FBC Carthage E-News for August 13, 2012

FBC Carthage E-News

August 13, 2012

Good Morning,

As we begin a new week, I encourage you to remember the message from yesterday and “put on” those characteristics of compassion which reflect the Lord Jesus Christ. The passage was Colossians 3:12-17:

Put on tender mercies – The heart of compassion
Put on kindness – The acts of compassion
Put on humility – The attitude of compassion
Put on meekness – The extent of compassion
Put on longsuffering – The length of compassion
Bearing with one another – The object of compassion
Forgiving one another as Christ forgave you – The example of compassion

Live for Jesus this week and let others see Jesus in you. As Matthew 5:16 says, “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in Heaven.”

The up coming three Sundays will apply this passage to our relationships in marriage, family, and work. These will be great weeks to invite someone to attend FBC Carthage with you.

This past Wednesday night we had Deacon Election and all five candidates were elected. The five men are Tom Broyles, Michael Collins, John Etheridge, Stephen Russell, and James Trainham. They will begin serving as deacons in September. Prior to that time we will have a Deacon Ordination on Sunday, August 26 and a Deacon Ordination Council on Sunday, August 19. Pray for these men and for our other deacons as they prepare for a new year of service.

Last night was another great night in AWANA. There were 64 children and 31 adults. Thanks to all the leaders for their hard work in organization, enlistment, and promotion. Parents, if your children are not in AWANA, plan to bring them this Sunday at 5:30 PM. There are classes from 3 year olds to high school. Lets make FBC Carthage the place to be on Sunday nights.

Have a blessed week:
Bro. Tim

Here’s the news for the week:
1. Sunday was another great day in Sunday School. This coming week has two important events to help us grow even stronger in our Bible teaching, fellowship, ministry, and reaching our community.
• This coming Sunday, August 19, will be our first teacher’s rally of the new year as we meet in the Christian Life Center at 9:30 AM. During this time we will review curriculum options, discuss class organization, and make plans for the new Sunday School year.

• Monday, August 20 will be the annual Sunday School University for all Sunday School teachers. There will be conferences for teachers of all age groups. This meeting will be held at Stevens Street Baptist Church in Cookeville at 6:30 PM. We will take the church bus and leave from the church parking lot at 5:30 PM.

2. The Senior Adult Fellowship will join with other senior adult ministries in the association for a potluck fish fry tomorrow night, Tuesday, August 14 at Hickman Baptist Church. (Just got word they will have baked fish as well as fried!) We will leave from the church parking lot at 5:15 PM in the church bus. Let’s have a good group representing FBC Carthage at this special event. If you have not signed up, contact Tim Frank or the church office today.

3. This Friday, August 17 will be our first youth trip together to an away football game. We will meet in the church parking lot and leave at 5:00 PM. Sign-up and permission forms will be available during youth this Wednesday night at 6:30 PM.

4. The photos of church members taken at the Smith County Fair ministry booth will be available in the Connection Point this Sunday. Stop by and pick up your photo.

5. The Girls In Action (GA’s) are collecting school supplies during the month of August to send to missionaries and to give to the local schools. Bring your supply donations and place them in the boxes near the doors.

6. Ladies, just a reminder that the Beth Moore Bible study of James will begin this week on Tuesday night, August 14 at FBC Gordonsville and on Thursday morning, August 16 at Carthage United Methodist Church.

7. The Building and Grounds Committee will meet this Wednesday, August 15 at 7:30 PM to conduct a walk through of the buildings and discuss building needs.

8. This past week we learned of an armed robbery and break in which occurred against on of the pastors in Ridgeways Baptist Church in Nairobi, Kenya. Pastor Hamisi, his expectant wife, and their two year old son were in their home when twelve men burst in with guns and demanded all their possessions, bank account information, car, etc. After several hours the men left with everything of value, even the rugs off their floor. We will receive a love offering this Wednesday night to send to this couple to help them in this traumatic time. This is also the week in which Pastor Hamisi’s wife will give birth to their second child. Pray for this couple as they work through this ordeal and prepare for the birth of their child.

9. This week is the New Salem Baptist Association focus week. We are a member of the association which includes ten churches and one mission. Bro. Marty Dodge is our Director of Missions. Each month we invest in the work of the New Salem Baptist Association through our church budget. In addition, once each year, we receive a special offering to allow you to specifically give to the association’s work. We will receive this special offering this Sunday, August 19 for the work of the association. I believe in the work of the churches together through the local association. In fact, my doctoral thesis is on the cooperation between the churches in the local association. Listed below is an excerpt from that paper which gives information about our association:

The New Salem Baptist Association was formed on October 30, 1888 with nineteen churches from the Salem Association. In those early days, the association and its annual meeting were very important in the lives of the churches. A history of the association describes those early days:

“In the early 1900’s, an associational annual meeting was a very special occasion. The meeting lasted for three days and evenings with hundreds of people attending, many from other associations. The people stayed in the homes of people in the area, Baptist or not. Many of the travelers camped out in tents. The lack of fellowship halls did not discourage them from feeding the hundreds of people who attended. They stretched fencing horizontal and very tightly between trees and spread the food on these long “tables.” It was routine for ladies to cook as many as twenty-five pies for these occasions. It was quite likely this was the only time in the year that many of these Christian friends met.”

