1 Peter 4:10 NLT
God has given each of you a gift from
his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.
Nehemiah 6:9 NLT
They were just trying to intimidate us,
imagining that they could discourage us and stop the work. So I continued
the work with even greater determination.
What are the skills God has
put in your life? Some people work well
with their hands with special skills like a carpenter or an artist. Other people are great leaders or teachers that
help other people join in the process.
The strongest people are those who have joined their skills with others
which actually makes everyone involved much stronger.
The same is true of The
Community Fellowship over the last eight years that God has used us to impact
our community. We have been part of a
group of churches known as the SBC of Virginia or
SBCV since we began. Not only have
there been people from this organization that helped us organize, but along the
way we have been able to work together on various projects across our region of
the work.
The last week of September
is the week of prayer and offering for the SBCV, and that is why I have been
sharing about our partnership and how we have worked together for the purpose
of honoring God and the growth of His kingdom.
Please pray for the churches involved in winning our state to Christ and
who are serving the people in the communities in which we live.
It was in May of 2012 that
our church family was able to buy the former American Standard Building Systems
property. It is 22 acres and over
140,000 square feet under roof that will one day become the home of The
Community Fellowship and our ministries.
This past summer has an incredible time of transformation for this new
building. We have a very long way to go
for the move, but we continue to move in that direction, seek the resources
needed, continue building and seek God for our future.
One of the ways we have seen
this property transformed is with the help of Baptist Builders led by our
friend Bill Miller from Danville. Several
Thursdays each month Bill leads a group of 5 to 10 men who are working
throughout our building. These men are
skilled laborers most of whom are retired and love giving their time and effort
to churches like ours. They are helped
with our new stage but are currently working on the walls in our new children’s
building. Baptist Builders is a ministry
of the SBCV that supports new construction, renovation or current property and
often help with disaster relief work in our state and beyond.
I have to also thank the
group of almost 70 men known as Men on a Mission that came to help us the last
week of May. These men helped us and
through their labor of love gave us a gift worth far more than $100,000 in free
labor to help prepare our new campus.
Another of our partners is
SBC Disaster Relief. Our new campus has
become a hub of resources for disaster relief work for the east coast of the
United States. This began not long after
we took possession of the property and will continue for a long time. It is incredible to look back at how disaster
relief workers have been helped by things we can assist with. When a natural disaster happens on the east
coast, often we get the call to assist with resources.
There are lots of other
people and partners that have helped our church family grow and get stronger,
but we would be so wrong if we did not acknowledge the fact that our greatest
resource is not in buildings or in material things. Our greatest resource is people. The people who are part of our church and the
people who have chosen to partner with our church family are a tangible gift
from God allowing us to do more and share Christ more often.
When we use our skills for
the good and growth of the kingdom of God, we are doing more than we know. May God use our people, our greatest
resource, to make a huge impact in Martinsville and Henry County, throughout
Virginia and the United States and to the ends of the earth.
Philippians 1:11 NLT
May you always be filled with the fruit
of your salvation—the righteous
character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.
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