#faulty image on evangelism

[fanfic-lover-girl]

As a Christian, I want to give my experience with this, especially since I do find it awkward to talk about God with my non-Christian friends (which I admittedly seem to have less of after graduation).

I get where this responder is coming from. Christians are persecuted and some claim that Christians in the west get off on being persecuted since it makes them seem more authentic or righteous in the sight of God/others. Yet, the motivations described in this quora post do ill in describing the motivations of bible believing Christians who genuinely want people to know about Jesus. The description fits a cult which the church is not meant to be. Christians are not meant to be unthinking drones - we should not have blind faith. We are not supposed to be of the world (living in sin) but we still live on this Earth and should be productive and fruitful while we live here.

Christians are called to evangelize. Jesus sent his disciples out, even before his death. We do not evangelize to become closer to our church community. We do it because it's our obligation to spread the gospel to others. And because we honestly love them and want to see them find God.

We do share our experiences with people in the church. For example, I have heard friends in college testify (give an account) about friends/family members who they spent time with talking about Jesus who came to the faith. If the loved one rejects the message, my friends may come back to the "tribe", and share their experience, and others pray about the situation and give advice. Sometimes, the person may be advised to back off for a while so that their presence does not become bothersome.

Trust me, the "uncomfortable feelings" don't go away just by coming back to the "tribe". I have heard people in my life and even in the public forum talk about the pain of their parents, children and friends not being saved. I personally have a friend who currently struggles with Christianity and it hurts me. Probably almost or even more than my own faith struggles hurt me. She's not an "other" that I feel uncomfortable speaking with. We still love each other and I have not abandoned her. No one I know secluded themselves in the church when their atheist or agnostic friends reject them and/or their faith. They just keep trying and loving the person.

To address the point about evangelizers being annoying: it's more effective to talk about religion with close loved ones vs strangers. At least for me. My Christian friends in college would always be a friend first to someone before thoughts of preaching to them even came to mind. Being a good friend is a way of spreading the gospel too. The "other" described in the post sees something different about you and they want to know more.

While street preachers serve a purpose, I don't find that approach to be an overall effective strategy if you want to reach people on a personal level. I think it works ok in countries like Jamaica, where I am from, because people tend to have respect for the church. Most schools in Jamaica have Christian backgrounds. If they have a problem with the Christian trying to communicate with them on the street, they politely decline or just ignore them without a fuss. On the other hand, here in the US, people seem to have a deep hatred, almost demonic in nature, towards God. You don't see the level of craziness, such as that shown by LGBTQ+ or pro-abortion activists, towards Christians in Jamaica. You just don't. Once in a blue moon if you're lucky. Who's the third-world country again??

Look, I am bad about talking with my non-Christian friends about religion. I tried with 3 college friends who I cared about a lot and I felt like a complete goof. I got better at being casual and open about my beliefs but directly talking about the gospel...nah.

I will end my little ramble with a message from an atheist about people who do not proselytize (attempt to convert to another religion):

“I’ve always said,” Jillette explained, “I don’t respect people who don’t proselytize. I don’t respect that at all. If you believe there is a heaven and hell, and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think it’s not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward.

“How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate someone to believe everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?”

Jillette then offered this example to illustrate his point: “If I believed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that a truck was coming at you, and you didn’t believe it, that that truck was bearing down on you, there’s a certain point that I tackle you, and this is more important than that.”

“This guy was a really good guy. He was polite, honest, and sane, and he cared enough about me to proselytize and give me a Bible.”

So whenever I feel embarrassed when I remember my attempts to talk to my friends about my faith, I remember this quote!

[redwoodpress]

“Babel”

I watched my TV screen weeks ago as state after state bled the color red, foreshadowing a death that would break across not only my TV, but my America. Subtle whispers of profanity escaped my lips the same familiar way they have when tragedy affected my life, as every border dripped into the next, like a color by number sent from hell. The only thought that kept coming back around, “This is America. This is America. This is America.”