Through the course of the next 120 years, the association and its practices have changed. Today, only three of the original churches are still members of the association. Today’s three-hour annual meeting draws between fifty to seventy messengers and guests.

The purpose statement, as stated on the association website says, “The New Salem Baptist Association exists because Southern Baptist Churches have chosen to join together in fellowship and mission. Therefore, the purpose of the Association is to equip, resource, and encourage one another to be Kingdom Servants in obedience to our Lord’s Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20 and Acts 1:8).”

During the 2009-2010 church year, the churches of the New Salem Baptist Association reported a total membership of 2,656. That year there were 59 baptisms reported in the churches for a member to baptism ratio of 45:1. Through the state of Tennessee, that ratio of church membership to baptisms ranges from a low of 18.39 in Judson Association to a high of 79.66 in Watauga Association.

Churches of the New Salem Baptist Association
The churches of the New Salem Baptist Association are as follows:

• The Brush Creek Baptist Church is the oldest church in the New Salem Baptist Association. It was constituted on May 29, 1802 and is located in Brush Creek, Tennessee.

• The Carthage Road Baptist Church is located approximately five miles outside of Carthage, Tennessee. Their first service as a mission congregation was in June 1987. They were organized as a church and joined the association on September 30, 1990.

• The First Baptist Church in Carthage, Tennessee was started by the Peyton’s Creek Baptist Church and organized on July 16, 1881.

• The First Baptist Church in Gordonsville, Tennessee was started as a Sunday night service in a storefront. In the spring of 1955 they became a mission of New Middleton Baptist Church. On April 15, 1956 the church was organized as the Gordonsville Baptist Church.

• The Hickman Baptist Church was started as a mission of the Brush Creek Baptist Church in July 1805 and constituted in July 1806. This church is located in the small community of Hickman, Tennessee.

• The Lancaster Baptist Church was established in 1897 in the community of Lancaster, which is four miles east of Gordonsville, Tennessee.

• The New Middleton Baptist Church, which traces its roots back to 1830, is located in the New Middleton community, four miles from Gordonsville, Tennessee.

• The Peyton’s Creek Baptist Church was organized as a church on the third Sunday of July in 1812. They were admitted into the association in 1915. The church is located in the community of Monoville, which is three miles west of Carthage.

• The Riddleton Baptist Church was organized on January 2, 1888 and is in a very small community of Riddleton which is five miles outside of Carthage, Tennessee.

• The Rome Baptist Church was constituted on the first Sunday of December in 1854. The church is located in the Rome community, 8 miles west of Carthage, Tennessee.

• The newest member of the association is the Iglesia Hispana de Carthage which began in 2007. It was started as a Spanish-speaking mission to reach the growing Hispanic population.


Work of the New Salem Baptist Association
The work of the association can be divided into the following four areas:

• Fellowship among the churches is one of the main functions of the association. Each week the pastors have a weekly fellowship breakfast meeting which includes a devotional, prayer, and promotion of upcoming events. The youth committee coordinates association-wide fellowship activities each quarter. A senior adult fellowship is held each year, as well as an annual Fourth of July picnic.

• Community or local missions is a main function of the association. The churches of the association serve together in various mission events which include a weekly Sunday service at the Defeated Creek Campground, summer backyard Bible clubs in four housing areas, ReFuel youth local missions week in the summer, a ministry booth at the Smith County Fair, and a We Love Smith County Day in February. Every three years, the association holds a county-wide revival at the local community center. The association also supports the Iglesia Hispana de Carthage which meets each week at First Baptist Church Carthage.

• World-wide mission efforts are a constant focus of the association through the Woman’s Missionary Union which holds quarterly meetings to study and support mission causes. During the past two years, the association has conducted mission trips to Waimae, Hawaii and Rogersville, Tennessee. An On Mission Celebration is held with visiting missionaries from the International Mission Board, North American Mission Board, and Tennessee Baptist Convention every five years. The Ray B. McCall Mission Fund is an endowment fund for missions which has given over $12,000 to churches and individuals of the association to be involved in mission projects around the world during the last year.

• The final area of associational work is in conducting annual church-related events. These events include a pastors’ and deacons’ training dinner, a Vacation Bible School clinic for the workers of the churches, and an associational children and youth Bible drill and speaker’s tournament.