On Sandhurst's Origin with Steve Adams | The Sandhurst Podcast

On this episode, we look back at the early days of our church, exploring the vision that started it all, the mission that shaped its direction, and the memorable stories that have become part of our church family's legacy. This conversation with Steve Adams offers a meaningful look at where we've come from and how that guides us today.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

All right. Welcome everyone to the Beyond Sunday podcast. We want to equip the Saints to think biblically about God, life, and culture so that our faith goes beyond Sunday. Today we have a special guest, and I'm super excited about it. We have the one, the only, Mr. Steve Adams. Steve, welcome. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

Glad to be here.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Hey, glad to have you. So if you don't know anything about Steve, I want to give a little bit of a framework for who you are, and then I have a bunch of questions because I'm I have a lot of things that I want to try to draw out. But a little framework for who you are and uh what I hope happens um today. Uh Steve is one of the three original couples that started Sandhurst back in 1983, 1984. In fact, we have a picture of them that hangs on the wall uh of some of the original couples. And Steve, that's you right there, right? That that's Steve. All right. So uh you are one of the original couples who started the church and uh officially began uh in 1984. And so this is a little gym uh that well, I'll break it out in a second, but you're one of the original couples and no, I will break it out. So this was uh the the three-ring binder that Rob Colonis kept all the notes from the first few months of Sandhurst and gave it to Adam. Adam gave it to me, and I was just thumbing through it, and it is good. It has the attendance for each week, and when you know the church was like 16 people, 18 people, maybe 22 people, and it has all the like church bulletins. And I was coming across this one this morning. This is November 4th, 1984, and I'm just looking through it, and it says an evening worship, 6 p.m. Worship around the Lord's table at the home of Stephen Ann Adams. And it gives your address. And so you've got a long legacy of uh leadership and um investment at the church at Sandhurst. And so I'm grateful for it. Here's here's what I kind of the presupposition that I'm bringing into this, and then I just want to ask you a bunch of questions. All right, the presupposition the presupposition is that we understand our story when we understand the bigger story that we're a part of. And when we understand our story more, then we know how to engage it more. And so our story at Sandhurst in 2026 is part of a bigger story that started in 1984, and many of us at Sandhurst don't know that story. And my hope this morning is uh that we will be able to just get a little bit of a glimpse into the bigger story that is the church at Sandhurst, and then we can kind of uh sense ourselves in it and know how to engage it better. Quick example of that. Um I was sensing in myself, and the elders were too, just this desire to hear again from the people who helped found the church, what what was the heartbeat of those guys? And so we invited you to come in uh to an elder meeting probably a month and a half ago or so, two months ago. Correct. Um, and we had a bunch of questions for you, specifically about missions. And uh we were just hammered you with question, question, question, question. We sent you a list of questions beforehand. And uh the the way you answered the questions was both good and surprising because we and I wanted like a lot of specifics, like why did you decide this percentage? Why did you decide to do this and not this? And uh and what you kept saying is this well, we just felt like the Holy Spirit was prompting us to do that. We were listening to the Holy Spirit, and this is what we thought we felt like he was pushing us to do. So much of um the way that you guys founded the church on was trying to listen to the Holy Spirit and then do what he says under the Word of God. And so when I say like we understand our story more when we understand the bigger story we're part of, that's a practical example. Like we as elders, um, that that impacted us. We understood our story more when when we understood the bigger story that our elders are a part of, that yeah, we have a group of elders leading the church in 2026, but to be able to hear your story from uh 1984 and hear, oh man, we are currently part of a bigger story than 2026. And the men who helped found this church, not perfect, okay? I'm not trying to put you up on a pedestal, but I am trying to say that uh we were impacted, and I was impacted by hearing you say over and over again, we're trying to listen to the Lord and do what he said. And that has impacted our prayer times and impacted the sort of expectation that I had and have in our prayer times now. So understanding our story as part of a bigger story has impacted me. That was a long sort of uh preamble to it all, but want to uh just hear um from you how did the church at Sandhurst start? I want to hear about the the origins of Sandhurst first. How did it start? I know you're part of it, who was part of it? How how did this thing come to be?