So many of you called me to weep into the phone, asking the static silence between us to change the outcome. Your fears were sent to me from other countries. The defeat that landed on your bones you gave to me that night and we tried to carry it together. You ranted, screamed, went silent. We all processed in a myriad of ways. I walked onto my school campus and familiar faces were gone. Protests broke out, everyone split like the Red Sea, and that night I cried myself to sleep because I realized I wasn’t Jesus and I couldn’t hold the weight of your emotions in my hands. I was tired for you. I was tired for me. I was tired.

I told a friend the other day that if the phrase, “God is in control” has become a language that is only used to silence you, I will not say it right now. I won’t erase your pain with empty Christian jargon.

You are mourning, I am too. I am listening. There is nothing but love in my heart for you. Before I say more, know that if I have any internalized racism in my body, I don’t want it. I never did. But we have the choice every day to love or hate each other. This is humanity.

Friends, we were destined to fall. From Genesis to now, we are still falling into some bad dream. Whether it’s Greek mythology or it is literal, whether the world was created in seven days or Charles Darwin’s view on creation wasn’t that far off, whether you kiss the bible or you want it to burn in the hell it speaks of, we are still broken. This is America. This is the world. This is sin. Hate me for bringing God into this conversation. Hate me for talking about sin; but look around, is anything else working? Do people, on an individual basis, suddenly believe you and fall at your feet when you argue? Are we getting anywhere?

I tried to remember as I sat in my astronomy class that this world is a dot in an expansive universe. It’s still spinning, at just the right angles, to keep us alive and well. We have made it through the Depression, two World Wars, the Holocaust. I am not decreasing those events, nor invalidating the present. But we are still here. We have felt deep loss and time has given us just enough to keep growing through and out of the pain. We watched 9/11 as children-we feared that day as something so strong and mighty fell. As dust storms chased after people like a horror film and fires choked them out of life; we wondered if we would ever recover. We are still standing.

But we will never have perfect stability.

Former wars, pointless like Vietnam took innocent lives as it depicted faulty images on our televisions. Media took us in its grimy hands and left us isolated, confused, devastated. Language made blanket statements out of us, human documents that anyone could read and somehow understand, instead of individuals who have been written by complex experiences, loss, love, heartbreak, humiliation, triumph. It became “us” and “them”. Power, privilege, oppression, entitled, injustice, white supremacy, woke-there are a lot of hot words floating around, and not everyone knows what they mean. The words reinforced the borders; pathways to individual people are getting caution taped. Dialogue is broken and conversations are dead-one word out of someone’s mouth is suddenly cause to crucify them, instead of educate.  I hear a tower of Babel; we’re all speaking a language that no one will listen to. The definitions have trapped us all. Enough.

We were told to love our enemies. We were told to bear with one another in love. Anger is good, hate is not. Focus. Fight for people, instead of just fighting.

We will never have perfect stability.

There will always be angry, ignorant, white men in the middle of America who hate African-Americans, the LGBTQA community, women, immigrants, Muslims. There will always be people in those groups who hate those white men back. Social media will always be a faulty platform to write atrocious things to people in anger.

Honestly, we chose to hear what we wanted to hear. We were living in the fear of the question, “Is it this bad? Is America this bad that these are the best candidates?” And then as politics progressed the fear ate us alive and vulnerability gave us no other choice than to believe a lie. That politics was all we had. That media from terrible sources defined us. And we became the borders that Trump talked about. They were both racist, corrupt, aggressive in sexual assault or passive in preventing it, drunk on power, drunk on money, fallen-whether they said it like a badge of honor on national television or did it behind closed doors. They still are. We lived within the walls of corruption before Trump even talked about his damn wall. Before he got elected, we chose hope against all odds in unimaginable filth. And then the nightmare came true and we threw out hope and fell back into filth. Hate. We let a single man get inside our heads and spin us in circles.

It’s a shame, it’s embarrassing and surreal. Because I look at the rest of the world, having been to third world countries, and their generosity is uncanny. They have nothing and their hands are open and they say, “Here. Take it from me. Take the shirt off my back.” Their hands are open for not only us, but for the seemingly improbable truth of hope.

