Summer interns are here! Be sure to say hey to these guys when you see them around. They’ll be with us until August, working with various ministries and campuses while serving and taking internship classes.
Read MoreIn January, we began a series of discussions on “The African American Experience: How We Got Here” in order to better understand our current situation in the Upstate and beyond, and to discuss how our church can help bridge some of the gaps.
What now?Grace Church Equip exists to help advance the growth and success of the local church. On May 7-8, we hosted 22 churches and 3 nonprofits—65 people total—for a conference on how to do discipleship in the local church.
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We Choose is our two year ministry plan. It is a strategic way to budget, discuss, raise, and spend resources in a manner that will help us accomplish our mission of making disciples.
We Choose sustains the ministry we have already been entrusted with, as well as looks ahead to future opportunities God has put in our path.
Didn't get a hard copy?
View our ministry plan
Outreach and missions is centered on our core value of being "Culturally Engaged". Through engaging our neighbors locally and internationally, we can strategically create relationships that provide opportunities to share the gospel and care for those in need.
Click "Read More" for what the Wood family had to share about their experience on the Chicago trip together!
In two days, June 22, three Grace Church members and staff leave for follow-up training with pastors and leaders in Nicaragua, specifically in Rivas (2010-2012) and Matagalpa (2013-2015). Merritt Anderson will be teaching our "Leadership Values" course, David Vaughan will be teaching a "Study of Parables", and Wes Cavin will be leading a session on "Growing Church/Christian Unity".
Summer interns are here! Be sure to say hey to these guys when you see them around. They’ll be with us until August, working with various ministries and campuses while serving and taking internship classes. Watch this video introducing each of them!
Learn more about our interns or learn more about Grace Church internships.
In January, we began a series of discussions on “The African American Experience: How We Got Here” in order to better understand our current situation in the Upstate and beyond, and to discuss how our church can help bridge some of the gaps that still exist. Click "ACTION ITEMS" below for eight action items that we have taken as a church over the last few months.
To visit our page on "How We Got Here", including the full discussion on video, and the downloadable notes, resources, and presentation, click here.
Eight college students are spending seven weeks of their summer running Camp Impact in Allendale, SC. They got here last week and will be here for the rest of this week training before they head out. If you're going on a trip this summer, be sure to say hey! Click "WATCH" below to meet our Allendale Camp Staff!
To learn more about Allendale and meet some of our key partners, watch this video.
To read more about our partnership with Allendale, click here.
We have the privilege of writing biblically-oriented worship songs that our congregation can enjoy. "Hope to Carry On" is a Grace Church Worship original song based in Paul's letter to the church of Thessalonica. In the midst of persecution and uncertainty, Paul was calling the church to stand firm in their faith and to walk in holiness as they anticipate the return of the Lord. Not just in their own power, but through the encouragement and life change that comes through selflessly loving each other.
"And may the Lord make your love for one another and for all people grow and overflow, just as our love for you overflows. May he, as a result, make your hearts strong, blameless, and holy as you stand before God our Father when our Lord Jesus comes again with all his holy people. Amen."
— 1 Thessalonians 3:12-13
Because we are driven by the desire to do discipleship in the community we are surrounded by, it is important to us to have a permanent location for each local congregation in our church family. Our Greer and Anderson campuses are under construction in completely new buildings and will be finished soon! Click below and scroll down the page to see the Greer and Anderson building progress pictures, or click "watch" to hear Matt Williams give an update on each.
Zach Mercado, our Harrison Bridge Students Director, will be teaching this weekend on 1 Thessalonians 5:23-28. Get to know him a little! ⬇️
An important partnership for us is supporting DSS across several communities in the Upstate. One of the ways we have recently done this is through our Foster and Adopt Resource Center. Some of our volunteers from the resource center have cleaned and replaced the toys in the DSS visitation rooms for foster children and their parents. We will continue to clean and replace toys in the rooms for DSS as needed. Thank you to everyone who is helping out!
To learn more about our ministry for foster and adoptive families, click below.
As part of our ongoing commitment to invest in young leaders in the German church, as well as provide discipleship resources, we hosted intern Franziska Klein for seven weeks this winter. Click below to watch as her and Chrystie Cole, our women's director, sit down to talk about her time with us and the difference in local church across different cultures and countries.
