More about our last year and a little about this year.

from top: Mia & Vince are married!; Jamie & us in Tehuacana; Anna, Lydia & Dennissa.

May & June 2019 In late May we made a trip to Texas because Sarah’s niece was getting married in Lubbock, Texas. It was a great wedding and wonderful to welcome Mia’s new husband, Vince into the family.

We stayed an extra week in order to spend a weekend at an annual conference in Tehuacana, Texas. This conference is beneficial to Christians working and ministering in the Arts. A highlight was reconnecting with an old friend from New York days, Jamie. He has been an artist and curator for decades and it had been some years since he and Kirk had seen each other. We cherish our time with Jamie last summer and we’ve maintained our contact as much as possible since he lives outside the USA.

July & August  2019 The summer of 2019 was a traveling summer for us. We were home for about a month, then in July we headed west again to attend the biannual Cru Conference in Colorado—which we wrote more about in our August 2019 letter. We returned to Rock Hill in time to welcome incoming Winthrop University students during an event on campus called Convocation. Student and local organizations set up tables to invite students to become more involved on and off campus. We had a table and handed out our annual 200+ handmade sketchbooks on the busy but sweltering day. It is a great rallying day for any new students but especially our FriArts leaders on campus. This year one of those student leaders—Lydia—was baptized at her church. Dennissa (on our staff team) had been meeting with her for the past 2 years. Itʼs so great to see a young artist growing in her relationship with God!

February 2020 Since moving into the studio space last year, we have tried to find ways of utilizing the space to serve and connect with our local artists. One of the ways that we do this is through something we call “Gettys Together”. One afternoon a month, we invite the artists connected to studios downtown to come and hang out with us. It has been amazing to have our art neighbors come for some or all of the time—chat, talk, and just get to know us and each other better. Some have even discovered their fellow artists, who have a studio in the same building, for the first time!

Two things this event has done for us and the community. One, it has made our community and the buildings we do stuff in “more human”—in that there is a greater warmth and familiarity among the community. And two, it has increased our neighborsʼ trust in us. Some of the artists have felt a freedom to just stop by to talk when we are in. And they have begun to see us as one of them. This goes a long way in building trust and opens opportunities to go into deeper places to believe God to transform lives and a community.

Thanks for your prayers and help in this. Next month we’ll tell you about the last part of our 2019 and another segment of more recent news.

Gettys Together Poster

Having a studio space removed that obstacle and allowed us to use the Friday Arts Project Studio space, resulting in many new friends and new volunteers. Having the studio has also helped us connect with our neighbors in the other art studios in our building and in the downtown area. They see we are here and serious about the arts and willing to invite them to be a part of what we do. Pray for us as we get to know the new friends and continue to get to know our studio neighbors. We wish for them to see our love for the arts and their creativity, but also our love of Jesus of Nazareth—just as much and more.

Thank you, friends. Remember you are helping us not only join them in their creativity, but also helping us be, live, act, and speak as our Lord would to them in these moments.