About

In 2000, after seven years of youth ministry, I left Gainesville, Georgia, to become the Director of Admissions at Covenant College. The primary reason for accepting the position was so Krista could finish her undergraduate degree. We made a four-year commitment to Covenant and began a new life in higher education. Three years into my commitment to Covenant, Krista and I began discussing what we should do at the end of that time. We entertained staying at Covenant. We considered going into business. Finally, after praying for several months about the decision, one night I came to the conclusion that, whether I liked it or not, I was being called back into ministry in the local church. Exactly what type of ministry we would go into was still to be determined. We were offered a position on a college campus with Reformed University Fellowship. We were offered a position doing youth ministry near my family in South Carolina. We even had an opportunity to do campus ministry in Madrid, Spain.
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During the midst of the decision-making process, I ran into my former pastor Jimmy Dodd. He had served at Mitchell Road Presbyterian Church before moving to Kansas City to plant a church. Knowing my personality, he suggested that Krista and I attend the Church Planter Assessment Center. Having nothing to lose and unsure as to exactly what God wanted for us, we decided to attend in May of 2004. Upon arrival we met with a dozen other couples. Most of them had dreamed of church planting and were under considerable pressure to "pass" the Assessment Center. Krista and I had nothing to lose and so we relaxed and just enjoyed the process. On the final day, we were pleasantly surprised to have been one of just a handful of couples to be completely approved to church plant for the PCA. After our approval, representatives from Presbyteries all over the nation "recruited" us. We spoke to people from Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and Phoenix. It was exciting to think about bringing the Gospel to a city in the West with very little conservative evangelical presence.

At the end of the day, we were invited to meet with Bob Cargo, the Church Planting Director for Perimeter Church in Atlanta. After speaking with people from so many distant and exciting locations, we "politely" agreed to meet with Bob. In the meeting, Bob gave us a glimpse of Perimeter and their vision for church planting. Within just a couple of weeks, I had agreed to come on staff at Perimeter as their first Church Planting Intern.
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One of my very first meetings was with Randy Pope, the founding pastor of Perimeter Church. In our meeting, he asked me about my past experience and passions. After listening to me ramble for some time, he asked if I had ever been to Rome, Georgia and suggested it as a possible location. At that time, Krista and I had been looking at Buckhead and the Virginia Highland area, so I politely changed the subject. Eight months later I was sitting in my office at Perimeter, still unsure of exactly where God wanted me to plant. After spending some time in prayer and asking God to show me where he wanted me to go, I thought back to that conversation with Randy and decided that I should at least take a trip up to Rome to check it out. So, then and there I walked out to the parking lot, hopped into my car, and drove to Rome. I drove around Berry and Shorter. I drove around the city. I drove around the Historic Downtown area. While sitting on Clocktower Hill, I called Krista on the phone and said, "You may think I am crazy, but I think this is exactly where God wants us to be." The next weekend, my parents took our kids and Krista and I drove up to Rome together and God confirmed the same feeling in her.
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We drove back to Perimeter and made the announcement that Rome was our destination. Over the next four months, almost every day, we either got an e-mail or a phone call or ran into someone who gave us a contact in Rome! It was a great confirmation then and now that Rome was exactly where God wanted us to be. In July of 2006 we moved to Rome and immediately went about the "work" of meeting as many people as possible.

For six months we had people over to dinner, met folks for coffee, and had informational meetings in our living room. Before long, we had an amazing group of people who were committed to starting a new church in Rome. In January of 2007 we began holding worship services in our home. In another six months, we had outgrown our living room and began worshipping in the Rome Civic Ballet. In February of 2008 we began maxing out the ballet and moved into the DeSoto Theatre.

Over the last eight years we've continued to grow in attendance and in organizational community. We've hired staff, ordained 2 classes of elders, and created vehicles for equipping and assimilating the people of Seven Hills Fellowship. Our partnership with the DeSoto Theatre has matured as well. Our first agreement with them consisted of Seven Hills giving the DeSoto $12,000 towards the renovation of the foyer in exchange for a year's lease. The partnership worked so well that we arrived at a second agreement. This time, Seven Hills gave the DeSoto $75,000 towards renovating the upstairs of the DeSoto in exchange for a four-year lease. In 2012 we arrived at another agreement, this time giving $250,000 toward new seating, a projector, a screen, new foyers, and bathrooms. The current deal gives us space in the DeSoto through 2024. All in all, this partnership has not only been a blessing for us, but for the DeSoto Theatre and the city of Rome as well.