Sunday School RSVP Form

We will be meeting for Sunday school in a large group in the community center beginning Sunday, August 23. If you plan to attend, please fill out this RSVP form so that we can know how many people we should plan for.

Thank you for filling out this RSVP form for Sunday School! We look forward to seeing you!

Congregational Update-COVID-19

Members of Farmdale Baptist,

As elders, we wish to maintain transparency before our congregation and steward our congregation well, especially during this season. For these reasons, we wish to inform you about a current COVID-19 situation.

On Wednesday night, July 29th, we had an individual at our prayer meeting who later tested positive for COVID-19. They were asymptomatic and unaware that they had the virus. Upon discovering that they had the virus, they informed the pastors and the few with whom they had close contact. Your elders are aware of all parties involved and are encouraging responsible precautions to ensure the well-being of our congregation and community. For the time being, these individuals have chosen to isolate themselves to the best of their ability and according to sound wisdom.

The elders decided it is best to follow the wisdom of God by implementing the principles of Leviticus 13-14: isolate the contagious, carefully watch those who might plausibly be infected, remove contagions, and preserve that which is good. By following these principles, we strive to follow God’s understanding of “love your neighbor,” (Leviticus 19:18). Since the case of COVID-19 was in our church but not from our church, it is not necessary to cancel our Lord’s Day gathering at this time. We will continue to monitor our situation closely in order to ensure the safety of our congregation and community.

During this time, please consider the following:

1)     Pray for those who are sick and those who were exposed.

2)     Contact your elders if you have questions or concerns.

3)     Maintain the unity and peace provided to us by the Spirit of God.

4)     Trust in God’s sovereignty.

Like you, we long for the New Creation when decay and death meet their destruction from Christ. Until that time, we must steward our lives according to God’s word, realize we cannot remove all risk, and trust that the Judge of all the earth will do what is right; for he is good and does good.

Safety Precautions for Worship Gatherings

Church Family,

Your elders have been monitoring Covid-19 closely as we seek to faithfully shepherd the flock God has placed under our care. Your spiritual and physical safety has preoccupied our prayers, discussions, and meetings for several weeks. Thank you for your humility and support over these months, especially concerning our past two outdoor worship services. After much prayer and deliberation, we concur with the recent guidelines issued by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and will move our worship services inside. Both the elders and the CDC believe that indoor meetings can be safely conducted as long as certain practices are followed. Further, we are grateful for recent court orders affecting the state of Kentucky, as these are answers to prayer. We will continue to faithfully follow Christ while seeking to live a “tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity,” (1 Timothy 2:2) as we pray for our governing authorities.

In light of these considerations, we will be holding our worship service this Sunday, May 17, inside our building at 10:45am. Your elders encourage you to exercise discernment and responsibility during this time. Should you believe you are at risk, or a risk to others, please stay home. We understand that you yearn to gather with the body of Christ. Yet, during this unprecedented time, certain realities may prevent you from joining us. We will continue to love and minister to you during this time, anticipating and praying for your return to gathered worship. If you have questions, concerns, or reservations about meeting, please contact your elders so we know how to pray for and shepherd you during this time.

It is also our great desire to exercise wisdom in ensuring the safety of all of our people as we gather this Sunday, and so we ask that you please read the following guidelines, which outline how the service will be conducted.

Time: As stated above, the service will begin at 10:45am, and it will end at 11:30am. Please arrive no earlier than 10:20am.

Entry Into the Building: Parking will be in the normal lot behind the gym, and all members will enter and exit through the exterior vestibule doors at the back of the sanctuary. Parking attendants in yellow vests will be available to direct you where to go when you get here.

Spacing and Seating: When entering the building, we ask that you keep at least six feet of distance between you and the family in front of you. Upon entering the building ushers in yellow vests will tell you where to sit. We will seat one family unit to a pew, and there will be an empty pew between every family unit. We will also alternate which end of the pew each family sits on so that there will be at least nine feet of distance between your family and the family directly in front of you. Blue tape has been placed on the pews that will indicate where in the pew you may sit. Once you have been seated you must stay in your seat for the duration of the service except in the case of an emergency.

Restrooms: The restrooms will not be open for public use, so please keep that in mind in your preparation before the service. We will ensure that the service begins and ends on time for this reason.

Masks: As you are able, please wear a mask as you enter the building and keep it on until you sit down in your seat. Once you sit down, you are free to take it off, but we ask that you please put it on again when you get up to leave.

Singing: We will have congregational singing during the service, and we encourage you to sing if you attend. We have made great efforts to ensure that we maintain plenty of space between all family units for this reason.

Childcare: There will be no childcare available during the service. If you would like to request seating in the back so that you can get out easily to take a fussy child to the vestibule please email colin@farmdalebaptist.org.

Exiting the Building: We will dismiss everyone in an orderly manner after the service. Members seated in the back will exit first and we will move from back to front, dismissing one pew at a time. If you wish to socialize after worship, we simply ask that you do so outside, in the parking lot, and responsibly respect each other’s health.

Cleaning: All surfaces will be disinfected the week following the service in preparation for the upcoming service.

As has been our practice in the past, we will post the audio recording of the sermon on the website, and we are prayerfully considering how to best provide those who are unable to attend with the best pastoral care and spiritual resources that we can. We ask that you pray for us during this time as we seek to exercise wise leadership of our church, and we invite your input if you have any thoughts on additional ways that we can care for and communicate with the body during this time.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to call the church office or reach out to one of the pastors directly by phone or email. We are praying for you and look forward to seeing you on Sunday.