SPEAKER_01 5:16

Well, it's very interesting as how the Lord worked. Um there were three couples that came to Florence within the spell of about a year, um, each of us from totally different backgrounds. One was located close, Rob Colonis and Deb, in Sumter. And they were brought here because Rob got a job at the hospital as business manager. Another couple, Bob and Vicky Hinchwood, came because they were led from where they were in Illinois to start a cardiac rehab program at McLeod Hospital. So they came. My coming came about because I was very pro-life, very anti-abortion, spoke of it, was on a uh crisis pregnancy center, uh bored and served as a physician there uh in Birmingham, Alabama. I could not, I wanted to stay in Alabama. I'm an Alabama boy. All right. And I wanted to stay, but I saw it all over the the uh state trying to find a practice that everybody had a pro-life view and was very against abortion. I could not find that in Alabama, I could not find it in Georgia. I found people who said, oh, well, we'll stop referring, and I uh or we'll stop doing, and I said, Well, you can't refer, and basically you have to have a pro-life view. I didn't believe that. So I was drawn here with my wife, and people thought I was crazy. I found a man that was very pro-life here and started a practice. I met Bob and Vicky, who Bob and Rob were both at McLeod Hospital. I met Bob and Vicky because a church here, right down the street from us, uh asked me to speak on the abortion issue. They came, we met, we became friends very quickly. I met Rob because I had some questions about hospitals, and he was the business manager. We got together, we all hit it off, uh, we all found we were believers in the Lord, and we eventually decided to start a Bible study in our community. They lived in part of Oakdale, I lived out in Whitehall, we got together, started meeting, and then we decided, the three of us, we would invite people in the neighborhood.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

All right, I'm gonna pause you. I'll make sure I'm tracking the story correctly. So you're a physician in Alabama, and you have a deeply held conviction that is a pro-life stance, and you're looking for a hospital that you can work at that is overtly pro-life. Right. And so you end up finding that, I guess at McLeod? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

And a physician that I was be being in the practice with that was also very pro-life. Aaron Ross Powell Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:21

So that's what brings you to Florence. Yes. You start working at McLeod. During that time, you was like, all right, let's let's get involved in a church. You go to a a church around here, and it's at that church that you meet these two other couples, right? I didn't meet them at the church. Okay, you didn't meet them at the church.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Through the medical community. They both were employed at McLeod Hospital, and I was that was my main hospital. Okay. And and and again, I met Bob and Vicky at the uh abortion talk I gave.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

All right, sweet. Okay, so you meet these two other couples, Robin Deb Clonis and Robin Vicky Henschelwood, right? You meet them.

SPEAKER_01 8:59

Bob and Vicky Henschelwood.

SPEAKER_00 9:00

Bob Bob, yes. You meet them, and okay, now carry on.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Okay. So uh we decided we all were visiting different churches. Um we uh decided during that time that we wanted to start a Bible study for the community, as I mentioned. Um we invited people and started meeting. Uh and then I don't know exactly what prompted us to decide to start a church other than the Holy Spirit, as you said. And so we started and set up a time in September of 1984 to start a church. We had CIU either uh students in the seminary or in the Bible college and professors at times come to speak for the first six months. We met at the Y MCA in Florence, and that's where the church originally formed.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

All right, so 1984, you said September, uh, we're like, we want to start a church, meeting in the Y. Who's who's coordinating, like bringing in these different speakers to serve as kind of like um, you know, preachers for each week? Are you doing that? Is Rob doing that? Bob doing that? Who's doing that?

SPEAKER_01 10:21

Okay, I'm glad you brought that up. Let me mention how God bought three different people or three different couples with different skills. Rob Colonas had skills which later were borne out uh that in in in administration, he was very good leader in administration, and Deb was similar. Bob and Vicky, Bob never met somebody he didn't like. He was Mr. Friendly. Yeah. And so what a great asset for the church. I was driven by missions because of the church that I came to know the Lord in as a freshman medical student in Birmingham. And so my heart was for missions, both local and over the world. So he brought all three of us together with special skills. So to answer your question, Rob Colonis coordinated getting speakers through January of 1985.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

And you're meeting the first six months in the YMCA.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

That's corre well, longer than that, but it was six months before we called a pastor.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

So six months of kind of having people filling in, and then what happens?

SPEAKER_01 11:37

Well, um we we had in the meantime started going while this was going on. We decided to go to a church in Sumter that Rob came from, that Pastor Bob Norris, who eventually became our pastor, pastored. While we were in the process of the Bible study, Bob was called to Atlanta to start a church by some couples. I interestingly went to um Bob with an offer from the three of us after we had been attending his church in Sumter and then he had moved with an offer would he consider coming from Atlanta to us. That church that he started fell through. It never really even started. So he agreed to come to Florence. Uh, if I might add one of the things, um I was raised Catholic. Uh the Lord led me uh to seek a relationship with Jesus Christ. I had Bob baptize me in a swimming pool in Buckhead, uh, Atlanta when I visited to bring our offer because I had been baptized as a child and I wanted believers' baptism. The interesting thing was it was at a Catholic family's home, and you should have seen them looking out through the screen windows and saying, What is going on here at our house? Why is this happening? So they we got chuckles out of all of that.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

I love that. All right, and just for those who don't like know the people, want to keep names clear. We have two Bobs and a Rob. Okay. We have Rob Colonis and Bob Hengewood. They were two of the three founding couples with you. And then um and then we have Bob Norris.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Well, my first name is Robert Stephen.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

Are you serious? No, I'm serious.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

He brought all the Bobs together.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

I did not know this. Wow. Okay, so that complicates the the names even more. Okay, but for for the sake of clarity, we have Steve, we have Rob Colonas, we have Bob Hinchelwood, founding couples, and then Bob Norris becomes the the first pastor of with the church at Sandhurst, but it wasn't called the Church at Sandhurst yet, right? No, it was called Heritage.