And we are here, screaming our own pride into every facet of communication available, and to be honest, it’s making me sick. The story isn’t about us. Other countries seem to understand this.

We’re all yelling about self-love, and that’s important, but I have more things to do than to just love myself. There are a lot more people who need love, and it’s about time we start doing it.

Fighting for the orphan and the widow isn’t optional. Fighting for immigrants isn’t optional.

We are better than this.

We’ve worshiped fear. We’ve set up an altar and bowed down. One side mentions God and the others say they are privileged and white and don’t understand pain. Another side speaks out about their very real oppression and injustice and the others tell them that it’s not happening. Our experiences are not the same, you’re right. I am not you. But to be honest, I told myself that God was in control because I had nothing else; I was horrified at the state of our country. I didn’t say that God was on the throne to suddenly diminish that systems are still broken and people are still in need. I didn’t say it as a means to turn a blind eye to injustice, and I know many did. I say that God is control because I cling to nothing else, our world is chaotic, and I have nothing left that brings the sweet waters of peace. Maybe that sounds privileged, but it’s what I have right now.

The divide is getting wider, we have to stop it.

We somehow thought we should stack up our pain and struggle next to each other and let them compete. We’re not the same but we have both held hands with fear, and eaten depression for breakfast, and been paralyzed by tragedy. I don’t want to be in this game anymore, and nobody wins when we compare scars. Fear is real, fear is valid. But fear is still just that-fear. It’s easy, it’s natural, it’s a reflex, and it is something we can fight. Whether you are more affected by this election or not, we still have choices to make about the demons that tuck us in at night and how we are going to send them back to hell. We’re in this together, let’s act.

I don’t ask for ignorance. I don’t ask you not to feel, not to cry, not to see darkness, because we have faced a death of sorts. But I urge you, in this time, to look around at the people taking care of one another. I urge you to look back and see the ways people took care of one another in times of war, disaster, tragedy and learn from them. Look at how people love each other and wake up when nightmares become realities. We can do the same-give, share, find peace in calamity. People are reaching out with both arms in places they cannot see light for others doing the same. If we generalize others into groups without families, personalities, capacity for love and loss, capacity for understanding, we become our own boot camps of hatred. If we don’t help each other realize that, we will be alone, aching over an unstable America, asking it to be heaven. This is not heaven.

By the same token: I didn’t go to church for 5 years because I disagreed with a lot of the things the evangelical church was doing, or not doing. I was questioning, and I was frustrated that the church was not doing one of its primary jobs, to seek justice, peace, and love. This is what I proclaimed obstinately and obnoxiously over people who argued their case. I recently just sat in the car with my best friend after our church service. She has been a church-goer her whole life. She is someone who has watched me go in and out of churches most of my adult life, going once and picking it to pieces like a 5 year old at dinner. I consistently found something to be angry about. She told me that day, “I never wanted to argue at you about how church and community was right because I knew you had to come to that conclusion by yourself. I just knew I was always going to be at least your one friend who always went and I would let that speak.” I almost cried because her patience astounded me. She is a loyal friend because she doesn’t try to make me believe her, she’s just there for me, exemplifying what it’s like to live a life pursuing a God who loves all and waits for all.

So my point is, if I’m not around people who are different than me, how does anything change? If she didn’t stick around, I would have never been part of a group that has changed my life and pushed me forward into change and made me a better person. And if someone like me who is frustrated doesn’t stay, then how does the culture there ever change? Turn your frustration into finding solutions. Otherwise it’s for nothing.

We can’t afford not to change.

So I’m still going to sit next to someone who doesn’t agree with me politically. Do you know why? Because if I wait for them, like I know God waits for me, then maybe we can bridge the divide. My silence and cold shoulder only closes all doors between us. And you know what? This waiting doesn’t take any energy out of me, not nearly as much energy as it takes to be angry.

It doesn’t mean I’m not going to fight for justice; it just means I am going to focus on the people who are in need, instead of fighting at the people who are not.

