Bill Maye

What's God Doing?

I just wanted to get a recap out for everyone that attended our leadership meeting and SNL meeting Sunday night and help those who were unable to attend know where our focus will be for the next 6 months here at BCC.  First off it was an awesome weekend as we concluded our latest series "Got Questions" and I want to thank our staff and volunteers for doing an excellent job throughout this series.

Here's a summary of where we are headed.

1) We are focusing all of our attention and energy in gearing up for our Christmas ROCKFest outreaches which will included ministering at Bread of Life Outreach Center on Dec. 6th; Dec. 6th - Grocery give away along with gifts and meals to 135 elderly residences in Stewart Manor; Dec. 14th - Host a special Christmas party for 42 needy families from Get Smart and give gifts to thier children; Dec 14th - Take up a special Christmas Offering to continue raising money for the remaining projects in our ROCKFest Outreach Focus; Dec 21st - Special Christmas Service Outreach at BCC.

2) We are exploring another site for BCC that is south of Sanford by the new Walmart Supercenter on Wilson Road.  The building we are looking at is 60,000 square feet with 8 acres of land and would allow us to reach more people in our community.  In fact there are 35,000 more people within 15 minutes driving distance from that location than our present location.  To help us undertake such a large project, we have joined in partnership with ARKS, a christian based organization that assists churches like ours in purchasing, finances, and constructing new facilities.  This partnership will ensure that we are making the right move and will help us in taking our next step so that we can focus our attention on our mission and not be consumed with the host of burdens that are associated with a building program. When completed this new facility will be extremely economical and will allow us to increase our impact on the lives of people in the Sanford area.

3) Growth Groups - We are adding our next component into the ministry teams that have been so successful over the past two years.  These groups will be home based weekly meetings that will be surronded by topical studies, connection, prayer and outreach.  We will begin these groups on the week of January 11th, 2009 with our first topic "40 Days of Community".  Then we will finish the rest of that first trimester with a 6 week stewardship campaing that will be used to help us raise revenue for our new building.  These groups will meet in 13 week trimesters with 4 week breaks in between.  During the breaks the groups will have the option of choosing differnt curriculums that can be used for the next trimester.  This is going to really assist all BCC members and attenders in connecting with other, using and growing in their spiritual gifts and taking their next step toward Christ.

4) We will be shifting our communion services to the first Sunday of each month and endning our SNL service in order to allow for growth groups to take center stage in the life of the church.

I'm excited about the direction God is taking us as a church and I'm continually amazed at how you step up to every challenge that God puts before us.  I would not trade BCC for any other church in the world.  Keep praying, keep giving, keep serving and keep reaching and we will see God do amazing things through us and for us in the next 6 months.

Bill

GCI Pastor's Meeting

What you think about is what you focus on.  It is really cool that God is really speaking to me in the area of FEAR.  As a pastor or church leader what you worry about, whether it is finances, or how many people are coming, that is what your focus will be on.  In some cases that is not necessarily bad, but if these things consume your thoughts they will draw you away from what's really important, the harvest.  Those people who don't yet know that they matter to God.  This is what we are about.  Brickcity Community Church exists to reach those who are not Christ followers yet.  That is the reason we do things the way we do, so that we will meet people where they are in order to help them take their next step towards Christ.

Some folks who come to BCC are already Christ followers.  Believe it or not we like that.  We want to be here for all people, but our main focus is on those who don't have a relationship with Jesus.  For some Christ-followers this can be a hindrance.  They don't understand why we use secular music and video in our services, or why our services are more of a production than what they are used to.

Here's what we are doing.  We are creating an experience that helps break down wrong ideas about the church that are perceived by people who follow Christ.  They perceive the church as irrelevant, or that what we have to say they've already heard and it wont possibly help them in their lives.  They also feel that they have already been judged by Christians because of what they do or how they live their lives.  At BCC we want to show people that we are just like them, sinners, not worthy of anything God would gives us .  The only difference is that we a have received the grace and mercy that God freely gives.  This is what we long to share with the world and we think that the best way to do this is to communicate it in a way that people that don't follow Christ can get it.

For those Christ-follower's at BCC have you been challenged by some of the things we have used in our services?