In Christ,
Your Pastors

Outreach Opportunity this Weekend!

We would like to take an opportunity over the next few weeks to reach out to some of the houses surrounding Farmdale to let our neighbors know we are meeting and would love to have them join us. We will distribute door hanging bags containing a gospel tract, church information, and a few homemade cookies. We will be targeting the houses on Durrett Lane including Hannah Avenue to Carroll Avenue this Sunday afternoon at 3:00 pm with plans to go farther down Durrett Lane and Trinity Circle in the following weeks.

We need member participation in the following ways:

1. Help by baking cookies! We will be including cookies in the packet of information we leave at each home. In order to meet our goal for this week, we need help with baking about 11 dozen cookies. If you are willing to bake cookies, please let Allen Day know how many you can make and deliver to the Mission House (4309 Carroll Ave.) anytime Saturday morning before 10:00 am. Also, we are going to put a note in the bag letting people know that we have taken safety precautions in preparing the cookies. So, if you are able to bake cookies, please use a mask and gloves while preparing them.

2. Help fill the bags on Saturday at 1:00 pm! Please contact Allen if you are able to help fill the door hanging bags we will be distributing on Sunday. We will meet in the gym at the church at 1:00 pm on Saturday. 

3. Help distribute church information packets on Sunday! Sunday afternoon at 3:00 pm members will be mobilizing to visit certain houses with our information packets. In order to respect the expectations for social distancing, we will simply be hanging the bags on the doors without knocking. Please contact Allen if you are able and willing to participate on Sunday. 

4. As always, pray for our neighbors that our outreach would lead to evangelism opportunities, lasting relationships, and new conversions.

For any questions, or if you would like to participate, email Allen at allen@farmdalebaptist.org.

RSVP For May 24th Worship Gathering

If you plan to attend our worship gathering this Sunday, please RSVP below.

Why We Aren't Live Streaming

Church Family,

Some have asked why we as pastors have chose not to live stream our services during this time when we are unable to meet on the Lord’s Day. Here is a short video giving an explanation along with a brief written explanation below. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions or would like further clarification.

Will explains why we are encouraging and seeking to equip our people to do home worship as opposed to live streaming services during the current quarantine.

As pastors, we have been providing you with home worship guides, which we encourage you to utilize on Sunday mornings during this time in which we are unable to gather corporately. While we could work on ways to stream an online worship service, we believe that the better approach is to offer these home worship guides. Here are a few reasons why:

  1. Our worship services cannot be replicated online. Your presence and participation are what make our gatherings “corporate” and special. While online gatherings might have some of the same up-front elements (preaching, praying, singing, reading, etc.), they cannot have the same participation from those gathered. Your role in our worship services are vital as you add your “Amen” to the prayers and preaching, sing songs, hymns and spiritual songs to the Lord and to one another, and testify to the greatness of our God to all who are present. We can’t replicate online what takes place in our sanctuary on Sunday, so we are choosing not to make such an attempt. (This statement doesn’t mean that you cannot be edified by an online sermon or a song, and we do not mean to imply these things are wrong in any way to view. Many churches are utilizing this approach and we in no way feel that they are wrong to do so. We simply want to emphasize the importance of us gathering together.)

  2. While not a substitute for corporate worship, we do feel that family worship should be an important part of the life of any family and can serve as a helpful supplement in times like these where we are unable to meet. Like an online service, family worship falls short of the Scriptural mandates that we have for the church gathering, but we do feel there is much Scriptural warrant for husbands and fathers to lead their homes in family worship (or others to lead if there is not a husband or father present). If you have not already been accustomed to having family worship in your homes, this time might be used by the Lord to jumpstart this practice as a part of your family’s routine.

  3. These outlines will keep us singing and learning the same things, so you can use them as a point of reference when you talk with other church members throughout the week. As you call to check on one another, you could bring up a way that a passage, a song, or a prayer was particularly used by the Lord and your fellow church member would already have reference for what you are discussing as they will have also read, sung, or prayed the same things.

All this to say, we hope you will find these guides helpful as you worship the Lord in your home during this time!

In Christ,
Your Pastors

Submit Questions for a Friday Night Q & A

Church Family,

This Friday evening we will again have a live video conference for anyone in our church to attend. However, on this occasion we are providing an opportunity for you to submit any questions that you would like for our elders to answer. These can be questions related to how to think about the current pandemic, question about the church in general, questions about biblical or theological issues, or general life questions. We’d like to encourage you to use the form below to submit any questions you’d like answered. Please submit them by this Thursday at noon.

Blessings,
Your Pastors

Suggested Resources for Your Edification

Drew offers several suggestions for resources that you can utilize while you have more time at home right now.

Resources mentioned in this post:

News

Sermons

Other Resources

  • Founders Ministries - Christian resources from a historic Baptist perspective

  • Ligonier - A Christian teaching fellowship that provides a number of sound resources

  • Monergism - A repository of free Christian resources on the historic Christian faith

  • 9Marks - A ministry devoted to providing resources to promote the building of healthy churches, specifically from a Baptist perspective.

Walking with God Through Trials

Resources mentioned in this video:

Home Worship Guide for March 29, 2020

Will provides an introduction to and overview of Mark 14:1-25 to help prepare you for home worship this Sunday, March 29, 2020.

Click the following link to download the home worship guide for this Sunday: Home Worship Guide 3.29.2020.

UPDATE: The last two songs in the worship guide are missing the second page of sheet music. You can download these here and here.

Click the following link to download a prayer guide to use each day at home for the week of March 30, 2020 to April 5, 2020: Prayer Guide.