SPEAKER_01 14:02

Heritage. And that's an interesting story because uh that was Tammy and and the uh and I'm blanking on the last name. Uh they they had uh a place up near outside of Charlotte, and they had uh anyway, the the they were misleading people and buying shares into this uh Christian community, and uh they were called heritage. And so we prayed and decided we would follow like what the Bible said the church at Ephesus, the church at Philippi, etc. So we would become the church at Sandhurst. I love it. So we changed that.

SPEAKER_00 14:46

Okay, so you were Heritage Church, but then there's uh a ministry or church that is uh gets involved in some corruption who also has the name heritage, and you're you're like, okay, we don't want to be associated with that. Let's go a sort of biblical route. We have the church at Antioch, let's do the church at Sandhurst. Correct. I like it. Um I'm curious to know, like in those early days, what was a church service like when you're at the YMCA? Do you have is there a setup crew that comes early and just like help me visualize uh one one of those early church services?

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Well, as I said, Bob Henselwood was the greeter at the Mr. Kind. Yes. And um Rob and I alternated. If we didn't have somebody from CIU, Rob and I talked, uh, or taught, uh, or preached, as you might say. And we started in the book of Philippians, and that's what we taught, and asked the uh members that were coming from CIU to preach on as we went through that. And we also did that in our Sunday school hour. As far as setup, there was a room right after you went in that is probably about twice as big as the room we're in here, maybe three times. And so the three of us came, set up chairs, uh, and took them down because we couldn't meet in the evening at the Y. So we started meeting at my house for evening services.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

Okay, like the the thing says here evening worship six. Yeah, the bulletin says six p.m. And again, this was uh what is it, November 4th, 1984. I love it. So the order of service says worship, and then a welcome, Bob Henschelwood, Mr. Kind, uh, a hymn of praise, uh, which was oh for a thousand tongues, then a congregational prayer, then announcements, worship through tithes and offerings, a hymn of hope, and that's how firm a foundation, the message, Drew Choti? Chote? I don't know if you know Chote? Yeah. All right. Tell me about him.

SPEAKER_01 17:05

I can't remember much about it. Okay, I'll be honest. I I can't. I'm sorry. That's fine. Hymn of response. We we the people that stood out, um, we had I don't you're of a different generation than I am, but the Yankees, Bobby Richardson, uh, was a second baseman, uh, very gifted. He's from Sumter. He had a son, uh, he has actually two sons that went in the ministry, and we got one of them to come. Uh, the other one started a church in in Sumter. Um, and um he he was uh very instrumental, and the CIU professors were uh they were gracious to come.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

Also on the bulletin for this, we have missionaries of the month and uh oh, I thought maybe I was looking at a different one. Some of them the missionaries that we still support. Uh Tracy Hipps was on here uh on one of these. Right. And it was just cool to see.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

We from the beginning when we met and decided, uh, and you hadn't brought that up yet, but it because we wanted to be a very mission-focused church, we had a discussion about what percent of the general funds would be given to missions. And this was before we actually started the church. This was in the planning stage, as the Lord let us. Um in a sense, it uh was part of the church because we declared ourselves a church at my house and we were meeting uh on Sundays there when we quit going in Sunday evening and when we stopped going to Sumter and uh started giving our tithes and formed the church. It wasn't the church wasn't available at the Y until September of 84. And we came and discussed and prayed about, asked the Holy Spirit to guide us. Um we had recommendations anywhere from 50 percent, uh, which is my background from the church I came from where I was saved, to uh 20 percent.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

That's 50 percent to 20 percent of the every dollar that comes in would then be. Okay. Of the general fund would go directly to mission support.

SPEAKER_01 19:29

Mission support, both local and foreign. We the missions committee officially started meeting, even though we had talked about supporting, but when Bob came and the missions committee started with Deb Colonis, Bob Norris, and myself, I was designated the one to head up that mission committee.

SPEAKER_00 19:57

How many people are coming to the church at this time? And what's like a ballpark of the general fund? I'm just curious to know, like just get a better idea of what it was like.

SPEAKER_01 20:06

Probably by the time we started the the uh missions um support and in our first two designated missionaries from our first meeting was probably about forty to forty-five people were meeting. Okay, as far as money. In the whole church. Yeah, the whole church, yeah. The whole church. Now that started growing more after Bob came because we had one consistent person preaching. The two missionaries we uh supported to start with were a couple that ministered to North Africa, uh, the writers, and we all knew them from having visited one of the churches. They were back home on uh home leave for a year, and then another one was Harold Morris. Um let me tell you an interesting story about Harold Morris was the missionary of the month on November 4th, 1984.

