Coming Home to Grace Fellowship Church


In July of 2000 we found ourselves living in Suburban Lodge off of Ashley Phosphate road in Charleston SC. All five of us lived in a single room with two beds, a bathroom and a tiny kitchenette. We found ourselves there because a decision had been made to utilize the medical services at MUSC for our daughter Jessica who was at that time 9 years old and had been diagnosed with a brain tumor.

In August of 2000 we met Troy and Shannon McNear in Goose Creek and we moved into their double wide trailer off of 159 Mapleridge Drive. We spent several months getting settled into our new surroundings and learning what it was like to have a daughter with cancer. Our church home was 2.5 hours away on Hilton Head Island and all the friends that we knew lived either in Texas or on Hilton Head Island or Bluffton SC. We missed the comfort of having people that we knew close to us. The search for a church home was sporadic at best and due to our circumstances we probably spent more time focusing on internal issues to our family vs. looking outside of our family.

In December of 2000 I wound up at the Trident Medical Center with chest pains in the Emergency Room. For the last ten years I have suffered chest pains about once per year and every time I would be examined nothing could be found. When I explained this to the doctors in the Trident Emergency Room they admitted me over night for observation and stress tests the next morning. I remember the pastoral care lady that came by to visit with me just before I was to be released. The first thing this pastoral care lady did was to ask me a direct question and wanted to know exactly how I felt about something. I have no idea what the question was at this time but I remember unloading on her. It is amazing that the lady stayed in the room with me longer than 5 minutes. I guess I had a lot on my mind and she became the recipient of all those thoughts and feelings.

One of the focuses of the conversation was to find out where our family attended church. Of course, at this point we were not attending anywhere. We did not have a church home. The pastoral care representative assured me that she would provide me with a list of local churches and organizations before I was discharged from the hospital. The conversation ended on that note and the lady took leave of my room. I figured that would be the last I would see of anyone in Pastoral Care at Trident Hospital. I also figured that the lady went back to her office to put a big red X on my room on some centralized map of the rooms in the hospital to warn other Pastoral Care employees to steer clear.

Before I knew it Tom Glisson knocks on the door and introduces himself as the Director of Pastoral Counseling at Trident Hospital and wanted to come in to chat for a few moments. I was having flash backs of the days when I would have fun with the local Jehovah's Witnesses. At first I would play stupid and let them present their plan to me. After a while I would start asking pointed questions about things to the point that they figured out that I was not a dummy and that I did in fact know something about my bible. Before I would know it I would have older and wiser representatives showing up at my door. So, here I was facing the "Big Gun" of pastoral care. I did not know if I was in trouble or if he was there to just escort me off the property.


Tom Glisson is very good at what he does and I think that the first thing that he did was to put my mind to ease. He was not there to shoot me with a big tranquilizer gun or to beat me up about what I had said or not said to his Pastoral Care representative. Tom told me that he was a little uneasy with sharing that he was the pastor of Grace Fellowship Church. He was uneasy about it because of ethical policies at the hospital which forbade him to solicit hospital patients for membership to the church he pastors. Tom Glisson offered me a list of local churches and told me if we happened to come by for a visit that we would be welcome.

I will never forget the day that I visited the CHEESY CHURCH located on a DEAD END Street in Goose Creek SC. One rainy Saturday evening in December of 2000 I found Grace Fellowship Church. If it had not been for the Internet and Mapquest I probably would have never found it. I remember calling Katy while sitting in front of the church in the parking lot and commenting how CHEESY the church looked and that it was located in the middle of a subdivision on a dead end street.

At first glance this church did not even come close to meeting anything that was on my check list for a church to visit much less considering our home. I was thinking, "You have got to be kidding me". Who in the world comes here? How can anyone find it? What can I ever hope to find here? What will my family think? Does Pastor Tom Glisson REALLY pastor a church that looks like this? Many thoughts went through my head and now I know that it was a good thing that I did not discount the value of the church because of the way the outside looked and where it was located. I threw the mental check list into the trash and committed to visiting the next day which was Sunday.

Little did I know but Grace Fellowship Church would become our church home for 2.5 years. I thought that I was the ONLY person that was crazy and had problems that most church pastors would shirk from. I even found out that I could scratch behind my ear and say "my doctor said I would be fine, he just never said when" and they actually loved me despite my problems and invited us to keep coming back. Maybe they kept allowing us to come back out of shear love and concern for Katy and the kids.

