Two Year
Ministry Plan

Earlier this month, Grace hosted a re|engage conference for church leaders from around the country. Re|engage is a discipleship ministry that uses stories of grace, teaching, and small groups to help married couples move towards oneness. Over the years, our leadership has gained valuable insights and experience in facilitating re|engage, and this conference was a great opportunity to share what we’ve learned and connect with other churches.

Nearly 200 people attended, representing 47 churches from 13 states. Some leaders were learning how to launch the re|engage curriculum at their church, and others attended for deeper development around topics like Shepherding Values, Case Studies, Loving People by Listening and Asking Good Questions, Leading Yourself, and more. It was a great time of connection and encouragement for all involved. One attendee had this to say:

“What a great day! I just got done debriefing with my team, and they got so many insights from your team today. Thank you all so much for being gracious hosts and providing practical insight to our leader couples.”

We are thankful for all the volunteers, leaders, and staff who made this conference possible. If you would like to learn more about re|engage, click below.

We are celebrating that over the past two weekends, over 870 students and leaders attended the 24Seven and Fusion retreats at Carolina Point! These weekends were full of energy with worship, teaching, games, and time spent in reflection and community for our students.

The Authentic retreat, for our 7th and 8th graders, explored the idea of how our identity and sense of self is easily rooted in things outside of God. This weekend helped our students find where they are searching for identity, and they learned that who God has made them to be is more significant than anything they could have imagined for themselves.

The Tribe retreat, for our 5th and 6th graders, focused on how God has given us a powerful gift that we often overlook or take for granted: relationships. Students learned how family, friends, and church community provide relationships that can help build their understanding and faith in God.

In addition to teaching, worship, and small groups, students were also able to have fun together and ride go karts, participate in team sports, and enjoy lots of other activities! We are so thankful for the additional 230+ volunteers and staff who helped plan and served on these retreats on the worship team, work crew, AV, program, and more. Join us in praying that God continues to work in the hearts of these students, for the Spirit to move in conversations with their parents, and that there is growth in their lives from the seeds that were planted on these retreats.

To learn more about Grace Church Students, click below.

This past weekend, high school students from across all campuses came together for Forge Winter Weekend—385 students and 165 leaders attended! Students gathered at our Pelham campus for teaching and worship, and then they spent Friday night at their respective campuses. On Saturday, there was more teaching and small group time, and groups also had fun around the Upstate during free time.

During the sessions, guys and girls split to hear gender-specific teaching. Our boys engaged the topic of Future Men—walking through what the Bible says about the direction, calling, and confidence of being a man made in the image of God. The girls learned about the idea of Reflected—understanding what it looks like to be a generation of young women made in the image of God who have the courage to move and confidence to yield as they live on mission for him.

We are so thankful for our students’ willingness to engage challenging topics and our leaders’ willingness to pour their lives into these young people. Will you pray that God would continue to work in hearts as our students learn and grow? To learn more about Grace Students, click below.

A little over a year ago, Grace purchased over 12 acres of land in Piedmont for our Natural Burial site. We believe that death and dying are discipleship issues that the church needs to be involved in, and this has prompted us to pursue the option of natural burial—a way to shepherd our hearts and minds as we surround our loved ones in death. As a peaceful, less expensive, and simple alternative, there is no vault, coffin, or embalming.

Over the past 15 months, we have buried eight people, and it has been humbling to be able to walk through the grieving process with these families. We are thankful for this unique opportunity to wrap around families and support them while they grieve.

We have also been able to develop the land in various ways so we can better serve our church body. Land has been cleared, fencing installed, trees moved, and stone columns are being added. We have also built a shed to store tents, chairs, and other items that are used to serve families during the burial process, and in the future, we hope to add a chapel as well.

Natural burial has created new discipleship opportunities for our members as well. Volunteers have been involved in making caskets, digging graves, landscaping, greeting, parking assistance, connecting at the burial site, preparing flowers, and sending prayer cards. We are so thankful for each volunteer who makes this ministry possible, and we pray that God would continue to use our efforts to bless the church.

If you are interested in learning more about natural burial or getting involved as a volunteer, click below.

We are celebrating that over the past two weekends, 449 students, along with 258 leaders and volunteers, attended the Forge retreats at Carolina Point! These weekends were full of energy and a meaningful time of worship, teaching, and community for our high school students.