SPEAKER_00 21:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 21:05

Let me tell you a story about Harold. The first time he came to visit us, he was supposed to preach too. Bob had asked him to. And um we waited, and finally Bob got up and started preaching, and about 15 minutes later in walks Harold, all flustered. He said, Well, I walked in this church and sat in the back pew, nobody recognized me. This was not at the Y, this was at a church quote church close to the Y. Oh. It turned out to be a Mormon church. And he said, After about five minutes, I realized this could not be the church I had been invited to. And so Harold came and was able to preach. That's hilarious.

SPEAKER_00 22:01

Yeah, that's back before you have cell phones and GPSs to just like make it easy.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

That's exactly right.

SPEAKER_00 22:08

All right. So in in so you got 40-ish people, you're still at the Y, you have this conviction that you've wrestled through how much are we going to give to missions? Your background was 50%. Ultimately you guys landed on a number. What number did you land on? And how'd you get there?

SPEAKER_01 22:31

We landed on 30%. We all felt that that was what the Holy Spirit was leading us to do. We prayed about it and prayed about it, and I I can't say that it was some miraculous light. It just seemed that that was what the Holy Spirit was calling us to do was to give 30 percent.

unknown 22:52

Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

And was it 30 percent or is it one third? So just a hair more than 30 percent.

SPEAKER_01 22:57

I've been saying thirty percent. You are absolutely right, Will. It was a third. Just a hair more, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

Yes. All right.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

But for some missionaries that would be important because that three and a half percent would uh three and a third percent would be their share.

SPEAKER_00 23:11

Yeah, for sure. All right. And so you got this missions emphasis. You've got a pastor, you've got the why. Uh uh tell me about kind of how things grew, how you guys landed on building a building, and what were some of the growing pains that you guys experienced in that?

SPEAKER_01 23:32

Uh that didn't occur for several years. Um to look, we progressed from the why meeting that room to meeting in the gym at the why. And part of our um setup was we now had some other people that helped set up, but we had to set up chairs now in the um Y. The other interesting thing is we had expanded to all over. Uh some will tell you about meeting in the shower room, uh, some will tell you about meeting in the weight room that we had, because we then went from having just one general Sunday school and a kids' nursery to different areas throughout the Y. So we ended up making use of the Y. And probably by the time we got to the church here, um which was many years later, we probably had around 200 to 250 people coming on every Sunday.

SPEAKER_00 24:41

All right, at the Y.

SPEAKER_01 24:42

At the Y. At the Y. How we found this, we were uh thinking we were stable enough to find our own building. And we actually looked at one church that was in downtown Florence, but it would have we would have filled it. It was a small, small church. So 250 would have filled it, and we would have no room for growth. We heard about um some land that was in a trust in this area where the church is now, and so we came out uh, and I vividly remember I'll tell you another story. Bob Hinchwood and I went one time together and looked at the land, and there were things such as people dumping trash, refrigerators, and things like that. It was all wooded. Uh, and when we were there in the middle of this forest, suddenly, I don't know if you've ever heard an owl take off from it. Sounds like a jet engine coming real close, and wings are flapping and everything. And Bob jumped out of his pants just about. I don't know that I've heard it that loud before, but Bob came from Chicago and was really not much in nature or anything like that. And he jumped. I mean, I'm sure I jumped some too, but that was an interesting thing. But anyway, the Lord uh blessed us, we prayed about it, we made an offer to the trust. It took some, because there were so many members involved, it took a little while to get that, but then we bought the land.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

All right, so you build this, and uh w to what would you attribute the growth that you guys saw? You went from you know 40s and you develop uh this conviction about uh giving to missions. Now you're seeing 250. Um when you look back and go, I think I think part of the growth could be attributed to what?

SPEAKER_01 26:53

Several things. It's all attributed to God, the Holy Spirit. But Bob Norris was a verse-by-verse uh preacher, and uh he was very gifted at uh teaching the word, and so I think that was a large attribute. Uh we had uh we drew people from all different denominations, and we weren't trying to take away people uh from other churches, it's just they came because Bob was a good teacher. I think they came also because we our our emphasis at that time was teaching the word of God, um, not going on something like a subject of love or uh a subject that we we just went through the word of God. Like I said, the first book we taught was Philippians, and we tended to stay in books of the Bible. Bob Bob Norse is probably, and he must have done it three times during the tenure of the church, going through the book of Romans, and and he was very gifted at what he did. And I attribute that, I attribute it to Bob Hinchwood's great ability to communicate with people, and I attribute it to uh Rob Colonis's and Debs and Vicky, I I should have said with Bob. Um they they had a very kindness uh outreach, warmth about them. I, as a physician, was in an OBGYN practice, very busy. Um so I was on call every other weekend, and uh we were the busiest practice delivering babies. One month, in fact, the 2nd November I was here. My partner took off 10 days of November. I delivered 64 babies in that uh month, and he delivered 38, I think it was. Um but anyway, I wasn't able to be there as often as those two. So give all the credit to those three, more so than me.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

Yeah. Well, and so I'm glad you brought up the wives because I know your wives we mentioned the husbands probably more in our conversation so far, but the wives were very instrumental. Very instrumental here.

