On Thursday just before lunch, I received a text from a friend with an article attached announcing a new mask mandate for the city of Fayetteville. This mandate requires that masks be worn in indoor settings while not around those not in your immediate family. In light of this I called the other elders and as we discussed how we should respond. First, it was clear that none of us like wearing a mask and if you’d have asked us a few months ago, we thought we’d be done with all of this. But that is not the case and we cannot pretend that we are out of this quite yet.
The more we talked about this effort to help control the spread of this virus, the more we saw the mandate for masking indoors during the Sunday Gathering as a way we can serve others. We talked about Romans 13-14, Philippians 2, and the way of Jesus in serving others, putting their needs before his own.
In addition to all of this, the headmaster of FCA has since issued a statement to their staff encouraging voluntary compliance with the mask mandate for our city.
In order to love and serve FCA well, we will be encouraging the same. If the pandemic has taught us anything, it is that we value the Sunday morning gathering of the church. Gathering for worship is an essential and irreplaceable means of discipleship, growth, and encouragement for all followers of Jesus. By choosing to wear a mask for another season, we can put the humility of Jesus on display for others by putting the needs of others above our own desires.
Church, throughout this pandemic we have been continually encouraged by your willingness to love and serve others like Christ has served us. See you all tomorrow for worship.
On behalf of the elders,
Jacob Warren | Lead Pastor