New facility gives Calhoun Association ministry center resources for service

What currently looks like a traditional red barn sitting picturesquely on property in Calhoun County will soon be a ministry center bustling with activity and changing people’s lives.
Calhoun Baptist Association’s Service Center South, which assists people in need, should be open for business in its new location by November.
The site was dedicated Sept. 20.

The barn is on property owned by the Alabama Baptist Children’s Homes & Family Ministries (ABCH) in Oxford. ABCH officials offered the barn to Calhoun Association rent-free if the association would renovate it, pay the utilities and share space with ABCH’s Pathways Professional Counseling.

For John Thomas, associate director of missions (DOM) for Calhoun Association, the offer completed a six-year search for new property for the ministry.

“It’s a better location with easier access,” he said. “We believe it will help us serve more people.”
Room is needed for clothing and food storage as well as distribution points for those items. The ministry also offers financial aid to qualifying families and needs office space for that service. The 50-by-40-foot barn is being converted into an eight-room facility with an upstairs loft and ramps and other structures allowing the disabled proper access.

There is the potential for adding some cold-food storage as well, noted Jim Davis, director of the northwest and south centers and associate director of church and community ministries for the association.
The offer and resulting renovations further a partnership between the association and ABCH that began 10 years ago.

At that time, the association offered office space to the ABCH administration and counselors with Pathways.
Since then, the two groups have worked together in many ways, said Ted Embry, ABCH area director — central/northeastern Alabama.

“This (offer) is expanding that partnership and returning the favor of the benevolence they’ve shown us,” he said. “We can join with the association to help more families in more ways.”
Sid Nichols, Calhoun Association DOM, said, “I believe this is a launching point into much greater potential to do what we want to do, and that is intersecting lives with Jesus Christ.” (ABCH)