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Very Vicky, Deb, and Ann were gifted at teaching the kids. And that was something that was awesome. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

Really, really, really grateful for them. And and part of what I hear you saying in terms of like, why'd we see the growth that we did? Well, you talked about Bob's preaching, you talked about the other Bob's kindness, just personal connection, talked about Rob's um giftedness with administration and all the behind-the-scenes stuff that nobody ever gets to see. Um we talk about your heart for missions, we talk about your wives' um skill and passion for kids. And, you know, Vicky, I know she did a lot of music stuff. Deb did a ton of stuff that wasn't uh that that was kids, but also moms of kids. And so, like, to what would you attribute the growth? Well, yes, God working through his people who were exercising their gifts in their church. Everyone, everyone's going, okay, what has God gifted me at? Like, and w how what am I good at? And I'm gonna do that. And the church, the church grew.

SPEAKER_01 30:32

God sent appropriate people, uh, even women that at times were part of the church that were gifted in teaching, like community Bible college uh college, Bible study. Yep. Um, we had leaders in that that came and helped get that started. Um we had Jean Irick, I don't know if you ever met Jean, but you know, she was gifted in the precepts ministry, and so we had all sorts of gifted people drawn to the church that obviously God brought to use to help the people, the children of God grow in their walk with the Lord.

SPEAKER_00 31:19

Use your gift, use your gift. Uh, that's actually where we're gonna be in 1 Corinthians very soon with chapters 12 through 14. Um so when you start the church and you've got a few core values, although I don't think you were calling them core values, but two of them were expository Bible teaching and missions. Um I think probably a core value that just kind of was all these core values were pretty organically uh developed. Uh so another one would be community, like you the the church in those early days was a family, operated like a family, cared for one another like a family. Um what to I want to hear, you know, this is the end of Missions Month uh for us here. And when when you were bringing in this heart for global mission, um what did you hope to see in the church that would embody that conviction? Part of it was, okay, well, missions is gonna play out in our budget. One third of our of our general fund is gonna go to missions. How else did you hope to see missions get um how how else did you hope to see missions kind of come out in the church in the early days?

SPEAKER_01 32:45

We wanted people to not only support through the church, but we encouraged them to communicate with the missionaries, to reach out to them, to perhaps get uh and in many cases go on the field and serve on short-term mission trips. Uh so that was an emphasis. Um we we wanted to s be part of the community and uh we helped support Crisis Pregnancy Center. Uh we helped uh ministries that reached out to the homeless here in town, uh and especially to uh I think there was a heart for those that were hurting, and we wanted to hear help not only bring in the word of God, but we you know one of the most important things I think in a church is to minister to those needs that people have. And so that was all part of what we hope to do and accomplish locally. Worldwide, we we were really blessed because Bob was on the board at CIU, and so he had uh a great ability to line up people both at CIU, uh in the nation of the U.S. and then worldwide that he had missions. So um one of the things that helped us was we started a mission month in February every uh weekend. Uh we had uh a couple or two come in. One was the main speaker on missions that uh Sunday morning and Sunday evening, because by then, once we had moved into this building, we did have a uh place to meet on Sunday evening too. Anyway, Bob Bob was very instrumental in getting all sorts of wonderful people who were on the field, but he was also good at bringing in people who were students at CIU who were looking to go to missions. And so we were able to start support in that way too.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

Right. So what what you hoped to see in the church in the early days in terms of missions, uh, you wanted to see, and you did see uh the church connected with the missionaries they had sent, um, writing letters, um visiting them, so connected, um, sending short-term trips. You wanted to see really, you wanted a church who was not an inwardly focused church that was just kind of all about what happens here at our campus, but you wanted to be out there uh globally and locally, trying to go, okay, how can we help people who are in need, as we say now, across the street and around the world. That's what you wanted. And so heavy involvement from the church outside the walls of the church. That's what you wanted to see.

SPEAKER_01 35:54

But heavy involvement within, too. You you put it better than I did, Will. But we wanted to be ministering in as many ways as we can. Um we wanted to see people come to Christ uh through the work of the Holy Spirit, obviously. We wanted to see people grow in their walk. We wanted to see people get involved in missions. We wanted to uh raise up hopefully people that would be called to missions too. And that happened.

SPEAKER_00 36:27

Uh and so part part of the way that happened, it sounds like, is uh Bob Bob Norris was a good communicator, but he was also well connected with people who were on fire. And he invited some people who were on fire for global missions to come to the church at Sandhurst and let uh let their fire kind of ignite the church a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 36:47

Aaron Ross Powell That is correct.

