Tuesday, November 4, 2014

No Longer Homeless:


As of this past Tuesday October 28th Trinity is no longer homeless!! You have seen the news articles in the paper, on the internet and even on TV… and it is finally done. Now, the real work begins. We will meet for our last Sunday at Grace Bible Church this Sunday, November 9th.  Grace has lived up to their name - they have been so good to us as a sister church!  The frustrating thing to me about being in the Bible belt has always been the competitive nature of churches in general. It is not consistent with the gospel message, and it leaves the world somewhat confused as to what it is we really do. So, a big thank you to the Grace Bible family!  You have been a wonderful picture of grace in action. 

We now have nothing more than a nice tool; a building was never our goal but it is a tool.   Now we must choose to use that tool to give us security and fellowship within our walls, or we can use it to reach an area with the Gospel of Christ. I honestly believe those who are at Trinity don’t just want a building to come hear preaching, or a building with white columns with our church name on it… God has done such a work in our fellowship that our focus is no longer inward but outward, looking at the fields. While this vision will continue to take shape as we go, there is certainly something big going on in our Trinity family. Some of these moves will involve doing things we have never done, and frankly things that go against our grain in general.  The exciting thing is, we are doing something that isn’t about us, it is about HIM! To see the lost come to Christ is a very exciting thing, and I am honored to be a part of this journey. I can blog, talk, journal and text about this move all day, but I want to use the remainder of this time to just give you some important dates and even an explanation of the “why?”

Our first official Sunday in our building will be Sunday, November 16th.  The only thing that will be ready will be the Worship Center and very nice temporary nursery.  This “temporary nursery” (probably until January) is located in what will eventually be our office area (probably appropriate knowing our staff!) as it is already in good shape with clean carpeting and fresh paint.  This will be while the children’s area is being renovated.  Once the children’s wing is in better shape, the nursery will move there and the offices will be renovated for office use.   We believe the children’s area will be ready for us to use by January although the decoration will be done by World Of Wow in the April-May time frame.   If you have not seen their work, check out their website. They will be working in our student and all of our children’s areas. http://www.worldsofwow.com/?gclid=CO_GkNze1MECFaE-MgodQnoAXg

We will continue to worship at 9 am simply to keep things somewhat sane during the holiday time. November 16th will simply be a “soft opening” so we can get our feet under us. AWANA will continue to take place at Hope Sullivan until January. Our current plans are that the first Sunday in January we will move back to regular service times: 9am-BFG, 10:30—Worship Service and 5:30- AWANA.    On Wednesday, 4:45-6 Mid-Week supper (we may not be able to begin this in January – it will depend on the construction schedule) and 6:15 we will begin a full midweek (Sunday evening style) service.  


On January 25th  we will have our full Grand Opening. We should have all our Greeter Teams, Parking Teams and everyone else set and running smoothly, and we will be able to receive and minister to a much larger group. Obviously, this doesn’t mean we don’t reach out and invite right now! It has been amazing that during this crazy transition we have had visitors and people join. I have never been more excited to be a Pastor, and never had anything in my life that I was filled with more anticipation for. Make these dates a priority on your schedule and in your prayer life. God is really at work in our fellowship and I am so thankful to be a part of this!