There are times under the sun for everything. Right now, it’s time to grow up, even when the adults or the peers in our lives haven’t, even when mom’s we barely know get on our Facebook to scold us. We live in a time that people our age spend nine hours a day on social media; we can talk all day about change, but we have to live it. And quite frankly, it’s time to disregard the thoughts of people who don’t believe in peace. It’s time to forgive, even when it’s difficult. In the end, a bitter heart is only hurting you.

Don’t burn bridges. Light a flame to lead people out of their shadows. That’s more important.

History does not dictate how we move forward. Be present. Move. There will always be people who live in the past; we get to be the minorities, whites, women, men, LGBTQA community, immigrants, Muslims who don’t. So let’s move the conversation forward, too. Embrace your ancestry, but ask yourselves-who are we? Who do we want to be? That’s the question we have left, let it propel us forward into truth.

We can’t say that “Love trumps hate” and then cut someone out of that, regardless of who they are, no matter how much they piss you off. You have to give them margin to change, because you would want the same. Redemption is a story and it’s rolling, but we’re going to miss it if we don’t wake up. That means pursuing love when it’s difficult and grace when you don’t want to in a culture that tells you to do whatever feels right for you. Unfortunately, that doesn’t really work because whatever feels right for you is often easy, and it means to hate people and stay bitter.

We can’t do anything about the way we grew up, but we can do something for the way the ones after us get to grow up. We are not our ancestors. We don’t have to be our history books. We don’t have to lick our wounds. We are not our Facebook statuses. We are all made of the same stuff, flesh and bone; please recognize that.

Can we work together? I’m so tired of not working together. I’m so tired of division.

The color of my skin does not erase the fact that we are called to forgive each other, just as much as the color of my words don’t erase the oppression you encounter because of your skin color.

We will never have perfect stability.

But stability is stone cold cement, founded by old ideas, like the walls of Jericho.

Like the walls of Trump’s hate.

We are built by truth, love, grace, courage. And we move.

The sound of your voices are bleeding through. Can you hear them?

 P.S. This article doesn’t give you an excuse to suddenly start bashing millennial “snowflakes” and call them lazy, entitled, and stupid. It also doesn’t give you an excuse to bash all white people, all people of color, or the church. If you are, you’ve done a tremendous job in missing the point. And please don’t read one paragraph of something and say you understand all of it.

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[the-record-columns]

July 24, 2019: Columns

‘Finders Keepers?’

By KEN WELBORN

Record Publisher

In the news recently there was a survey reported on in which wallets were left where people could find them — some with money, some with no money, but all with a name and a way to contact the person who "lost" the wallet. 

The statistics were interesting, noting that more folks tried to find the owner of the wallets with money in them as opposed those who were broke.

Go figure.

Then, in the past week or so an armored car on an interstate in the Atlanta area had a side door swing open and $175,000 fell out, making a blizzard of currency.  At least 50 cars stooped to help themselves, many posting their finds on social media.

Big mistake there.

The cops are using those posts to track down the money — it is a misdemeanor or a felony, depending on how much you find, if you know who it belongs to. 

All this brings me to "Moose" Robinson. 

I know no other name than Moose, a ragged sort of character who lived in Wilkes for many years.  One fateful day in the early 60’s, I was drinking a Cherry Coke at the counter of the Brame Drug Store and Moose was there as well.  For whatever reason, as we talked he said he had some advice for me — to always look down at my feet as I walked, because there was no telling what I might find, and he smiled.��"Listen to old Moose," he said, "...you will be glad you did."

He was right.

It may seem silly, but lo nearly 60 years later, I still do what Moose said, and, when I notice a piece of treasure — even a penny — I always look to the sky and say, "Thank you Moose."

Sometimes I even say it out loud.

Which brings me to a story. 

In the 1970’s, I worked in advertising for Paul Cashion at WWWC Radio, when it was a little Top 40 station that could be heard almost to Cricket. In those days there was a big Easter Sunrise Service at Mount Lawn Cemetery and we carried it live on the radio. The narrator spoke in hushed tones as he read the script of everything that was going on in front of a huge crowd each year.