SPEAKER_00 36:48

Yeah. Um so we see uh you you guys are seeing this Heart for Missions uh grow in the church. But not only missions. I hear you going, okay, well, we weren't just just kind of outwardly, like we wanted a core value community, we wanted Bible teaching happening inside the church as well. Uh what are some examples? And I know that you know you started to see some people who weren't just CIU students, but were like people from the church going, hey, we'll go. Uh we will serve as, you know, we'll sell everything, go as missionaries. Uh who are some of those people that stick out to you that that go, man, um that they they got the itch, they started to burn, and uh and then we sent them off.

SPEAKER_01 37:36

Well, probably the best example is Wick and Cindy Jackson. Um Wick was a builder here in town of homes, and um they were called by the Lord through the efforts of the Hardings. The Hardings were missionaries in Ethiopia. He came to speak at several of our monthly once a year monthly mission months, and they were in need of someone to coordinate the building of a uh Bible college in Ethiopia and Attic. And um Wick and Cindy prayed. Uh they uh actually Cindy was on the missions committee. Um Wick uh participated some, but uh wasn't an official member if I remember right. But um it was an interesting growth seeing them mature and then Wick had never built such a big building ever. I mean he did homes and he was good at what he did.

SPEAKER_00 38:47

Because he was going to Ethiopia to build a church building.

SPEAKER_01 38:49

Yes, and uh Bible college, so it had to have not just the big church building, but accessory parts to that building, which would be more in the nature of building a home than it was that. So Wick and Cindy um uh prayed about it and uh sought counsel from the elders, and the Lord led them to go there. And so that would be the best example of people in our church that went.

SPEAKER_00 39:21

Yeah, and uh since then, you know, the what they did in Ethiopia, and we we should have we can Cindy on in some of these these legends from the early days. Uh they start in Ethiopia, starts with building a building, but uh it becomes very much more about building the building, it becomes about uh building the people who are there. And they both have so many stories of the people who they met and led to the Lord there uh in Ethiopia. That transitions uh after Bolivia. Uh I mean after Ethiopia, they go to Bolivia, I think Bolivia. And and now they're uh going around the world still involved in missions, and Cindy has her own Burn Care International, which has a whole story behind it. But point is um in those early days, there were people with fire. You said Harding, what was his name? Harding. Yeah. Bob Harding. Bob Harding coming with fire for what God's doing around the world, and then catching some people in the church on fire who then go and do it. And I do think that there's something to uh for our church to be able to hear in that to go, man, if if when something comes up, whether it's uh world mission or local outreach or anything, when you start to feel an itch kind of like, I can't do nothing about this. I need to go. Uh I I need inaction is not an option. Uh that that uh might be the stirring of the Holy Spirit to act on. And you can test it with time, you can test that sort of fire with uh talking to other people, but don't do nothing with that itch. Is that is or I guess I'll pose the question to you. If somebody came to you and was like, I kind of feel a nudge in a in a direction, ministry or um getting involved in a ministry, uh what should I do? What would you say?

SPEAKER_01 41:21

Well, we told them that there were several things they needed to do. They they needed to pray, uh to seek God's guidance, they needed to have others praying for them, they needed to get their affairs right. Um I I don't want to get into specific instances of who, uh, but they had to have their finances right. You couldn't just blindly go off. Um they they needed to take care of any debts they had, they needed to uh seek counsel from uh fellow mission from missionaries, uh from the church board, the elders, they needed to seek counsel from their family too, to make sure that this is what God was calling them to. So we we encouraged those things. And we um we also and I wanted to put in we attracted missionaries to come be part of the church. Um like in another good instance would be the Johnsons, Paul and Robin Johnson. Um we had them in for missions month. And in long story short, uh they were full-time missionaries in South America, but then they came back and started a ministry where they were part-time in the U.S., part-time in South America, and they eventually were led to move here. Now they've recently moved, uh, they're getting up in age like I am. So they moved to the upper state to be near one of their sons, who is a missionary uh in the upper state with a gap year Christian ministry that he runs.

SPEAKER_00 43:12

Yeah, my brother works with him.

SPEAKER_01 43:13

Oh, I forgot that. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. That's right. So you know all about that.

SPEAKER_00 43:17

Yeah. Uh what did you guys say to people who had a stirring perhaps from the Lord in a direction? Uh you'd say, well, seek guidance from the Lord, seek guidance from people you trust and people who are familiar with that field, and get your affairs in order. Yes. All right. I I like that. Um as you look at you know, over the last 42 years, we've seen the church go through a lot of different phases and changes, ups and downs. Um in forty two more years, you'll be gone, and I'll be up there and perhaps gone as well. And yet we both want Sandhurst to be. You'd say it a bunch of different ways. I would say it we both want Sandhurst to be loving and obeying God by the power of His Spirit for the praise of His glory and helping others do the same at home across the street and around the world. I'd say however you want. That's that's what I hope. What would you hope to see if you could just pay a visit to Sandhurst 42 years from now? What are some things that you would love to see?