Our goal over the next years is to support or establish a healthy church with leadership development and DNA among the English-speaking internationals of Munich. This church can also serve as a base for supporting and resourcing young German church leaders.
Grace Church Equip exists to help advance the growth and success of the local church. On May 7-8, we hosted 22 churches and 3 nonprofits—65 people total—for a conference on how to do discipleship in the local church. It was an incredibly encouraging time and we look forward to continuing to help equip and build up other local churches. For more info, contact [email protected]
"The Equip conference gave us tools and strategies that are actionable and time tested. More than motivation and strategy, Grace Equip was an experience that reoriented us to the purpose most of us got into ministry—to see people changed to be more like Christ."
—A recent participant from Rock Hill, SC
Dr. Carson Felkel, the lead physician from Bon Secours Behavioral Health, further equipped our staff today in assessing suicide risk and learning to identify mental health issues while caring for our members and their families. We also heard from Ken Bickel about Family Grace and the support it offers to family members.
Family Grace is a family support care group we offer for families and spouses of those with a loved one dealing with depression, anxiety, and other mental health difficulty or disorders. Click below to learn more about our care groups and to sign up if you are interested in being a part.
We choose to partner with JumpStart as they help prisoners, through Christ, move towards a future greater than their past. Recently, over 50 Grace members chose to go inside of Perry Prison to show appreciation to the prison staff for their difficult work and to learn more about the mission of JumpStart. Click below to learn more about JumpStart.
Our Chicago team (pictured below) and Allendale team (pictured above) are spending their spring breaks serving others!
Our Chicago team left this past weekend, and they are spending the week serving a local church with construction projects and VBS activities to further the church’s efforts in their own community.
Our Allendale leaves tomorrow and comes back April 20, coming alongside local Allendale churches for a weekend including a community service project and a field trip with kids in the community.
Chicago team pictured here.
We recently wrapped up our month of Grace Church Students retreats. Thank you to all the volunteers who spent their weekend with our students. We danced a lot, worshiped, played games, spent quality time with our small groups, and sat under teaching about pride, creation, parables, and who we are following. Needless to say—God was present, and lives are being changed in these students. We are grateful to know them and grateful that our parents give us the chance to speak into their students' lives. To watch the teaching and recap videos from each retreat, click below!
We are a multilingual and multicultural church, spanning across 12 campuses, in which three of those are Spanish-speaking. We have just launched two new Grace en Español campuses in Spartanburg and Harrison Bridge. We are excited for what God is doing through these communities! By clicking below, you can watch Daniel and Mariagracia tell their story of life change and finding a church family through Grace en Español, and you can also hear Matt Williams share the update on our new campuses.
This medical team is in Kenya this week, focusing on providing support for local churches as they seek to have a credible voice in their communities. To learn more and get involved in what we are doing in Kenya, click here. For real-time updates and photos from our Kenya team while they are there, click below.
What has changed?
While the situation in Nicaragua is still very fragile, we're seeing several encouraging signs. In addition to a resumption of talks and negotiations between the government, private sector, and religious entities, we are also learning about other missions teams from the U.S. that are returning to Nicaragua (medical teams, teaching teams, and construction/other humanitarian teams).
3 Minute Read
This past weekend, Bill White taught at our church plant in Charleston, Grace City Church. They are going through a series on Judges, and Bill was able to step in and teach on Judges 5. Grace City is pastored by Will Plonk and was launched over a year ago. Please continue praying for them with us as God works in the lives of their people.
To learn more about Grace City, visit their website. To listen to Bill's teaching, click below.
It takes a variety of churches to reach the city with the gospel. Mitch Miller is leading a church revitalization efforts at Griggs Memorial Baptist Church in the Poe Mill area of Greenville. Will Broadus planted Reconcile Church in an urban context in West Greenville, South Carolina. Grace is contributing $1250 / month to help these churches.
Interview with Will Broadus at Reconcile Church
Interview with Mitch Miller at Griggs Memorial Baptist Church
Retreat month is underway - this month we will have over 2000 students and leaders attend a weekend retreat where they are encouraged and fed spiritually.
