As we all continue to find our place in Grace, we come to these official moments of business meetings and recognize that when we vote on a budget this is more than facts and figures. We have become a growing and very diverse FAMILY with 7 campuses, hundreds of house churches, and literally thousands of leaders who have been discipled. As God leads, we step out in faith and keep extending His Kingdom. Our budgets facilitate the growth of Kingdom through this Grace Family of Churches. It all belongs to God, and amazingly enough, we get to be a part of it.

As leadership at Grace, we want to say THANK YOU for being such a generous people. God uses your Kingdom generosity to fund an ever expanding family of churches, and quite honestly, God has much more in store for us in the days ahead–so thank you in advance for your continued generosity.

Here are just a few family highlights to celebrate since we last affirmed a budget.

• We have gone from 5 to 7 Grace campuses in the last year, adding Grace Capital City (Washington D.C.) and Grace Marietta to our growing family.
• On Pentecost at the Tabernacle, we raised roughly $200,000 to pioneer a new campus in Washington D.C. Chris and Jessica Moerman stepped forward to lead there, and already have 3 house churches and 75 people gathering for worship Sunday afternoons in the Starbucks on Capitol Avenue.
• A total of 40 people from multiple campuses were SENT to Grace Capital City to start that work as a family on mission.
• Within 4 & 1/2 months of the first mention that a Marietta House Church might be able to become a campus, God gave us 8.5 acres of land and a functioning facility a half mile from one of the largest High Schools in Cobb County.. Buddy preached the first morning service on January 24 with around 170 people gathered for worship.
• Grace in Athens isn’t 3 years old yet, but last year they grew from 4 to 10 house churches with 20 adults discipling 100 student leaders. They are regularly pushing 500 in worship participation, and last February they baptized 39 people who had come into the Kingdom. That is God-sized fruit.
• Grace Monroe grew 30% and almost doubled their previous year’s giving in the process of becoming a self-funded campus contributing significantly to the family mission funding process.
• Snellville and Midtown sent significant numbers of leaders, people and resources to start new work in Marietta and Washington DC. This sacrificial giving makes multiplication of disciples, house churches and new churches possible.
• Midtown also has established 50 Healthy House Churches that are truly Houses on Fire.
• New Hope has experienced MAJOR growth in Kidzlife and Lug as Randy and Anita Rainwater have stepped over from Snellville to lead that campus and more aggressively reach the Next Generation.
• Historically, Snellville sent people to start Midtown, Monroe, New Hope and has been the center of sending and resourcing a lot of the Kingdom advancement that God has stirred through all of the Grace Family of Churches. Snellville has sacrificed by SENDING so that we can MULTIPLY God’s Kingdom Footprint through planting churches. In the midst of that, God continues to expand Thrive, Good News Clubs, and Mission Partnerships locally and globally where hundreds come into the Kingdom.
• Across our campuses, we grew financially by 7% from the previous year. The $7 million that came into the family this year meant that we were able to set aside $1 million for mission causes locally, globally and through church planting.
• We haven’t even touched on the hundreds of children students and adults baptized across all 7 campuses, or the many exciting developments in the Grace 360 Mission efforts around the world.
• For the sake of KINGDOM MULTIPLICATION, Grace churches SEND and intentionally subtract locally so that through our praying, giving and going, God has moved from one location to many locations. Multiplication requires that we send and resource the advance of the Gospel through His people.

Therefore, when we vote on a budget, we are not just affirming a set of numbers of dollars on a page that we think we can raise. We are affirming the VISION of 7 campuses with 7 campus pastors who work with their team asking, “What is God calling us to do, and how is He going to provide to get it done?

Grace, you have routinely demonstrated that you believe in this vision. Just as some of our campuses sacrifice to make the vision happen, many of you do the very same thing — you sacrifice in numerous ways to invest in this mission. As elders and staff teams, again we say THANK YOU! Kingdom work is expensive, and your faith to invest in the vision blows us away year after year.

God funds our vision through the Kingdom investments of our family. Thank you for investing in the Kingdom through Grace.