Those of is who worked on the event would meet at the then Holiday Inn on 268 in Wilkesboro where they who had 24-hour room service, and would let us in at about 2 a.m. and fix us a big breakfast. There were five of us to meet there and I was the last one in. They were all standing on a rug which said Holiday Inn on it as I came in.

By this time in the mid 1970’s, I had been heeding Moose Robinson’s advice faithfully for over 15 years, and, as I glanced down walking in, I saw what I thought was money folded up.  I leaned down and palmed the money and asked if anyone had lost any money.  Lo and behold, they had all lost money — at that very moment — one had lost a 5, one a 10, one a 20, and the big loser lost a 100 dollar bill.

Yeah, right.

I turned my back to them and realized that I was holding four neatly folded 100 dollar bills so new they stuck together.  I told my cohorts that they were out of luck and walked over to the front desk where the man on duty told me just to give it to him and he would put it in their vault until someone asked for it.  I didn't tell him how much I had found either, and gave him my phone number if someone reported losing some cash.

But what to do now. On Monday, I locked the cash in a file cabinet at the radio station and waited for the Holiday Inn to call.  I figured no one could lose that much cash and not be retracing their steps. Thirty days went by with me looking at the money about every day, but no call.

Unsure of what to do, when I ran in to the Wilkesboro Police Chief Delbert Wilson in the post office one morning, I buttonholed him and told him my story, and asked him what I should do.  He didn't bat an eye and said that after 30 days if no one had come forward, I should just take my kids to the beach and enjoy it.

I took his advice, and, as I paid the room rent at the old Blockade Runner Motel near the Cherry Grove Pier in North Myrtle Beach, I took a moment to look up to the sky and once again say a hearty, "Thank you, Moose!"

Note:  Finding $400 in 1975 is like finding nearly $2,000 today.

No kidding.

To the moon and back, from North Carolina

By HEATHER DEAN

Record Reporter

Apollo 11’s 50th anniversary was last week any many a fascinating science fact have been shared.

But did you know that a small town about 35 minutes from where I’m sitting at my desk was integral in the mission? The special nylon material of the U.S. flags that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin planted on the Moon in1969, was woven at Burlington Mills in Rhodhiss, N.C.

Rhodhiss gets its interesting moniker from John M. Rhodes and George B. Hiss who partnered and built a cotton mill in Caldwell County in 1902 called Rhodhiss Manufacturing Company.

Then they constructed the village of Rhodhiss, which included a horseshoe-shaped dam, electric generator, and mill, general store, and worker houses with Rhodhiss incorporating as a town in 1903.

Workers were offered comfortable housing, some health care, schooling and credit at the company store. A two-room school house was built soon after.  Within the next decade, the Town of Rhodhiss would expand into Burke County, courtesy of a new steel bridge that spans the Catawba River, cementing North  Carolina’s place in the boom that made our state the textile capital of the world. The small town has a total area of 1.3 square miles, including the river, has only one traffic light, a cautionary flashing yellow light, not a stop light. As of the last census there is only one police officer for the 366 people, (112 families) that reside in the town. It was the perfect place to make a flag representing small town American ingenuity, I would say.

Of course there were some naysayers and critics as these things often go.

Being an employee at a mill that made flag fabric, one tends to focus on the job at hand, not about the next plant the material would end up in. For goodness sakes, they were a supplier to hundreds of companies and agencies, including NASA. It wasn’t until a few weeks after the moon landing that a company memo was put up in the weaving room about the part they played in history. Even then, there were some Burlington Mills employees who thought the moon landing was staged, but that didn’t stop them from partaking of the celebratory steak dinner with all the trimmings for every employee.  

According to Rhodhiss Town Historian Sherrie Sigmon, the flag material wasn’t the only item prepared for NASA in the plant. In a magazine article, she wrote that Burlington Mills contracted with NASA and the military for bulletproof vests during Vietnam, and material for the nose cones and heat shields on the U.S. Navy’s Polaris and Trident missiles as well as NASA’s Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecrafts.

