The backpacks are out of the closet again. If you drive past the schools this week you will see the parking lots filling up, the buses lined up, teachers hauling in boxes and bins, folders and laminated name tags. Something shifts in Statesboro this time of year. Summer loosens its grip (even if the heat hasn’t!), alarms get set earlier, and a whole community begins to pick up its rhythm again.
As you and your family begin stepping into a new rhythm for the fall, I hope you will make the intentional choice to integrate discipleship into your life. By discipleship I mean choosing to grow in your relationship with God by making intentional choices for yourself and for your family. Nobody drifts into it. It gets built the same way a school year gets built, one ordinary decision at a time.
Here are a few places to start.
- Read the Bible. Not all of it, not today. Start with a few verses a day at a time you can actually keep — over coffee, in the carpool line, at the kitchen table before homework. We post a Weekly Reading Plan at pittmanpark.org that follows what we are preaching, so what you read at home and what you hear on Sunday work on you together.
- Pray. Short and honest beats long and polished. Pray in the car. Pray over your children before they get out at the drop-off. Pray for the teacher whose name is on the folder. If you want to pray alongside others, the Woody Powell Prayer Group meets Tuesday mornings at 8:00 and our Women’s Circles meet throughout the month.
- Spend time in worship and community. Be here on Sundays, and put your family somewhere they can be known. Park Kids Sunday School is growing and our new Wonder Class opens at 10:00 this Sunday in the Creation Company room, where preK through first grade will learn with Ms. Libby. Wednesday nights start back on August 12, with communion in the chapel at 5:00 and Kids Choir, Open Table at 5:30, and Choir, Bible Club, Youth Small Group, and a fall study on unity for adults at 6:30.
- Give and serve. Discipleship that stays in your head is not finished yet. Our head and heart knowledge must move our hands and feet to action. Pack a bag on Wednesdays with Backpack Buddies. Sign up for the English Class team this fall. Help serve or clean up at Open Table. And if you are able to give, think about catching up on your pledge or making a special gift to our Landscape Matching Grant that runs through August 31, with every dollar still doubled up to $25,000 at pittmanpark.org/give.
This Sunday, August 2, is a good place to start. It is Family First Sunday, we will share communion together at both services, and we begin a new series called Behind The Magic. Come and sit together. Let the first Sunday of the school year be the first ordinary decision, and let the next one be easier because you already made this one. Whether you choose to just dip your toes into a new discipleship rhythm this fall or jump into a whole new routine, the most important thing is to make space for God to move in your heart, in your life, in your family, and in our world.
God bless,
Jonathan Smith