December

December 2

1981 - Wednesday evening Art to Heart at Anderson College (now University) in Anderson, SC. It's not written on my calendar, but I'm fairly sure this was headed by Scott Lenning when he was a student there. So if it was, thank you, Scott. (I just realized that the last of these posts where I was not sure who had headed up something where we did Art to Heart, I was fairly sure it was Scott's dad. Maybe I didn't write it down because of how well I knew them.)

1998 - Wednesday evening Art to Heart at Franklin First Baptist Church. I don't know for sure which Franklin FBC this was. We've done Art to Heart quite a few at the one just outside of Nashville including after it became People's Church but not since it has been Church of the City. But we've also done Art to Heart at FBC in Franklin, NC and maybe even at some others. Odds are this one was in Tennessee, but that's based on math not memory.

December 5

1992 - Saturday evening "This Little Child" Art to Heart for Allendale-Hampton Baptist Association Christmas rally at First Baptist Church in Fairfax, SC. Thank you, Don Turner.

1998 - Saturday evening Art to Heart as part of leading a weekend of ministry December 5-6 at Immanuel United Methodist Church in Lakeside Park, KY just outside of Cincinnati. Thank you, Kathy Ours. (This is a church that came to Seesalt for many years and launched the "Bill Cox is a pirate" movement.)

December 7

1986 - Sunday morning Art to Heart at Mt Calvary Baptist Church in Dillon, SC. Thank you, Tom Brown.

Also 1986 - Hustled to tear down and pack up in DIllon, drive to Sumter, SC and set up in time to do Sunday evening Art to Heart at Crosswell Baptist Church. Thank you, Bill Bochman.

December 9

1987 - Wednesday evening "This Little Child" Art to Heart at Northeast Baptist Church Don't know for sure what city, but after searching online, I think it was in Columbia, SC. Earlier that day we got back from 11 days in Hawaii for a Home Mission Board national evangelism conference followed by some vacation time, so we were probably dealing with some lack of sleep and jet lag on this one. Thank you, Vicki Ross.

December 10

2017 - Sunday morning Art to Heart at Piney Grove Baptist Church in Swansboro, NC. This was rescheduled from a month earlier when Kathy was (quickly) recovering from hip replacement surgery. Thank you, Randy DeVinney. And if I remember correctly, this was Randy's last Sunday at Piney Grove before becoming pastor at Westerly Hills Baptist Church in Fort Mill, SC.

December 11

1988 - Sunday evening Art to Heart at Ft Johnson Baptist Church in Charleston, SC. Thank you, Mike Turner.

December 12

Calendar entries a little incomplete on this date:

1978 - Did Art to Heart Tuesday at 7:00 pm somewhere but have no idea where.

1980 - Led a retreat for North Trenholm Baptist Church of Columbia, SC December 12-14 at Awanita. Probably did a chalk drawing, but not sure which day.

December 13

1976 - Monday evening Art to Heart for Riverside High School Christian Fellowship Club at Fairview Baptist Church in Greer, SC.

1987 - Sunday evening Art to Heart at St. George Baptist Church in Orangeburg, SC. Thank you, Art Beasley - not only for this invitation, but even more for all your help when I first came on board directing youth evangelism for the SC Baptist Convention.

1988 - Tuesday evening Art to Heart at West Hartsville Baptist Church in Hartsville, SC. Thank you, Bev Kennedy. (I was reminded from other calendar notes that we missed an Amy Grant concert in Columbia to do this one. Priorities.)

1992 - Sunday evening Art to Heart at Westside Baptist Church somewhere. There are a lot of Westside Baptist Churches and if I had to take a wild guess as to where this one was, I'd guess Sumter, SC but far from sure. Thank you, Robbie Martin.

December 14

1976 - Tuesday afternoon Art to Heart for Middle School JOY at Taylors First Baptist Church in Taylors, SC. This was a group that I led each Tuesday for five years when I was minister to youth at TFBC. Thank you to all the students who helped make those five great years.

1976 - Tuesday evening Art to Heart for "Odom banquet." I'm pretty sure this was at a Christmas banquet for a Taylors First Baptist Church Sunday school class led by John and Aileen Odom. In 1976 my chalk drawing set up was much simpler so it was no problem to do one for a middle school group after they got out of school and then do another one somewhere else for an adult Sunday school class. With a 3-4 hour setup and an hour teardown, that would be hard to do today.

1986 - Art to Heart for Sunday morning service at Riverland Hills Baptist Church in Columbia, SC where we were members at the time. Thank you, pastor Jack Ellenburg.

1988 - Wednesday evening Art to Heart at First Baptist Church in Mauldin, SC. Thank you, Ken Kessler and Mike Glenn.

December 15

1976 - Art to Heart for JOY Explosion. JOY Explosion was our weekly Wednesday night meeting for senior high students during the five years I served as minister to youth at Taylors First Baptist Church in Greenville, SC. Just posting this brings back a flood of great memories. Thank you to all of our TFBC students for five years of (mostly) great Wednesday nights.

December 18

1985 - Wednesday evening Art to Heart at Taylors First Baptist Church. This was five years after I finished my tenure as minister to youth at TFBC, but was thankful that I kept getting invited back to do things like Art to Heart there. A wonderful church that will always hold a special place in my heart.

1989 - Monday evening Art to Heart for Allendale Hampton Baptist Associational meeting. Thank you, Don Turner.

December 19

1978 - Art to Heart at Greenville Poinsett Club for Edwards Road Baptist Church youth Christmas party. Thank you, Tierce Green.

December 27

1983 - For a handful of years, Concoxions did a conference that we called "Winteretreat" at Awanita Valley between Christmas and New Year's Day. We did a chalk drawing most of those years, but I don't remember exactly which days. 1983 was our last year of doing "Winteretreat." We loved doing the conference and had a faithful group of churches that came each year, but getting ready for it both administratively and putting together an all-new program totally dominated the Christmas season day and night for Kathy and me. This was Christopher's first Christmas which didn't mean much to a 7-month old, but we realized moving forward that it would be very difficult to continue "Winteretreat" and have much quality family time during the Christmas season. We've always considered family to be our most important ministry, so we made the tough decision to end "Winteretreat." As it turned out, we got only one Christmas season "off." The next year I went on staff with the South Carolina Baptist Convention and inherited "Evangelympics" - an annual series of regional youth events that included major conferences in both Greenville and Charleston between Christmas and New Year's Day. It was still an incredible amount of work, but I was able to start earlier and spread it out over a longer period of time. It also helped greatly that we had administrative help (thank you Margaret and others) and brought in a lot of program guests and small group leaders each year instead of doing so much of the program ourselves. I'm not sure, but I think that included not doing Art to Heart at Evangelympics those 10 years.