Pastor Emmett shared with the church the details about our new Three Rivers Campus on Sunday morning after the service. Here is the written version from Pastor Emmett:
What does it mean to have another campus?
This will be another location for TRCC to gather for corporate worship. The people who come to the new location will not attend the Unity location. We will still be one church with the same vision, DNA, coordinated mission and local ministry work, coordinated budget, and one body of elders. The second campus will have direct elder oversight by Emmett Long, Josh Pilgrim and Brad Poston, but all of our elders will have some responsibilities that relate to both campuses. Josh will serve as the primary teaching pastor, and the new campus will likely have a slightly different “flavor” than the Unity campus due to people and personalities, but the essentials will remain the same. Our hope is that God would use a second location to produce more radical followers of Jesus Christ than in one location alone.
Why start another campus?
Mitch spoke two weeks ago about some of the whys of church multiplication as we looked at how that happened in Acts. In a town with “a church on every corner”, at minimum 1/3 of our community is unchurched and more realistically closer to half is unchurched. There are many in our community who do not know Jesus as their Lord and who need to hear the good news of the Gospel.
The reasons to start a new campus boil down to our DNA, available resources, and opportunity.
The DNA of Jesus’ church is that it grows and reproduces, and in doing so produces disciples and leaders. God has given us this DNA and given to our church men who are called to lead. Some of those men are elders and some are not yet but will be when there is opportunity for them to step into leadership. We also recognize that if we do not continually develop leaders and disciples, we will stagnate and stop growing into maturity and obedience as a fellowship.
God has chosen to give us at this point in our history the resources necessary for another campus in people, pastors, and finances. We have had this desire for 13 years but not the opportunity in resources to make it happen as we do now. We are not called to hoard these resources but to give them away to produce radical followers of Jesus locally and globally.
The launch team: What does it mean to be on the launch team?
The launch team is a group of TRCC members that understands and epitomizes our DNA. It’s a group of people committed to being “all hands on deck” to help make the new campus a reality and to developing others who God will bring to join in the work. Everyone in this group will have some kind of essential role in the establishment and development of the new campus culture and ministries. Some roles may be more timeintensive than others, but all will be vital. Additionally, we’ve asked all launch team members to commit to a minimum of one year to help establish and provide stability to the new campus.
Our launch team came out of our radical life group and consists of the following 22 adults and 15 kids families/individuals, all of which are covenant members of TRCC:
Emmett & Jenny Long; Natalie, Karis, Jonathan
Josh & Jenny Pilgrim; John
Brad & Rachel Poston; Makayla, Hannah
Ben & Kim Hansard; Chloe
Ryan & Erica McKinney; Eliana, Eva
Justin & Alexa Owens; Violet
Chris & Hannah Seritt
Jeff & Alicia Audirsch; Gideon
Nick & Sarah Cooner
Jenna Gable
Lauren Sykora
James & Bonnie Mitchell; Lochlan, Natalie, Liam, Annie Rose
Please pray for this launch team as they work to see the new campus established!
If you are a covenant member of TRCC and want to be part of the launch team, come talk to us. We don’t want to exclude anyone, but we also want the Unity campus to remain vibrant and healthy. And we want launch team members that are committed to being “all hands on deck”. We need launch team members who are flexible, deal with change well, and committed sharing and living our their faith. We are looking for people who will lay the foundation and pass along TRCC’s DNA to those that God brings our way. And as we do that, our hope is that this campus will be the first of others campuses and other churches that God will be pleased to see us start across Northwest Georgia.
Where we are now and immediate plans
Our launch team will meet for the first time today to begin working through roles and responsibilities. Our next planned meeting is Sunday, Jan 10th at which point we will be meeting weekly as a launch team. When we begin meeting as a launch team we will no longer be in regular attendance at TRCC on Sunday mornings, but will instead be meeting in our homes to worship together and to plan for public worship services starting in March.
That gives us 9 weeks to organize/gel before the start of an expected launch of public worship services on March 13 or 20. We’ve targeted these dates because Resurrection Sunday is March 27 and we want to have at least one worship service before Resurrection Sunday.
Ben Hansard will have responsibility for Radical Kids on both campuses, and he is working toward leadership structures that will let him oversee both locations. I also anticipate that he will be on the UCS campus fairly regularly as we get things established.
We have spoken to both Shorter about the use of their business school (behind Chick-Fil-A) and with First Presbyterian about the use of their building (would be Sunday nights). If we can’t secure one of these or another location beginning in March, we could likely meet at UCS on Sunday nights. We are actively exploring options and trusting that God is going to provide a facility for us in his time. We ask all of you to pray for the new campus, and we will keep you updated as things develop.
Theology in the Dirt 