SPEAKER_01 44:27

Well, you know, Will, um the world and especially our country is changing. And I think back of Romans chapter one, and uh before you were born, I was in the 60s generations of high school. I graduated in 1967, and so there was the sexual revolt then uh be happy, make love. Um and so we saw the the first stage and I think of Romans 24, uh they were in the lusts of their hearts uh uh to become impure. And so we saw that. And then a little few more years later, uh probably decades, we saw the outgrowth of the homosexual in verse 26, you know, dishonorable passions. And then where I think we are now, which I'm very concerned for our country, so we need to be a light, because uh we became a depraved mind, um, would be what the New American Standard calls it. Um the um legacy Bible calls it unfit mind. Whatever you want to call it, we're seeing because of I think how blessed America is, people are losing their foundation, which you know, John Adams back when this country was founded said, our government cannot exist ex if we don't have two things. And one of those two things was the fact that they must, and I mean they must have a strong uh biblical basis. Uh he talked about that, and we're losing that. The church has become corrupt in America. Um so if you ask me to look forward, I don't want to see our church become corrupt. I want to see it stick to the word of God and not do like so many mainline churches have done, and where they say, Oh, well, that was back in those days. We're now of an enlightened mind, and they're totally disregarding God's law. When a church says it's okay, we want to love the homosexual, but we don't want to agree with what they do because God calls that an abomination. And so we're seeing that. So my hope for this church is that we continue to make the word of God the primary emphasis of what we do. We preach it, we love it, we train those to love it, and we act it out in our daily lives. And so I pray that uh we will never lose that focus and fall prey to what is happening in our country right now.

SPEAKER_00 47:50

Yeah, so you see uh our country following the downward spiral articulated in Romans 1, the exchanging and then the handing over to deeper depravity. And uh you see that infit infiltrating the church in a lot of ways in terms of especially watering down uh the gospel and scriptures teaching in the name of um a progressive enlightenment. And 42 years from now, you'd love to see Sandhurst preaching, teaching, and placing themselves under the authority of the word as our final authority, not as our sort of um, you know, as we often put, like it's not beside us as something to consider, but above us as something to submit to. Amen. Um as we close, just trying to think with you and going, okay, understand now that I get to see a little bit of uh the bigger picture that we are part of, just in terms of church at Sandhurst, not even like the church as a whole, and that would probably probably be a great thing to look into uh maybe with Adam and church history, how does church at Sandhurst fit into a bigger picture of the the church, like church history, but how does the church of Sandhurst at 2026 fit into a bigger picture of church at Sandhurst that started in 1983? Um I think some of the things uh have come out that what uh what made Sandhurst um healthy and thriving in the 80s is the same thing that made the church healthy and thriving in like the 80s, like 80 AD, you know, like uh not 1980, but 80. And that was the preaching and teaching and submission to the authority of the word. That was an outward mindset or an outward mentality that said, hey, um, you know, God's grace calls us in to send us out. We can't do nothing, we can't be inactive. Um a church that is submitted to the word, uh using their gifts and uh and reaching the world. This is um this is the the the story of the church from the beginning. It's the story of Sandhurst, and by God's grace, that'll continue to be the case.

SPEAKER_01 50:08

Yes, that would be wonderful, Will.

SPEAKER_00 50:10

Uh final thoughts or comments for uh for us listening?

SPEAKER_01 50:16

The the biggest challenge again would be that um anybody that's listening to this realizes that it's God's word. It's God's word. It's a love for Jesus Christ. It's thanking the Lord when you've been saved and not taking into account or thinking, well, I got saved, I contributed to it. It's by grace alone, uh, not works, uh, which so many people fail in thinking outside the world that, you know, well, I helped save myself when it's all God. God is sovereign, and God wants us to love him and to love our neighbor with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind.

SPEAKER_00 51:12

Yeah, and that really is a great way to kind of finish out our our conversation, at least right now, is to bring it back. You know, we've been talking about like church and to bring it back to a private devotion to the Lord and and the necessity of our hearts noting not getting unhinged from the gospel of Jesus that saved us. And uh a, you know, before there can be a sort of public sort of win the loss, build the believer, equip the worker, there needs to be a private devotion before the Lord, a love for him and uh a dependence on him, a gratitude towards him. Uh, and so I I think it's it's it's good to to end with eyes on him, not just eyes on the past.

