Mike Young, senior pastor of Zion Baptist Church, Brownsville, shares the gospel with attendees at the “Blue Oval City Workers Appreciation Block Party.”
STANTON — Although First Baptist Church, Pulaski, is located roughly three hours from Stanton, the members of FBC aren’t allowing the 150-mile separation to keep them from doing what they feel called to do.
Having gone “all in” on their mission to make an impact for Christ at Blue Oval City — the massive Ford auto plant being built in Stanton — the members of FBC are seizing their opportunities.
The church sent volunteers to serve at Blue Oval City outreach events on two occasions during a three-week stretch in late August and early September, and they are planning to make many more trips in the months ahead.
“As a church, we’ve really just seen the vision of what God is bringing to the Stanton area,” said Andrew Maddox, children’s minister at FBC Pulaski.
“He has really burdened our hearts about what He is doing in Blue Oval City. It is such a great opportunity — the harvest is really ripe.”
Most recently, FBC Pulaski sent a large group of volunteers to the “Blue Oval City Workers Appreciation Block Party” on Sept. 9. The event was hosted by Zion Baptist Church.
The FBC contingent helped grill hamburgers and hot dogs, and also worked the serving lines.
“Even though we are three hours away, we’re excited about the opportunity to be here,” said Maddox during the event. “This is a great chance for our church to see Christ at work.”
Other churches from outside the Stanton area — including FBC Collierville, which sent volunteers to the block party — have also shown a willingness to partner with the Haywood County churches to spread the gospel to the Blue Oval City workers.
Danny Sinquefield, Harvest Field One Team Leader for the TBMB and coordinator of the TBMB’s Blue Oval City Partnership, said it is this type of cooperation, from churches near and far, that will be the key to making a difference.
Sinquefield
“This is definitely not just a West Tennessee thing,” said Sinquefield. “This is a statewide opportunity for all of our churches to do something big, something special. And we are going to need churches from all over Tennessee to be involved.”
Chris Garner, the new pastor at Holly Grove Baptist Church, said there is tremendous excitement among the HGBC members about Blue Oval City.
“I’ve been at Holly Grove for two weeks, and the interest that the church has in Blue Oval City was part of the reason they called me,” he said about the church, which sent about a dozen volunteers to serve at the recent block party. “They wanted a pastor who had a vision to reach the unreached and to engage the lost. It’s exciting to me to see how excited our people are about Blue Oval City.”
Located roughly 40 miles east of Memphis, Blue Oval City will eventually cover approximately 4,100 acres and is expected to employ an estimated 10,000 people.
It is believed that the population within a 20-minute radius of Blue Oval will grow by 90,000 people within 10 years.
“As Jesus said, the field is white for the harvest — and we need to pray for laborers,” Garner saidww. “These folks need Jesus and we want to direct them to Him.” B&R