The FAKE retreat, for our 11th and 12th graders, explored the idea of exposing the fake gospels in their lives and fighting to find clarity, truth, and freedom in Jesus. The Mirrors retreat allowed our 9th and 10th graders time to learn how freedom from anxiety and being self-focused comes by removing yourself from the center of your life, putting God in the center, and focusing on loving others.

In addition to teaching, worship, and small groups, students were also able to have fun and explore the lake, ride go karts, participate in tournaments, and experience the OGO ball during their free time! We are so thankful for everyone who helped plan and served on these retreats. Join us in praying that God continues to work in the hearts of these students and that there is growth in their lives from the seeds that were planted on these retreats. To learn more about Grace Church Students, click below.

Last month, Grace en Español was able to host Shame: Finding Freedom—a conference exploring what shame is, identifying the experiences, thoughts, and feelings that cause shame, how it affects us in everyday life, and how to live in the freedom and comfort Christ holds out to us.

Over 180 women attended the conference—some traveling from Nicaragua, Colombia, Costa Rica, and Dominican Republic. We also had women leaders come from churches in Tennessee, Pennsylvania, and Atlanta as well as three different Hispanic churches in Greenville. Over 30 volunteers served by helping with hospitality, A/V, worship, parking, and security.

The goal of this conference was not only to teach women about shame, but to be a resource to equip other ministries and churches as well. After the conference, Grace staff and leaders hosted a lunch on Sunday to equip ministry leaders to start a shame study in their churches. We were able to share materials, digital resources, and guidance around helping women view shame through a biblical lens. As a result of this conference, we know that church leaders in Nicaragua are going through the material as well as women in a prison ministry in Colombia.

For our Español women, it was an impactful topic as shame is rarely studied or even mentioned in hispanic culture. As a result, 50 women are participating in the Shame: Finding Freedom study that launched 10 days after the conference. We also have a group of Forge girls going through this study.

What a blessing to see women from around the world come together and connect as sisters in Christ! We are thankful for all the leaders and volunteers who made this conference possible, and we pray that all who were impacted will continue to grow and experience life change. To learn more about our resources for women, click below.

Earlier this month, we were excited to host the very first NEXT retreat! NEXT is a ministry designed to engage college students in a way that tethers them to the local church and grows them as followers of Christ during a pivotal season of life.

The event took place at Pine Cove, and 120 students attended, along with 35 leaders and volunteers. Students heard teaching on the topics of fragility and resilience and how our obsessive focus on self leads to anxiety and/or arrogance. There was a lot for students to process, and they were thankful for their leaders and one another to be able to discuss these ideas in community and spend time in worship. And of course, they also had time for pickleball, socializing, playing games, and a dessert hour trivia challenge!

Many participants expressed their gratitude for biblical teaching on these topics. As they go back to a college environment where everyone is continually stressed or overwhelmed, our prayer is that they would continue to try and figure out what it looks like to follow Jesus as a college student. Will you join us in praying that they would find a sturdy hope outside of their circumstances and anchor themselves in the stability of God’s Word and the local church?

If you would like to learn more about NEXT, please email Dillon Carpenter at [email protected].

Did you know that we recently launched a podcast for our church body? When serving in ministry, we are often clear on the “what” behind the mission we are trying to accomplish and the "how" behind achieving our ministry objectives. Ironically, we can often forget the "why" behind the ministry we do.

The purpose of the Grace Church Members podcast is to discuss discipleship practices in the life of our church and help our congregation think about why we do the things we do. So far, episodes have covered topics such as baptism, singing, serving, and death/natural burial. These conversations have proven valuable for our members to engage with and reflect on.

In our most recent episode on death and natural burial, Matt Kelley had this to say:

Several years ago, we started a conversation about what it looks like to take care of people not just through life, but also through death and burial. We knew that we were trying to disciple people from birth until the grave, but once we got to the grave, we were not involved, and we felt like that was something we needed to explore. So we did a lot of research and honed in on something called natural burial.

The episode goes on to explain what natural burial is, its benefits, and why it is important for us as a church. This topic is just one of many that is helpful for us to reflect on and consider how we are being discipled and discipling others within our local congregations. Our hope is that this podcast challenges our members to be more fully devoted to God and his mission of making disciples.

To listen to this podcast and subscribe, click below. To learn more about natural burial, click here.

