When last we planned a Football Sunday, a storm named Fay decided to disrupt our lives so we postponed it until today, so here we go again! We have always called this Football Sunday because it marks the beginning of the high school football season and our NFC football team is always a special guest. I’m beginning to think that we should change the name to “Celebrate Friday Night” Sunday! With adding the band component to this year’s special day we have guests from the football teams, cheerleading squads, the band and parents from all of these groups! Welcome to all of you! You do us a great honor by being here!

A few weeks ago, I mentioned to you that we were praying about adding a new position to our overall ministry staff. For a very long time, our ministry has needed what is often called an executive pastor. For more than sixteen years, I have served as both the pastor and chief administrator of this ministry. There are a few positives and plenty of negatives associated with this. Today, I am pleased to announce that Perry Gaines will be coming to our staff to lift almost all of the administrative load from my shoulders and help cast and execute the vision of our overall ministry. This is a good move for the church and for me. It is also a good move for Perry and Diana Gaines, who are in our service today. We have been talking since November of 2007. I appreciate the nature of Perry’s unique calling and you will too. In his words, Perry states the following as his desire in ministry here at North Florida, “To serve the Lord Jesus Christ by being a ministry partner with the senior pastor and utilizing my leadership skills to assist the pastor in achieving the Lord’s vision. I believe the Lord has called me to partner with a pastor, to be his right hand man, to lead ministries, articulate vision, to assist in the area of leadership and overall to grow the Kingdom of God.” Please make sure that you meet Perry and Diana today. They are in town to establish a place to live, then will go back to their home near Memphis to begin the move.

Here are a couple of reminders. On September 28th, Tim Lee will return to Tallahassee for one very special day. Tim is the Marine who, in March of 1971, lost both legs in Vietnam as a land mine exploded beneath him. Tim is in his thirty-fifth year of evangelism and we are delighted to have him with us again for a Sunday morning service. As an added treat Gene Redding, former member of our church who served in Iraq will be with us to present a flag to our church that was flown over Bagdad. Please invite your friends to this special day! Finally, please remember that we are studying the Gospel of John on Sunday mornings and Wednesday evenings. We have just completed chapter one so this is very early in the series. Please join us at 7:05 p.m Wednesday and 10:00 on Sunday mornings to learn the Word of God!