South

The South Site of Bethlehem Baptist Church has been a pretty big part of my life ever since it existed.

January 2006. I was single, post-college, had worked for Bethlehem for about 2 1/2 years. My boss, David Livingston, called me into his office after the annual Pastors' Pray and Plan week.

"I'm going with the new 3rd campus," he stated, "and I'd like you to consider going with me."

The 3rd Campus (for a while, it was debated whether it should be West or South) was unfamiliar territory. Mostly families, south of the river, starting from scratch.

I figured I was kissing good-bye my chances of getting married anytime soon (not like being Downtown with all those TBI guys wandering the halls...), but I loved and trusted my boss and figured this was a good opportunity to trust the Lord and forge into the unknown.

Oh, what stressful, exhausting, exhilarating days led up to the first Sunday service at Burnsville High School (the day before my 25th birthday). I was the Info Booth lady from that day onward.

It was at the South Site Info Booth that a certain young curly-headed fellow started hanging around, raising the suspicions of Mrs. Livingston about his possible interest in me. (I figured everybody hung out at the Info Booth, and he was just being social!) And as time went by, he ended up not only being hired as the new South Site Logistics Coordinator, but asking me to marry him... and sitting behind the tables with me.

How many times did we haul in bins and pinch our fingers setting up tables in that cramped entryway at Burnsville High School? The South Site grew, and 5 years later, at the special anniversary celebration at Lakeville South High School, Ben was asked to give a testimony of God's grace in the past year, which he began, "I'm Ben Katterson, the South Logistics Coordinator. And it's a boy!" (per our recent ultrasound reading...).

I confess to dreading the early months of this year, with a brand new baby on the scene and 4 weeknight classes for Ben... plus a move of our worshiping center to Lakeville South High School for the foreseeable future. And God has answered many prayers, not just to allow us to survive these months, but giving peace and sweet snatches of time together in the middle of it. Now Victor and I hang out at the Info Booth (except for when we have to make our all-important lunch date in the Nursing Mother's Room). And Ben gives his sneakers a workout, chasing down details and keeping things running.

This has been our life for the past 5 1/2 years, moving church in and out of a high school each week, early mornings, late afternoons, tired Sunday evenings with a happy sense of grace.

And last Friday, April 20 marked a turning point.

12.1 acres right on I-35.
Originally priced around $3 million.
One lone bidder at a land auction.
Negotiated price: $760,362

And now the South Site has a home to lean toward.

It will still be a lot of Sundays ahead, hauling trailers, packing bins, setting out brochures and then packing them away again. But there on the horizon is a new time coming--we have waited and prayed and watched.

And when it's here, and the South Campus opens its own doors that first week, I will likely cry, feeling how wonderful and how bittersweet a change it will be.

For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness.--Psalm 84:10