Burlington Mills closed in the early 80’s.  

In 1995, a NASA administrator presented the town with a plaque and a small North Carolina flag that had been flown to the moon and back on Apollo 16, a thank-you for the mill’s many contributions to the space program.

Rhodhiss’ first town seal has an image of an Apollo astronaut standing next to an American flag. Town leaders ordered green signs to place at the town limits that include this picture, along with the words: “U.S. Moon Flags Woven Here.”  

Though there is still some historical question about the nylon material coming from this particular plant, the good people of Rhodhiss are not dismayed and even added a little extra to their towns celebration last week, with fireworks beginning approximately the same time that Aldrin posted the flag. These citizens are pretty sure about where the facts of history lie — after all, a National Space Agency simply doesn’t end up in a one- square mile town by accident…

  True Christians support Israel

By EARL COX

Special to The Record

The influence of Evangelical Christians - those who regard the Bible as the ultimate guide for life and stalwartly regard their Messiah as the way, truth and life - is declining. Why it is falling is complex, but boils down to accommodating the current culture resulting in confusion concerning matters of faith. Coupled with the rising population of the post-modern generation in an increasingly hedonistic culture, immoral secular education, embracing the faulty concept that there are no absolute rights or wrongs, a lack of respect for authority, a high degree of self-absorption, and the list goes on, leads to the conclusion that society's downward slide toward apostate thinking is practically inexorable.

An internet search today for articles that have “Evangelical” in the search engine is shocking due to the malice the public media has for Evangelicals. Even more jaw-dropping are insinuations of contempt toward Evangelicals from those proclaiming themselves to be Christians.   

Such adversity is disheartening because of what it means for both Christianity-at-large, and Evangelical Christianity in particular, and their respective stance regarding Israel and the Jews. Evangelicals are considered pro-Israel whereas many others who claim to be Christians embrace anti-Israel policies and attitudes including anti-Semitism and BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions). 

The Evangelical church has largely repented of the sins and atrocities of Christian history as it relates to hatred of the Jews having come to realize that Christians have not replaced the Jews. The modern witness and revelation that God stills loves His Chosen people, the Jews, and the Holy Land He speaks so much about in the Bible, is undeniable to those who are Evangelical. In contrast, many mainstream denominations hold anti-Semitic views and Millennial churches often have no opinion about why Israel and the Jews matter nor do they understand their importance to God as plainly expressed in His Word. This all stems from the liberal education being taught at many theological seminaries.

The post-modern church totters on its understanding of Jewish-Christian relations including the Jewish connection to land of Israel, and it is certainly not Evangelical in practice. Some mega church pastors are minimizing Hebrew scripture from the pulpit in an attempt to make a case for a more modern, accepting Christianity within their church walls. Such tactics may bring in people and improve attendance, but they are left bereft of the fuller teaching of ethics and morals for life, and judgement awaits those who oppose instructions as taught by our Creator who is the God of Israel.

It’s no wonder that churches, and even whole denominations, support boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaigns against the apple of God’s eye (Israel) and harbor anti-Semitic attitudes and practices, though many would deny it.

Such teaching about Israel and the Jews is compounded by a failure to understand the history of both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, for example. This is where post-modern thought in the 21st century manifests a major defect, i.e., forgetting that history begins before a person is born. Such forgetfulness and omission results in poor judgement.

Judging by media double-standards and hypocrisy, this will not bode well in the future for Israel and Jews. The non-Evangelical will be less sympathetic to Israel and her people. Regardless of Israel being the sole democracy with freedoms unheard of in the other countries in the Middle East, the self-interests of modernity versus Israel is ambiguous at present.

Today, Evangelical Christians are a tour d'force, influential in the defense of Israel and the Jewish people. They understand God’s love for the Jewish people and the land of Israel. They understand modern history as well as they do ancient history. These are the people who support Israel by visiting the Holy Land by the millions each year. They prayerfully support the Israeli government just as they support their own government. Evangelicals have contributed millions of dollars to help support the return of Jews from all over the world to their ancient homeland. New arrivals are helped in a variety of practical ways by Evangelicals as they integrate into Israeli culture and society.

