With us quickly approaching the official end of summer, let’s recap on all of the exciting events, milestones, and memories we’ve created this summer as a church. But before we deep dive into summer, I want to give an honorable mention about two very special pre-summer happenings that occurred. One was ‘Don’t Lose the Sound’ which was epic! This event was held on Sunday, May 5th and it was our First Lady’s Appreciation musical featuring the Whitfield Company choir. Wow! That was an amazing pre-summer event and there were many other special guests. (Quick reminder: you can always scroll through our YouTube page to view our past events or services). The second honorable mention is our ‘closing’. In May, the church closed on a loan that allowed us to purchase our current building, so that we’re no longer under a land contract, praise the Lord! It also allowed us to undertake some projects this summer that I will highlight below.
On to the summer recap….June came in with a huge bang! We had our first annual Health and Wellness Fair. The weather was perfect and there were over 400 people who registered. There were over 20 vendors and pallets of giveaways to those who registered. It was a tremendous success and we look forward to our 2nd annual fair. Next up in June was the district bible conference for the New Hope District. We enjoyed great fellowship with the saints at The Gathering Ministry, which is the church of our tremendous Superintendent, Pastor Stephan Jackson. To top off the month of June our Pastor who is also the Chairman of the AIM Convention for the Historic First Jurisdiction of Michigan had a record-breaking AIM Convention this year. Due to the extreme temperatures, it was moved to the Brooks Cathedral Conference Center, but God still came in and blessed us each night. Also during the conference, we had a very special guest in the person of Bishop Linwood Dillard. Registration was sold out, we sold AIM t-shirts, and we heard a mighty Word from all of our speakers and from our Bishop on the final night of the conference.
In July we celebrated our Founder and Pastor, Alan R. Evans on Founder’s Day and was joined by Pastor Wade K. Smith and his congregation. This was our first time worshipping with them and are looking forward to continued fellowship. We also began our Summer Camp/Program as well as Vacation Bible School which was very impactful and very well attended. July was also the annual youth day and we received an encouraging and soul-stirring message from our guest speaker, Elder Daniel Butts, and the youth ended the amazing day with Painting with the Pastor in the basement of our church. Our children and youth are unmatched!
August is where the action is! The month began with our annual church picnic. We had a wonderful time of fellowship and played a really fun Bible Bowl game. Then we were on to the 110th Holy Convocation of the Historic First Jurisdiction of Michigan Northeast. New Hope District night was Tuesday, our pastor preached on Wednesday night, and our First Lady rendered the sermonic selection at Sunday’s Official Day service. Later in August, we had our 1st baptism of the year and then the next Sunday was our annual Men’s Day service. During annual Men’s Day, all of the deacons were recognized and given certificates for their support and dedication. Also during the Men’s Day service, we had the welcome by Bro. Bruce Cartwright and preliminary messages from our own Deacon Madison and and Minister Nelams. During August, the work on our gymnasium roof began and ended by the end of the month.
Overall this summer was amazing and we’re so glad that God has given us the grace to keep forging ahead. There’s so much more to come. Stay connected and you won’t miss it!