193!

 

We could not have asked for a better day for our first Sunday morning worship celebration at Blue Ridge High! There was great energy and excitement! I have heard nothing but positive comments about our new home for worship services. The auditorium's acoustics were fantastic. The Ridgekidz area also is an improvement from our previous location. The grade school kids are in the band room and the preschool kids are in the front foyer of the school with the babies in the teacher's lounge.

 

Let me thank each of you who came Sunday. Let me also thank the many of you who served in some capacity, whether it was setting up, taking down, Ridgekidz volunteers, worship, sound, or media teams, parking lot and inside greeters, hot dog meal team, and flag football organizers. I want to especially thank those of you who invited family or friends or neighbors or co-workers to come with you Sunday. We had sixteen first time guest cards turned in! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

 

We set a goal of having 200 people this Sunday. Did we reach our goal? Well, we came close with 193 people counted. We counted two or three times. There are some ladies in our church who are pregnant. I even requested we count the babies in utero but that didn't fly. Nevertheless, thank you so much for investing and inviting the people you care about to come with you to church Sunday. As I shared in my "State of the Church" address January 10, we must invest in and invite the ones we care about to Jesus Christ and His church family. The Bible says in John 1:42 that, "...Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus..." We must bring the people we know to meet Jesus as well. Bringing them to church is a great way to do that.

 

So, where do we go from here? You may be a first timer reading my weekly email newsletter or a long time member of Ridgeview. We are a simple church. We meet corporately for worship, we gather weekly for our small group Bible study fellowships we call Growth Groups, and we seek to bridge people to Jesus Christ through serving them. Let me encourage you to take advantage of our Growth Group sign ups that are listed in this email newsletter. It's a great way to grow in your faith, get to know others, and serve the Lord through Growth Group service opportunities. Our Spring semester begins the week of February 21 and will end the week of April 25.

 

God bless and I will see you Sunday as we continue our "Road to Financial Freedom" message series. I have some great principles to share with you from Scripture as we deal with the dangers of debt (and how to get out).

 

See you Sunday!

 

Pastor Tommy