Mosaic is our ministry for children, students, and adults with disabilities, and we are so thankful for our staff and volunteers who serve these individuals and their families. Last month, we were excited to host a Mosaic Family Festival for all our individuals in Mosaic and their families. It was great to see 120 participants enjoying the festival as 100 volunteers loved and served them.

Families got to watch a movie and enjoy snacks, make various crafts and balloon animals, play outdoor games, pet snakes and miniature goats, and much more. Above all, it was a sweet time for families with children, students, or adults who have special needs or disabilities to relax, connect with one another, and have fun—knowing their loved ones were being cared for and welcomed by Mosaic volunteers.

What a blessing to see biblical community lived out in this way! If you are interested in learning more about Mosaic or volunteering with this ministry, click below.

Beginning in February, 2022, 95 young professionals began participating in ViewPoint Leadership Year—a 26-session experience for young men and women to help them be effective leaders at work, church, and in the community and to help them consistently apply biblical principles to every area of their work and life. Throughout the year, 28 mentors are walking alongside these young people as they learn operational best practices and seek to apply them to their work.

Being a young believer new to the workforce can be challenging. Many of our participants voiced their difficulty in viewing work through a gospel lens, living an integrated life, and finding practical ways to express the gospel in a professional context.

We are thankful to be able to provide a biblical framework for grappling with these challenges as well as practical tools to help participants be even more effective in their work. Many participants have expressed that the most useful facet of the experience is the relationships they have developed and the time they get to spend processing ideas and current challenges in a group context.

A few participants had this to say about their experience:

I learned how to live out my faith in the workplace by more than just my words. The way I treat people, the way I act, and the things that I do and do not do are all ways that I should live out God’s transformation in me.

I have learned that biblical community and Christian perspective is really important in my work. Even as an entrepreneur with no coworkers and no employees, I have the opportunity every day to represent Christ in some way.

Another cohort of participants will begin ViewPoint Leadership Year in 2023. Will you join us in prayer for the next generation of leaders? To learn more about the program, click below.

For years, both members of Grace church and individuals from our community have experienced life change through re:generation—a 12-step discipleship process oriented around life change and hope through the application of God’s Word.

In late 2020, we were excited to launch re:gen for Students with a small number of our high school students. Since then, the ministry has grown consistently, and more and more of our students are grappling with the difficult issues in their lives and experiencing positive life change. In this age of social media and constant access to information, teens face many weighty issues—pornography, anger, resistance to authority, substance abuse, anxiety, and more. We’ve been both challenged and encouraged by their willingness to confront their struggles honestly and be vulnerable in community.

While working through these issues has been hard, the rewards are already evident—both in the lives of participants and in their circles of influence. We are so thankful for our students, the leaders walking through this journey with them, and above all, a faithful God who offers hope and freedom through the gospel.

Will you join us in praying for re:gen for Students? New groups will launch this fall. If you are interested in learning more, click below.

The number of people with dementia is on the rise, and for each person diagnosed, care is required. Many families are functioning as caregivers without any education or training, which leaves them vulnerable to confusion, fear, frustration, and ultimately, burnout. One way Grace is seeking to support these families is through Understanding Dementia—a Grace Institute equipping class designed to help families and caregivers of those impacted by dementia gain a better understanding of the disease.

We were able to partner with the staff of The Gardens to offer Understanding Dementia this past spring, and over 50 people participated. The class covered basic dementia education, practical coping strategies, local resources, a dementia experience, and the opportunity to ask specific questions about dementia to professionals in the field.

One couple who took the class had this to say about their experience:

Understanding Dementia provided us with explanations about how dementia changes a person’s brain—giving us a better understanding about the changes we saw in my dad’s capabilities and his behaviors. It also gave us an opportunity to ask questions, share our experiences, and receive useful resources and support that we so desperately needed.

I have struggled a lot in my new role as a caregiver for my dad, and this class provided me a safe place to express my emotions, to be open about the challenges we are facing, and to feel accepted and understood. The dementia professionals presented the material with compassion and happily shared their knowledge and experience with everyone in the class.

What a blessing to come alongside families so they can be fully known and loved in a challenging season. If you are interested in learning more about Understanding Dementia or other classes related to caregiving, please email Julia Eldred at [email protected].

We are a family of local congregations, and there’s a lot going on across all our campuses right now. Grace Church exists to make mature followers of Jesus, and God has opened pathways for us to pursue this mission in many different ways. Click the video below to hear several of our campus pastors give updates about what’s happening at their campus. Stay tuned for the remaining updates!