Scott's Thoughts: Sun, Jul 3, 2022

Total Reading Time: 4 mins 30 secs

Super-Duper Mega-Important All-Church Multisite Dinner, Update, Meeting, & Prayer Time – Sun, Aug 7, 5:30-7p – We’re trying to give you plenty of lead time to prepare for this meeting because we would like as many FCCers as possible to attend and find out what the next two months of multisite ramp-up, outreach, portable prep, and promo will entail for all 3 campuses. We have ordered 2 new trailers and a bunch of equipment, have begun designing and planning our upcoming 2 months of “Shock & Awe” promo campaign (t-shirts, yard signs, billboards, direct mailing, social ads), and have scheduled a couple/few All-Church pre-launch team meetings and South Greene preview services. So, behind the scenes we’re ramping up for the South Greene launch on Sun, Oct 16! For more details and sign-up, check out the post about it on “News Feed” on the “Pulse” tab on the app (fccgreene.org/app) or find it at fccgreene.org/news.

Splash! was Really Good, Y’all! – We had something like 115 kids and 50 volunteers at what turned out to be a great week of learning about how kids can use their gifts to make a splash in the world! When my own kiddo was reporting about how much she enjoyed learning about farm technology from a couple high school boys who led it, she said, “And their moms were there to help, too!” So. Cool. Bigtime thanks to the many folks who sacrificed their time and energy to make it happen! (Charity and Samantha, make sure to sleep in on an extra day off this week!) Check out our FCC socials (“fccgreene” on Facebook & Instagram) for some photos. More highlights to come.

6th Graders Serving on the Team! – How cool is this?! For years we’ve somewhat quietly implemented H2: Serve on the team. starting with our 6th graders. This has already made a fairly significant impact on our long-term development of young and emerging leaders—see this H7 Story about David Bowlin to see an example of what I mean—but something more intentional happened this year that’s worth mentioning. During April and May, toward the end of the academic year, a few of our paid staff got together and schemed to reach out to rising 5th graders and their parents to help with the transition to our middle school programming and to intentionally onboard those who were interested in serving. So these staff invited parents and kids to meet to discuss their interests and giftedness, explain how serving and participation in the body of Christ work, talk through areas of ministry where they could serve, show how to respond to serving requests, answer questions—the whole 9 yards. How cool is that?! So, on Sunday mornings, you may notice a few more youngsters walking around with lanyards on, looking like they’re hot stuff with their grown-up serving responsibilities. That’s because they are!

H7 Story: Catalyst Donates to the Hope Center – If you missed it in the Greeneville Sun or on the socials, our own Catalyst Coffee recently donated $2,000 profits to the Hope Center, a pregnancy resource center here in Greeneville, and our Catalyst employees took a tour to see it and learn about their ministry. (Check out the Catalyst social post here.) The Hope Center does tons of important work to help provide a full array of free services extending far beyond counseling, pregnancy tests, and ultrasounds. They have personal various mentoring programs for both women and men that teach them the gospel, how to study the Bible, how to care for their babies, how to provide a loving parenting and family environment for children, how to provide financially, how to budget, etc. They make available diapers, formula, baby clothes, and tons of other baby items. They are also on the cusp of opening Honeysuckle Studios, which is a full-time residential program that will usually last 12-18 months which will be a comprehensive way to prepare (often single) young moms to raise and provide for their baby. Not only will it teach them how to cook and parent, but will help them find a job if needed! Pretty cool. If you missed our recent Coffee Convos episode with Pam Crank, the Executive Director of the Hope Center, check it out!

H7 Story: Campus Outreach at Chuckey-Doak, Greeneville, and South Greene High Schools – A brief bullet-point update on some recent campus-specific outreach events and info.
  • Afton – Chuckey-Doak High School specifically invited FCCers from our Afton campus to a lunch that CDHS folks put on to thank and recognize our people! That was soon after our Afton vols planned and executed about 3 end-of-school-year events. Y’all continue to absolutely kill it, Afton!
  • South Greene – We recently had some FCC vols show up and help care for South Greene High School faculty and staff. Not only that, but Bob Radank, South Greene Campus Pastor, became the SGHS Football Chaplain and has been showing up a couple times a week to give brief Bible devo thoughts/lessons and pray with/for the team. In fact—how cool is this?!—after the coach put Bob’s cell number on the board and said that players could contact him if they ever “needed to talk,” Bob got a call from one of them, so he had the chance to listen, be an encouragement, and pray with this young man. Btw, if you missed our Coffee Convos episode with Lori Wilhoit, the Principal at SGHS, check it out.
  • Greeneville – We are not only continuing to help renovate two rooms for the Greeneville High School Teachers Lounge, but some of our Greeneville vols helped setup and run a Kidz Zone for the recent Town of Greeneville Juneteenth event. They were very appreciative that FCCers stepped up to help make it happen. (And so am I! Thanks to all you amazing FCCers who are “everyday boring faithful” servants.)

Update on Great Questions Answered, Brown Bags & Bibles, and Coffee Convos
  • GQA – I’ve been making pretty decent progress on a few GQA posts. “Intro to GQA” (fccgreene.org/introtogqa) has been shortened—(believe it or not!)—and refined a bit. “What Should I Look for in a Church?” is 75% brand new content from start to finish, including lots of refining and nuancing of previously published material as well as a new section under “Essential Marks” called “(2) Expository Preaching.” And finally, despite saying before last Sunday’s sermon that I was close to some preliminary thoughts re the recent overturn of Roe v Wade, it is already turning into an extended series of posts. So, I’ll probably be ready in a couple Sundays with at least a first draft of a GQA for “The 2022 Supreme Court Overturning of Roe v Wade: How Should Churches Respond?” But, based on the reading and studying I’ve done the past couple weeks, that issue will likely end up being a small booklet of helps to guide our thinking on a biblical perspective on abortion, being thoroughgoingly pro-life as a church and as families, and how to refute all the main pro-abortion arguments. To see all published GQA posts, go to the “Pulse” tab on the app (fccgreene.org/app) or go to fccgreene.org/gqa.
  • BB&B – Don’t miss the new BB&Bs. We’ve got a lot of great biblical and theological content in our current series on the doctrine of “The Word of God.” Also—how cool is this?!–starting with Episode #71 we’ve got headings, key words, and Scriptures quoted onscreen to make it easier to follow (if you’re watching.)
  • CC – We’ve got episodes upcoming with Thomas and Kimber Callen, who are newly on staff at LongView Ranch in Mosheim. Catalyst is going to be donating to LVR soon so we wanted to hear about their ministry. Also be on the lookout soon for a CC with Dr. Scott Hummel, President of Tusculum University.
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