Pastor's column

“We have purchased the property!” was the report from Rich Edwards and the trustees who participated in the closing on January 11, 2012. The meeting occurred at 10:00AM on a Wednesday morning in the offices of Zelle Title, LLC. Those in attendance included the sellers and their realtor, an attorney that advised us, Jim Kuhar, our realtor, and our trustees: Rich Edwards, Dale Emerson and Tom McMurray. Tom serves as our registered agent for legal documents.

Our future church home will be on the 21 1/4 acres at the northwest corner of Washington Street and Bradfordton Road. It will be farmed in beans this summer, but there is approximately five untilled acres along the northern strip of the property into the corner that has some trees and grass. We hope to use that part of the property for some summer activities and a dedication service later in the spring.

Thank you, church family for your vision, prayers and support during this lengthy, but exciting project. Thanks to our Building Task Force members: Rich Edwards, team leader; Dwight Lambert, Pam Doris, Betty Gillaspie, Tom Wetherell, Patti McMurray, and Jim Jones for your years of service. Herb Short served in an advisory capacity.

Now what? I could anticipate that with our final meeting of this present BTF team on February 6 that we would be planning some kind of onsite worship and fellowship event when the weather permits. I think we may have some of the team members that may want to “roll off” and this would allow us to reconstitute a new building team with individuals best equipped to serve the church and take this process through the property development and building construction phase. More will be said about that selection process later.

You may remember some of my reflections at the end of November last year as I said, “In a sense, we’ve voted for the future in this crucial decision! This is an exhilarating, yet scary time for Springfield Southern. Indeed, we feel the exhilaration of a new chapter beginning for our church, but we also recognize the scary challenges that await us in this process. We will need to walk by faith through the days ahead acknowledging that there are many more steps before this dream becomes reality.” Continue to pray!