TRUCKSVILLE — It all started with an over-priced cinnamon bun at a turnpike rest area.
Ray Petts, lead pastor of Back Mountain Harvest Assembly (BMHA), was travelling with his family when his mother-in-law decided to grab a bite to eat during a pit stop. Exclaiming over the cost of the tasty but small treat, she said, “I say…wow!”
It was a “you’d have to be there to understand” moment, Petts said, but the humor of the situation and the phrase stuck with him over the next few weeks. Then, one day as he was driving to the office, the words again popped into his mind, and he thought to himself, “The church should realize how God makes us say ‘wow.’ How he can break in to the everyday realm of life and do supernatural things.”
Assistant Pastor Jack Rehill calls this “the wow factor.”
“It’s the fact that he’s not a God who’s far away and distant and out there somewhere,” Rehill said. “He’s a God who is very near. And the more we realize that, the more we understand how awesome he is.”
After Petts pondered these things, the idea took on a life of its own and the church soon ordered T-shirts and wrist bands and placed a series of three billboard campaign ads featuring the slogan.
The billboard, located on Route 309 just before the rock cut heading south out of the Back Mountain, featured the first of the three ads, a general promotion of the church, in June. Next up was a promotion of the BMHA’s expanding Kids’ Ministries. The billboard campaign will end the second week in September with an ad for the church’s new food pantry.
Linda Sapack, children’s pastor, said the church is in the process of starting a training center for the spiritual and creative development of children.
“Not only are we trying to touch the lives of the children spiritually, which is very important, but to nurture their talents and help them see their value and worth,” she said.
She said the church desires to help children “find what God has instilled in them and what his purpose is for their lives,” ultimately leading them back to the “wow” and awe of God.
The campaign isn’t limited to the adults and youngsters. Chris McNaney, student ministries pastor, believes it applies just as much to the middle and high school students he works with.
“You don’t have to be an adult to experience God on that level,” he said.
The youth pastor has only been in the role at BMHA for about a month, but said during those four weeks, he has already seen growth, both in numbers and spiritual depth.
It is that spiritual depth that serves as the main goal of the campaign.
“We’re just wanting to raise the level of God-consciousness that God makes us say, ‘wow,’” said Petts. “Even when we’re facing trials and obstacles, God makes us say ‘wow.’”
The T-shirts, bracelets and billboard are all a reminder of that.
The idea must have worked, as the church is now on its third order of T-shirts and plans to place a fourth order once they’re sold out.
And it all started with an over-priced cinnamon bun at a turnpike rest area.