Because of the sincere and enthusiastic support from Evangelicals toward Israel and her people, an unbreakable bond has been formed.  We must be sure that no one breaks it. 

The Watermelon People

By CARL WHITE

Life in the Carolinas

You never know for sure what’s going to happen when it comes to an outdoor summer festival in the Carolinas.

It might be clear, it might rain, it might be hot, or it might be hotter, you may have long lines, you might have shorter lines. However, if it’s been going for many years and at approximately the same time every year you have a good idea about what’s going to happen.  

Not so long ago I traveled to Pageland, S.C., about producing a segment on the long running Pageland Watermelon Festival.

I met with Tim Griffin, the festival director and Sherri Honeycutt, a committee chair. They are, as are all the other committee chairs and members, volunteers.

The festival has been going for 68 years. For the most part it is a year-long planning process with only a short break just after the festival ends each year. I’m sure everyone needs a break.

My original thoughts were to produce a standard six-minute segment on the festival which would include about a half-day visit. The show had visited the festival for a segment about eight years ago so I had a reasonable idea of what would be happening.

As our conversation progressed, I begin to hear a much bigger story developing. It was more than a festival; it was about a community working together for the benefit of their hometown. A celebration of heritage, agriculture, beauty queens, entertainment and yes, the humble watermelon.

The decision was made to work toward the develop of a special that will highlight the people of Pageland and others who have chosen to be part of this massive project, now and over the past 68 years.

The decision was also made for Life In The Carolinas to go Live for the Parade. This task would require a great deal of support including fiber installation to handle our data streaming requirements. Sandhill Telephone was able to step in and make this happen — once again demonstrating community support.

The 2019 festival would have a few new things and a few older traditions added back to the festival lineup. The watermelon relay race was brought back and would proceed the highly anticipated Watermelon Festival Parade.

A new “dance-off” was added at noon on Saturday, shortly after the parade. Two music stages would feature almost nonstop entertainment on both Friday and Saturday until the festival ended.

The week before the big festival, the plans called for the selection of the official Watermelon Festival Beauty Queens, an airplane fly-in, a golf tournament, and a Sunday Gospel singing. All being administered by volunteers and secured by approximately 50 members of the Pageland Police Department and Chesterfield County Sherriff’s Department.

Tim is the president of the Pageland Chamber of Commerce; he lives in Pageland and has long been a tireless promoter of the good in Pageland. It was Tim who contacted our TV show several years ago about visiting Pageland.

Sherri is the Clerk of Count in Pageland; she is not a resident, but she loves where she works. She said it’s because of the people.

Pageland is a special place and like the Watermelon there is debate as to what it is. Is it a fruit or a vegetable? It really depends on who you ask.

Is Pageland a good place to visit because of the Watermelon Festival, or is the Watermelon Festival a great event to visit because of the people of Pageland?

From my observations it’s the people. So, visit the festival for sure, but then plan your travels to visit Pageland at other times. Slow down and visit with the merchants and maybe catch a movie at the historic Ball Theatre.

Take a little time and get to know the colorful people in this little Southern town with a few hidden treasures worth looking for.

It’s worth the effort, because I think they have figured out a few things along the way, but they will be the first to let you know they are still working on it.

I’ll let you know when we finish the special, I know there will be lots more to share.

By the way, the 2019 Pageland Watermelon Festival was a big success and we had a great time.

See you at the Watermelon Stand.

Carl White is the Executive Producer and Host of the award-winning syndicated TV show Carl White’s Life In The Carolinas. The weekly show is now in its 10th year of syndication and can be seen in the Charlotte market on WJZY Fox 46 Saturday’s at noon and My 12. The show also streams on Amazon Prime. For more information visit www.lifeinthecarolinas.com. You can email Carl at Carl@lifeinthecarolinas.com