Dear FBC Family,
This moment feels to me like a jumping-off place. A fresh season awaits First Baptist Church—not only the promise of cooler days ahead, but also a Spirit-breathed invitation to embrace some new expressions of our mission and ministry, including new leadership teams, new governance structures, new nomenclature—even a brand-new building!
Sometimes churches that have been around for as long as ours find themselves fixed in familiar patterns that have become rote and predictable. Congregational life begins to resemble running around the same track in the same stadium, again and again and again.
This season feels to me like an invitation to trade the stadium track for a hike with Jesus in the deep woods. These days I imagine First Baptist Church wearing backpacks and headlamps, carrying bear spray and binoculars. I imagine us traipsing over fallen logs and sometimes taking a holy tumble into the stream below, laughing as we climb up the bank and try again.
This new season isn’t about reaching a destination. It’s about embracing the adventure of the journey as we allow God to surprise us, delight us, and lead us deeper into relationship with each other, our community, and the Christ who goes before us.
So, let's lace up our boots, grab our binoculars, and set out together with curiosity and wonder.
Here we go…
Pastor Julie