The year 2000 went into the year 2001 and in August of 2001 our daughter Jessica lost her battle with cancer and went to be with the Lord. Grace Fellowship church may not be the "popular" church in Goose Creek or easy to find. Grace Fellowship has a group of people that could care less about what you wear or what you drive to church or where you live. The church family accepts you for who you are and loves you despite your failures or shortcomings. The road that we walked down between June of 2000 and August of 2001 was not a very pleasant one and it was full of trials and anguish. I can honestly say that I am not sure that we would have survived the experience without the love and presence of Grace Fellowship Church and its members. Grace Fellowship became our church home and Pastor Tom Glisson became our pastor during this time.

In October of 2001 my contract with ACS Government Services was coming to an end at the end of the year and I began to utilize the Internet and recruiters to find a new permanent IT job or contract. Before I knew it I was offered a one year contract working for Ahold USA in Greenville SC. We found a house in Simpsonville SC to rent and shortly thereafter we left to start a new life away from Goose Creek SC and Grace Fellowship church. I can not tell you how tough that was to do. To move away from people that love and care for you. I remember Pastor Tom telling me about how upset he was about our leaving. I also can not remember any other pastor ever telling me that. The awesome part of being a member at Grace Fellowship Church is that you are not part of a huge organization that will swallow you up. You are part of the family and people know when you are there or not there.


In November of 2002 Ahold USA laid off 36 employees and told the contractors that our contracts would be terminated in April of 2003. On Feb 1 of 2003 my contract ended. I have been looking for work since then. Between November of 2002 and January of 2003 our family attended a church on a regular basis. We never joined because I did not know if this contract was going to be stable or not. When the leadership of this church found out that I was laid off but that we had not joined their church body they told us that there was nothing they could do for us because we were not official church members. We were not on their official church roll. I suppose that our attending regularly and tithing had nothing to do with it. It just was not good enough. We had a similar experience with another church and I have to say that those experiences soured me towards church attendance in general.

Recently our church family at Grace Fellowship came through in a BIG way when they helped us to make a trip to Corpus Christi Texas so Katy could attend a memorial service for her brother who had passed away in August of this year. Before we left for Texas we spent the weekend with Pastor Tom and his family and that was when he told me of a plan to approach the church to see about helping us to move back home. I was certainly surprised and overwhelmed by the idea. At this point in my life I was in survival mode making it from one day to the next and one week to the next wondering what in the world was going to happen to us.

I remember asking Pastor Tom why he was willing to approach the church about helping us in such a big way. Pastor Tom just shrugged his shoulders and said, "You are part of our family aren't you?" That is when I was reminded of the fact that even if you are not present in body once you become part of the church family at Grace Fellowship you are always considered family. The whole time we were gone in Simpsonville we kept in contact with Pastor Tom, his family and other church members because we had developed meaningful relationships and we missed all of the fun that we had together.
Grace Fellowship has reminded us and shown us that we are loved and appreciated as the church provided the funds needed to move us and our belongings back to Goose Creek. I am grateful for all of the hard work that was shown on Saturday when Pastor Tom, Tom Welch, Shawn, Troy McNear and many others whose names I can't remember helped us to unload the Uhaul truck and get settled back into our former residence. I am equally thankful to Troy and Shannon McNear for allowing us to move back into the house on 159 Mapleridge as well.

I am hopeful that Pastor Tom will share this story with the church either verbally or by passing this letter out so you can read it for yourself. I want to thank each of you at Grace Fellowship who have played a part in our family and the family life at Grace Fellowship Church. Your willingness to serve our family in both small and large ways has touched us tremendously. We are back HOME and we are glad to be here. Your love and generosity has stirred my faith in God and my spirit to the point that I want you to know that you too are part of our family. If there is anything that we can ever do to serve you or Grace Fellowship all you have to do is contact us and we will do whatever we can to minister to your needs or situation.

Thank you again for being the family of God and for being there for us in our time of need. May God richly bless you and anoint you to continue being who He wants you, the church, to be in this community.

In His Precious name and service
The Moffitt Family