things: food, smells, even the air in her home. A simple change could trigger a severe allergic episode. She lived in a world so small it was almost claustrophobic—one house, one air filter, one safe set of routines.

Rebecca is about my height, but at that time she weighed barely a hundred pounds. Her body was frail, but her faith was strong. In that confinement, she made a choice: if she was going to live, it wouldn’t be as a victim. It would be as a disciple maker.

Through prayer, trial and error, and determined perseverance, God began to restore her. Her health stabilized. Her world started to expand. She could go to church, go to public events— like walking through a mall without collapsing. For her, every step forward was worship. Every inch of ground regained was grace.

But what impressed me most was what she did with her recovery. Rebecca decided she wouldn’t wait to “get back to ministry.” She saw her healing itself as an invitation to mission. She joined me in teaching Christians around the world disciple-making methods, but that wasn’t enough, she wanted to do it herself. She felt called to do it herself.

Dancing Into a Mission Field

Rebecca began attending contra dances—those lively folk dances held in small halls around the South. The contra dance community was full of open, creative people—but also loneliness, confusion, and spiritual searching. LGBTQ participants, polyamorous couples, Wiccans, and atheists were all part of the same joyful, broken circle.

While she began dancing to get some positive exercise, but after attending several dances, watching the people, Rebecca thought, “Who is reaching these people?” She would pray over time, “God, these people are so captured and in the dark. How can we reach these people? Show me.”

Each dance became an act of worship, a way of reminding her body that it was alive and her heart that God was still at work. But for a while, Rebecca would have to take courage to go to dances alone and struggle with not knowing anyone, looking and praying for opportunities to develop relationships. She heard about dance weekends where from Friday night to Sunday afternoon, dancers would organize hours and hours of dancing to a live band and stay at cabins and Airbnbs together. She knew that would be her best opportunity to go deeper. So as she was asking questions about it, she got connected to a group of frequent dance weekend dancers. She was warmly welcomed and invited to join in on the upcoming local weekend dance at Table Rock.

That’s how Rebecca became part of a group called the Contra-Vagabonds—a roving circle of dancers traveling from event to event across four states. Most were unbelievers. A few were seekers. Some were believers trying to live faithfully without withdrawing. Rebecca began to see them not as hobbyists but as an unreached people group.

Eventually, she found other believers—disconnected Christians trying to follow Jesus in a community that didn’t understand faith but still craved love. To her joy, as she talked with the Christians one by one, they all expressed the same desire: to gather with other Christians and pray for lost dancer friends and to remain strong in faith and obedience in a culture run by temptation and faithlessness. God was definitely up to something. They began to gather pray before events and start a weekly prayer whatsapp call, and she started to help them think about how to have natural, Spirit-led conversations with their friends.

The Weekend That Tested Her Faith

One weekend in Georgia tested all of it.

For Rebecca, going wasn’t a small decision—it was a milestone. She was strong enough to host travelers in her home, carpool with friends, and share an Airbnb with others. But when she arrived, she discovered black mold in both of the bathrooms. Her throat tightened. Her skin prickled. She was hit with nausea and a headache. Old fears surged back—the helplessness, the sickness, the small world closing in again.

She texted me, overwhelmed. “I just feel like curling up in a corner and crying.”

We prayed together when she found a moment alone. We thanked God for how far He had brought her and asked Him to protect her body and spirit. Immediately, God answered our prayers, and she began to get better. What struck me most was how the Vagabond community—most of them unbelievers—cared for her. They worked to find a safer place to sleep, checked on her, and made sure she was okay. They didn’t see her as a burden; they saw her as one of their own. That’s the fruit of incarnational ministry. When you love the lost long enough, they start to love you back.

The second place she stayed was far from perfect. Rebecca ended up having to sleep on an air mattress with a bad chemical smell in a room so cold, she pulled her arms into her shirt, clutching herself to try to stay warm. But she told herself, “God has led me here, so I’m going to have faith that I’m going to be ok.” Having recently read about Joseph within prison, she rebuked herself and resolved to endure everything with a good attitude and look for any opportunity for God to show Himself. And the Lord was faithful. He sustained her with unexplainable strength and a positive attitude. With all the struggles and little sleep, the others were amazed how she was still going. She would just reply, “I’m just running on prayer and FOMO! God’s just helping me.” She stayed the entire weekend, dancing and loving people through the pain.

