Community TransformationOUR PERSONAL TRANSITIONHow we got here
Most of you who know us will wonder how have Peggy and I altered our decades of successful innovative endeavors between Christians and Jews to an equally innovative and vibrant version of the church recalibrating itself into a change agent in their communities and cities?
2017
In November of 2017 the Lord said to me “You have given most of your efforts for the past fifteen to twenty years building relational bridges between Christian and Jewish communities, but previous to that you have had twenty-five years of leadership in the church. Be open, because I will be reopening those doors”.
2018
In 2018 we continued our cultural exchange programs between American, Canadian and Israeli teens, culminating in our teen tour to Israel.
It was also in 2018 that my longstanding friend of thirty-three years became Governor of Tennessee, thus accelerating our preplanned state of Tennessee and Israel efforts to the next level.
2019
In 2019 I began working as a liaison between the Governor’s office and the Jewish community, networking and facilitating meetings with rabbis, Jewish business leaders and the presidents of the Jewish federations in Nashville, Memphis, Knoxville and Chattanooga.
Our main focus and efforts were aimed at establishing a New State of Tennessee / Israel Chamber of Commerce. A corner stone of that effort will be a gubernatorial tour of Israel for the purpose of facilitating trade, commerce and cultural exchanges.
After a lot of work and genuine excitement shared by all, we were saddened to see the covid epidemic force this progress to a halt. So this effort is all in place to be resumed when the Lord decides he wants us laboring in that field again. In the midst of this very disappointing turn of events, we were thankful for and intrigued by the heads up given in 2017.
Simultaneously, around the end of 2019 I had a dream of being at an event in California and having a deeply impacting connection with five brothers, a group of businessmen. As I pondered this memorable dream, and the impact it was having on me I decided for the first time in over a decade to go back to Redding California.
I meet with Bill Johnson and had a discussion with the mayor of Redding concerning their amazing success in impacting Redding through Christian based city transformation. While there, I found myself living out the dream by meeting the five brothers, along with their wives, and beginning this course change, all based in Abbeville South Carolina.
2020The Dream & the Shift
In January of 2020, Peggy and I began, what has been one of the most wonderful relational and vocational journeys, working seven to ten days every month in Abbeville South Carolina.
The quality of the lives of our new friends is rich and rewardingly refreshing and their emergence from a Mennonite background has given our friendships a genuine feeling of being with family. Our work in the community through Stoll Industries, the Harvest Church and our emerging involvement in the city of Abbeville's revitalization has been a very rewarding personal success story. We are now excited as we enter 2021 but even better envisioned, prepared and positioned for true kingdom advancement.
2021 Abbeville
As many of you know, the unanticipated switch of 2020 that altered most of our efforts from complete engagement in the Jewish & political sphere into being deposited by the Lord into Abbeville has been monumental, and has taken time and serious investment to begin to understand what the Lord is really up to. Pioneering does have its initial stages of raw discovery.
Now after a year of focused involvement, our commitment is deeper than ever, our vision is sharpening, and there is a growing, powerful force propelling a strongly advancing momentum, shifting our relationship from visitors to ownership.
Abbeville, South CarolinaandCommunity Transformation
A few years ago I found myself repeating the phrase,
“It’s time for the church to take on the challenge of adopting their cities. To move beyond the walls of the church and solve their community’s problems.
Imagine what your city would look like if all of the churches and nonprofits would not only advance their isolated endeavors, but collectively inventoried their combined leadership, skill sets and finances, all in an effort to solve the city's problems, eradicate poverty and advance the city's stature.
For believers to transform a city, we have to start with a different end goal in mind, we need a new target other than building a successful church. It’s a huge mental shift and for it to work, leaders and congregants alike will have to have a heart for change and a longing for something larger than they are experiencing in their local church.
If ninety percent of a churches' vision, activities and budget extends only as far as the doors of their church, then change will never happen.
But if we can find pastoral and business leaders, who will demonstrate breaking small insular thinking and practices by taking innovative chances then a church-wide season of re-envisioning itself can begin to take root. Equipping and empowering will give a platform for repositioning people outside the walls of the church and into the community; inspiring them to push them beyond comfort zones.
It’s the planting of a fresh vision beyond the walls of the church that will redefine identity; and new identity leads to an expansion of destiny.
This heart beat, this conviction is finding a beautiful new expression in the small, historic city of Abbeville, South Carolina.
Some years ago if you were to build a new mall you needed to secure a few large historically successful stores and they formed what was called “anchor” stores. Their proven success enhanced the chances of other stores success.
In Abbeville I would like to introduce you to one of those anchors, Stoll Industries.