July 22, 2010 Return to Current Sidelines Issues Dear Church Family and Friends of Southtown, I talk about them a lot. I mentioned them to Leith Anderson when he was here. I just wrote someone about them on Facebook. Who are they? The myriad of volunteers at Southtown. We have an incredible volunteer base here. We are never really ever short of volunteers and this is something I thank God for. From the dozen + who helped lay the flooring on Saturday in less than three hours, to the many hard-working committees and teams (Nominating, Finance, Constitution, Hospitality, Personnel, Trustees, ushers, greeters, and A/V, just to name some but not all), to the ministry groups (Deacons, Sunday School/Bible study/small group leaders, ETC volunteers, AWANA leaders, choirs, and Praise Team, again to name some but not all), to the many others who do and give time and effort for one-off events and opportunities. I encourage you that if you are not involved or engaged at some level in serving at Southtown, that you waste no more time and raise your hand to say, "Count me in!" Let us hear from you. What a joy to have Susan Freeman, the Executive Director of VEAP, here on Sunday. In conjunction with her coming, we launched our "VEAP Back-to-School Drive." VEAP's goal this year is to help fill 3,400 backpacks with necessary school supplies for children of all ages. We have our own church goal of backpacks, notebooks, pencil packs, scissors, and more. See the list and display in the foyer. Distribution boxes are also in the foyer, so let's go get those supplies and see to it that kids in our community have what they need to start the school year off right. Sunday morning messages are now online! You can go to our church's website (www.southtownbaptist.com) and listen to or download missed messages or listen to one again. Thanks to a great tech team that has made this happen. We continue our series on "The Seven Deadly Sins" this Sunday. I hope to see you then. Stan Our spotlight this week is on Steve and Betty Dyess. They joined Southtown a few weeks ago. Steve is the new Director of Missions for the Twins Cities Metro Baptist Association (TCMBA). He comes by way of the North American Mission Board in Atlanta. Steve and Betty moved to the Cities back in May and are temporarily living in Chanhassen. They are having a house built near Prior Lake and hope to be in it by October. They have been married for 30 years. They met in New Orleans where Steve was attending seminary and Betty was on staff at First Baptist of New Orleans. They have one daughter and two grandchildren who live in North Carolina. Their son-in-law is a pastor there. Steve also serves as an Army Reserve chaplain. He has worn the uniform for 40 years. Steve grew up in Shakopee and has pastored churches in Texas and Louisiana. Betty has served as a missionary in Africa for two years. We are very excited about having Steve and Betty as a part of our family of faith. We may not get to see them much as they are often in other churches on Sundays. However, Steve will be preaching here on August 29 so you can make plans now to be here that day.