Not long after the Lord opened the door for my family to come and pastor Selma Baptist Church, I was out prayer walking in the town of Selma one morning and it saddened me to see so many buildings in this charming southern small town, empty and lifeless. It was if I could gaze into them and see them once bustling with life as businesses were opened providing services to citizens of the town.
I prayed on each corner of each street and wondered what doors the Lord could open to bring hope to the town? Not a business per se, but a ministry, that could help revitalize the town by providing a service to the community that no one else was doing.
As the days and months went by, I had an opportunity to deliver a donation on behalf of our church to My Kid’s Club, a wonderful club for children in our community, and it was there that I met, Mrs. Mamie Moore, the then director of the club. We got into a conversation about the club and talked about helping kids; she shared her stories and I shared my stories of being a student pastor for seventeen years. It was out this conversation that the idea of teaching groups of kids how to play the drums came about.
In May of 2019, Selma Baptist Church launched our On Beat Drum Ministry with the children of My Kid’s Club. Each day we would take our newly purchased church bus and pick up groups of boys and girls and bring them to our church building where we would teach them drums and devotions from God’s word that would give them the wisdom to make wise decisions. In addition to this, we also took them to Starbucks for a tasty treat and to other restaurants for lunch. At the end of each lesson they would have an opportunity to enjoy a snack and converse. They loved it!
Fast forward several months later and our church hosted a meeting with business owners and entrepreneurs from the grass-roots group, Activate Selma and it was here that we learned about a vacant building in the town owned by Hester Properties that once use to be a recording studio. We went and took a look at the building and Hester Properties offered for us to use the space to operate our On Beat Ministry out of it.
After several conversations and much prayer Selma Baptist Church has taken a step of faith and will start our On Beat drum ministry on 101 Raiford St. in Selma, NC real soon. It seems the prayers that were prayed on that day of prayer walking the town over a year ago have been answered with this door of opportunity. We are excited to take the step of faith!
Todd