A Separate Conversation — and a Vision

A few weeks earlier, after another dance event, I had the chance to sit in Rebecca’s car with one of the young Christian Contra-Vagabonds she’d been mentoring. The three of us were talking late into the night about what God was doing among this community. The conversation turned to a question that’s stayed with me ever since.

I asked, “Can you imagine a church that moves from dance event to dance event? No building. No programs. Just people who pray together, worship together, and love each other while reaching the lost wherever they go?”

Rebecca’s eyes lit up, because it was completely in line with what God was showing her. The young man nodded. We talked about how these dancers—traveling from state to state, city to city—already lived in a rhythm that looked a lot like the early church. They had community, shared meals, and deep relationships. What they lacked was spiritual direction and discipleship.

That night, sitting in that car, we realized God was building the Contra-Vagabond Church.

A church without walls. A church that follows the lost.

And I remember thinking, maybe this is what Jesus meant when He said, “Go.”

Learning to Walk Among the Lost

Of course, that kind of ministry comes with real challenges. The Contra-Vagabond world carries moral confusion and spiritual darkness. Rebecca has worked with younger believers on setting boundaries and staying holy while walking among the lost.

In one situation, a Christian dancer was going to be placed in an Airbnb bed with a man, because the host thought nothing of it. Rebecca helped her, and they navigated the situation with grace—rearranging lodging and giving encouragement and support. That’s what incarnational holiness looks like: present in the world, yet uncompromised by it.

Worship Turns to Disciple-Making Action

Conversations That Matter

On the drive home, Rebecca shared a car with one of the leaders of the Contra-Vagabonds—a man who identified as an uninterested agnostic. They began talking about faith. He told her he’d always felt uncomfortable when Christians tried to “convert” him.

Rebecca smiled and said, “I understand. But if you believed there really was a heaven and a hell, and you loved someone, wouldn’t you want them to be in heaven with you?”

He paused. “I’ve never thought of it that way,” he said.

Later that night, as their conversation continued, he admitted, “I just don’t feel a desire for spiritual things. It’s not who I am.”

Rebecca looked at him and said gently, “That makes sense. The desire to seek God is a gift from Him. If you think you should have that desire, ask God to give it to you—and see what happens.”

That’s what real disciple making looks like—not pressure or performance, but invitation. She couldn’t manufacture faith for him, but she could point him toward the One who awakens it.

The Triumph in the Trial: The Church That Moves

When Rebecca called to tell me about that weekend, I told her, “You might see this as a set-back, in terms of your health — but I see it as a triumph. By God’s grace and through the prayers of the saints you overcame the struggles and were able to honor God among the lost. That’s a win. That’s victory.”

Because Kingdom success isn’t measured by comfort or ease; it’s measured by obedience. Rebecca’s body is fragile, but her God is strong. If she keeps showing up in places most Christians would never go, God will turn every setback into a new opportunity.

When I think of Rebecca and her Contra-Vagabond friends, I think of the kind of church we desperately need—one that moves toward the lost instead of waiting for them to come. It’s not clean or conventional. It’s messy and unpredictable, but it’s alive.

The early church didn’t have websites, budgets, or 501(c)(3) status. They had people. They had the Spirit. They carried Jesus wherever they went. Rebecca’s life is a reminder that the gospel was meant to travel light.

God is teaching them that the Church isn’t a place; it’s a people on the move. A people who dance, pray, and serve among those who don’t yet know Jesus, until His light takes root in the most unexpected places.

Through their embracing the disciple-making journey, an unlikely people group is being reached. Through God’s working, a vision is being born—a church that moves where the lost move, prays where they gather, and dances where they dance.

Maybe that’s what church was always meant to be.

And this is what CDM seeks to equip people and teams to do. To BE the Church among the rhythms of life. To be in, yet not of the world, shining the Light to break the darkness. Turning enemy territory into Kingdom territory.