On Sunday, July 19, Sound City Bible Church is excited to welcome Justin Schaeffer, who will be preaching at all three services (9a, 11a, and 5p). Many of you are likely familiar with Justin, but for those who are not, here is what you should know:
- Associate pastor at Mars Hill Shoreline for 3 years, on staff with the church for 7
- Has been married to his wife Amy for 12 years
- Dad to Ben (11), Riley (10), and Jonah (6)
- Bats right, throws right
- Moved to Atlanta in 2013 to participate in a church planting residency program
- Over the next year, is planting a church on the east side of Atlanta, Renovation Eastside.
Here is what Justin had to say about their current church plant:
We are currently gathering as three city groups (community groups) in the area we are planting the church. The three groups have been coming together for a weekly cookout and bible study in the park throughout the summer and have continued to add people and diversity. Our planting community is majority-minority, which is something to celebrate as we seek to represent God’s transcultural purpose to gather people from every culture into His church. We’ll be starting monthly preview services in October and then weekly services January 16 (MLK jr. Weekend). Our community is really seeking to follow the Spirit with boldness in sharing the gospel as we love and serve our neighbors. We are already seeing both resistance and fruit, which is very exciting!
We love Justin very much and are excited to have him preach on Sunday! Not only are we excited about having him here with us, we are excited about the work that God is doing in Atlanta through the Schaeffer family. As such, the elders have decided that Sound City Bible Church will be providing monthly church planting support to Renovation Eastside for the next year. If you are someone who would like to give financially above and beyond your regular contribution to your home church, you can do so in one of two ways:
- Give online. Go to RenovationChurch.com/give and choose “Eastside” in the “Choose Designation” drop down menu.
- Text-to-give. Text any amount and the word “Eastside” to 404.334.4884 (Ex: “$250 Eastside”).
A Special Note to Former Members
For those who are previous members or attenders of Mars Hill Shoreline, we want to extend a warm welcome for you to join us this weekend at any one of our three services. It is no secret that our church experienced a significant amount of turmoil in 2014, and for many of you, finding a new church home was a difficult and painful experience. It is our hope that our time with Justin Schaeffer this weekend would be glorifying to Jesus, loving for the current members of Sound City, healing for previous members of Mars Hill Shoreline, and a beautiful demonstration of the gospel of grace, forgiveness, and reconciliation lived out in front of an unbelieving world.
Because we expect to see some additional folks at this weekend’s services, and because additional folks means additional kids and additional work for our amazing children’s ministry volunteers, here are a couple of ways that you could help:
- If possible, attend the 5p service. Even though this service does not offer children’s ministry, your children are welcome to join us in the service. If they get too noisy, there is an overflow room where they can wiggle and squirm to their heart’s content.
- If you can’t attend the 5p service and want to come to a morning service, please come a few minutes early. We have a new children’s check-in system, and we will need 5 minutes or so to get your children’s information entered. Again, please consider keeping your older kids with you in the service so that we don’t overwhelm the children’s ministry volunteers.
We are looking forward to seeing Justin this weekend and hearing what God has put on his heart to teach us from the bible!