God is growing His church!

What a joy it is to see healthy ministry growth on every front!

• The Salt Company started off the year with 750 students at the Thursday night meeting in the gym. (Up from 7 when Jack Owens started the student organization 35 years ago!)
• The Freshmen group had 300 at their Sunday evening kick-off.
• D6 was packed for an exciting kick-off this past Wednesday.
• Escape 22 and 180, our junior and senior high ministries, each had 150 students
• The weekend worship services have grown 15% over the same period last year

Join with us in thanking God for hearts that are hungry for Him. Pray that He will find yielded hearts through which His work can continue to move forward unhindered throughout central Iowa!

Gearing Up for the Fall

5 Services will begin on the weekend of August 18/19...

• Sunday worship will have services at 9:00a and 11:00a in the auditorium, and 9:15a and 11:15a in the gym.
• To make this new schedule work, it will be more important than ever that people arrive on time to services. We will need to close the auditorium seating at 5 minutes after the start of each service and begin ushering people down to the gym for the next services.
• These are growing pains. In Troy's words..."It will be chaotic. But what a great place to be!" God is doing great things!

Kids Camp is underway...

• More than 100 children are at Hidden Acres this week for Kids Camp.
• Pray for Paul as he teaches, Mandy as she leads the counselors, the counselors, and the kids!

Mission teams are coming back...

• The Panama highschool team, the Thailand college team, the college Zambia team and one of the community Zambia teams returned this last week.
• The second Zambia team will be returning tomorrow...along with Pastor Jeff.
• Come out this weekend to the services to hear what Pastor Jeff learned in Africa as he shares "Lessons from Africa" with us. Isn't it great to be part of "a local church with a global vision"?

Your Move is Moving On

Pastor Troy and Mike just returned from meeting with our architects in Utah. Here are a few of the highlights:

• One of the lead men at BGW (Building God's Way) said "God is clearly at work in this project. I've rarely seen a church that looks so healthy."
• Steps were taken in the initial selection of materials.
• BGW's vision for making the whole building process a ministry to those involved has inspired our team.

This is our second week of Vacation Bible School:

• Many wondered if two weeks were really necessary...and they are! We are experiencing a 30% enrollment over last year.
• Experienced teachers turned to Mandy in the first week and said "I can't believe that someone has finally figured out how to make this fun for teachers...thank you!"