Community invited to Pray Farragut
The community is invited to pray.
The second semi-annual community “Pray Farragut” event begins at 5 p.m., Sunday, Sept. 10, at Christ Covenant Presbyterian Church.
The first gathering was in May near “the rock” at Farragut High School, adjacent to Lynn E. Sexton Gymnasium, following suicides by three FHS students.
About 25 staff members from churches in the Farragut area gathered for a luncheon at Christ Covenant a few weeks ago to talk about the prayer events that are planned for every six months.
“We believe the country needs us to unite together,” the Rev. Seth Hammond, Christ Covenant senior pastor, said about churches across the country. “We’ve been praying for revival for the last five years at Christ Covenant. We’re concerned about the direction the country’s headed in. … 2nd Chronicles 20 is one of my favorite [Biblical] chapters.
Jehoshaphat is king and knows an outside army is coming. He’s terrified. ‘Alarmed, Jehoshaphat resolved to enquire of the Lord … the people of Judah came together to seek the Lord. They came from every town. … We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you,’” he read.
“The local church is the hope of world,” Hammond added. “There’s nothing like the local church when it’s working right. … This Town needs us. We don’t want this to be a Christ Covenant event. We want this to be a community event.”
Other churches have expressed interest in hosting the next event in May 2018.
Farragut mother Terri Tucker, who envisioned and started
Pray Farragut, addressed the gathering. “I woke up many nights after that struggling with the devastating news with a deep heaviness in the pit of my stomach …” she said about the FHS suicides, “then for several nights I began to repeatedly have a vision, visions of the community coming together like never before in love and support for our Farragut kids and families.
“I envisioned droves of people gathering at the high school, holding hands and even surrounding the entire school and praying for God to bring about a much-needed change,” she added.
“Pray Farragut is an excellent opportunity for the faith community to show unity in our love and care for one another,” said Glenna Manning, pastor of discipleship and outreach at Concord United Methodist Church.
“We’re excited about partnering with Pray Farragut,” said Corey Mayfield, pastor of family ministries at First Baptist Concord, “and believe it will bring unity and bring believers together to pray for our community.”
The Rev. Harold Middlebrook was featured speaker for the event in May. “Pastor Middlebrook has spoken at Farragut Intermediate School for about 20 years delivering a message of encouragement to the kids telling them, ‘You are somebody.’” Tucker said. “Years later, many older kids still remember those powerful words.”
“The vision of Pray Farragut is that we each get outside the walls of our own church family and embrace our community as one body in Christ,” Tucker added at Christ Covenant. “That we see the needs of others through the eyes of Christ, and provide comfort to those who are discouraged. Please be in prayer that God will be at work in our Farragut community.”