SPEAKER_01 52:05

Right. We're just a small pin in this world, but God has put us here for a purpose, and that purpose is to glorify him most of all, but to also have a deep concern for the lost. We don't want, as Jesus or as God said, uh I I don't want anybody to perish. And uh we need to love them and we need to do our best to present the gospel in a plain way and trust in the Lord that if He's wanting to save them, that it will happen due to efforts, and we never know when we're a piece of the puzzle. It's like making a puzzle. You present the gospel and maybe only part of it sticks with somebody, and then somebody else doesn't, or they go and hear you preaching and it clicks, and they understand what the gospel is and what it means for eternity. I just hell must be an unbelievable place. And for one reason, I don't want anybody to go to hell, but God is so the opposite, he's so loving, he's so wonderful. He had a plan to save us, and those that he has will come to him. And we never know, we don't want to miss that opportunity of sharing the gospel with them and asking the Holy Spirit to open their minds and hearts to understand it so that they too can become part of God's family.

SPEAKER_00 53:54

I love it. Um and so let's let's end our time in prayer together. Uh if you'll pray for our church, I want to pray for our ones. And uh but before I do, I would imagine that some of the people listening are going, okay, well, we've mentioned the original three couples. Where are they now? And so you and Ann are still here at Singhurst. Uh if you come in the doors in the back, hang a left, that's where you guys are. And um Rob and Deb. Uh Rob is now in Greenville. Deb passed away what year was it?

SPEAKER_01 54:28

Five years ago.

SPEAKER_00 54:29

Five years ago. She was a legend. We named one of our daughters after her. Um phenomenal woman. And then Bob and Vicky are now in Alabama and actually just moved there maybe six months ago or so. And so uh still around, but you guys are the only ones who are local here.

SPEAKER_01 54:48

Well, they Bob and Vicky moved back to heaven on earth. They we visited them and and they have 50 acres of land and it's gorgeous up on they call it a mountain, but it's just a hill. Big hill. Yeah, big hill, you know. But uh it's it's a beautiful place to spend their retirement, and uh so that's where they are, and that's because that's where God wanted each of us. I I would ask that people remember Rob because he has an illness that is debilitating, and you never know when it's gonna hit any of us uh type like that. But Rob uh was in and let me share a request. He is not able to see well part due to part of this illness, and so he can't read and study the Bible like he used to. And he he was a devout reader, thirsty uh to know the word, to memorize the word, to apply the word, to share the word. So pray for Rob.

SPEAKER_00 56:02

Yeah, and Rob, if you are listening, bro, we love you.

SPEAKER_01 56:06

Amen.

SPEAKER_00 56:06

Amen. We pray for the church, pray for Rob, and then I want to pray for our ones.

SPEAKER_01 56:12

Okay, Father, we come to you in the name of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. Lord, we lift Sandhurst up to you. We pray, Father, that you will keep it faithful to your word, that you'll continue to bring people in that want to grow. We thank you for the church leadership. We thank you for our lead pastor Will and all that he's doing and the rest of the staff. Lord, um, help us ever be dependent on you, never to take credit for what is done, because it's through your sovereign will that we do these things. I pray for Rob, Lord, that you will touch him, that they will find a cure for what he has, that you will bless him. Just recently, he's had some more confusion. He's not able to see as well. Uh Lord, have mercy on him. I pray for his healing. And I pray for the healing of the church in America, Lord. Raise up strong bodies of believers, turn our nation, Father, back to what we were founded on, which is our form of government, uh, liberty, and uh most of all, uh strong in the Judeo-Christian walk, Lord. Thank you for how you've blessed us. Thank you for this time. Ask all this in Jesus' name.

SPEAKER_00 57:50

Father, I want to uh join my heart with Steve right now on behalf of the church at Sandhurst, that we would be a church who loves your word, who is privately devoted to you, to loving and obeying you first, before we're trying to do anything or um do like conquer and take spiritual ground outside. Lord, we we know that we need you personally. And so we say we love you, we say we need you. Yes. Um, and we rest in the gospel blessings that we are not worthy of, but have nonetheless received by grace through faith in Jesus. Um we love you for it, and we understand that the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few. We understand that um your church and the church's handhurst, we have we have lost people who need to be one to you. We understand that it's by your doing, Lord. We understand that uh you are not desiring that any would perish, but that all would come to repentance, Father. And so um we pray for them. We know that our ones are dead in their trespasses and sins, by our nature children of wrath. And so we pray for them, asking that the eyes of their heart would be enlightened, that you would do for them what only you can do. Amen. What they can't do for themselves. And we say, Here we are, send us. Um for those who have uh not yet been able to discern, decide, or choose the the one person that they want to win to you, Lord. I ask that you would um impress that on their hearts and uh that you would use us, that we'd be a church who says, Here we are, send us in weakness and fear and much trembling, not in persuasive words of wisdom, but a demonstration of the spirit and power. Um love you, Father. Um pray that we'd be a church that uses each of us uses our gifts for the building of the body, the common good, the strengthening of faith. In your name I pray. Amen. Amen. Thanks for being here. Appreciate it. Thanks for joining.