BACK TO THE BASICS
MINISTRIES
Dr. Bobby Mullins
JANUARY-FEBRUARY
2012 UPDATE
“It’s Time To Get Back To The Basics of Life”
TELEVISION EXPANSION
I am pleased to announce that we have expanded our television outreach into the Greater Memphis market with A Fresh Start now airing on WTWV. The program is seen over the entire Memphis Metropolitan area and its suburbs and reaches into communities in Arkansas, the bootheel of Missouri, and into Mississippi, including the thousands of hotel rooms at the nine casinos in Tunica, Mississippi. The program airs at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, following the one hour broadcast of Bellevue Baptist Church, which is the largest church in the state of Tennessee and the surrounding states and is one of the ten largest in the Southern Baptist Convention. A repeat broadcast of the program airs at 9:00 p.m. on Sunday night.
The A Fresh Start program that broadcasts each week on WTWV will not necessarily be the one that broadcasts on WVLR in a particular week in the Greater Knoxville/Smoky Mountain Corridor, as we will air programs in Memphis that will be new to that market which have previously aired on WVLR. My main purpose for airing A Fresh Start has never been for self-promotion or to try to get viewers to attend a church I pastor. It is to get a witness for Christ into homes and places where people are who are not church attenders. Many of the program’s viewers are regular church attenders and the program is intended to motivate and uplift believers and committed Christians, too, but we receive little financial support from viewers of the program whom we don’t know, so it is an outreach of Back To The Basics Ministries where we pay for the privilege and honor to take the message of salvation and the abundant life through Christ to the ones who need Him the most.
POST HEART ATTACK PROGRESSION
In the December Update I mentioned that I received 3 stents shortly after midnight on Monday, December 12, after it had been determined that I was having a heart attack. My heart attack symptoms actually started in a hotel room on December 11 about 4:25 a.m. that morning. I was to preach in view of a call at 10:30 that morning at Fellowship Baptist Church in Hernando, Mississippi. I took OTC pain medicine and made it through the day and back to Knoxville before heading to the hospital at 11:00 p.m. that Sunday. By the way, I received a 100% secret ballot vote of the 129 church members who voted for me to be their pastor at Fellowship Baptist Church, Hernando. Before Wanda and I left the Hernando area on December 11, after having lunch with the members of the Fellowship Pastor Search Committee, we stopped at my mom’s house in Memphis for a few minutes. My OTC medicine had worn off and I mentioned that I had some symptoms that are identified with a heart attack. Wanda and my mom thought it was probably just stress related to all that is involved in preaching in view of a call and receiving a call to pastor a church. After all I was supposed to be in good shape with all the jogging I did! So, I took more OTC medicine and made it to Knoxville. When I started unloading the car the symptoms hit again, and we knew it was time to go to the hospital.
I was released from the hospital on Thursday, December 15, but about mid-afternoon the next day, I had the same heart attack symptoms again, and back we went to the hospital. On the following morning, Saturday, I was taken back for another heart catheterization and received two more stents. I am blessed to say that my recovery has gone well and I am feeling as good right now as I have ever felt! I was told not to jog for three months after receiving the stents, but I am walking three miles a day most every day.
PASTORING FULL-TIME AGAIN
I mentioned earlier that I accepted the pastorate of Fellowship Baptist Church in Hernando, Mississippi, which is about 15 miles south of Memphis, Tennessee. Hernando is similar to the Farragut community near Knoxville and is located in Desoto County, which is the fastest growing county in Mississippi. Olive Branch, which is just due east of Hernando, is the fastest growing town in the United States. So, the Lord has given me a great opportunity at 60 years of age to help to grow a church spiritually, most of all, and numerically in an exciting place to be.
The church moved into a new two story octagon shaped building with a beautiful worship center in January, 2011, with about 300 padded seats out for worship, but 500 seats can be set out if needed. The church was begun in 2005.
The pastor search committee contacted me after a longtime family friend recommended me to the church. I didn’t even know about the church, but at this point in my life, it’s just right for Wanda and me. She will stay in Knoxville some and come to Memphis some, where I will stay at my mom’s home until we probably rent an apartment for awhile in the Hernando-Southaven area. We will continue to air A Fresh Start on WVLR in the Greater Knoxville/East Tennessee area and are excited about airing the program on a Memphis station that will allow us to get into the thousands of hotel rooms at the Tunica casinos.
Wanda’s job was phasing out as is at CAK (Christian Academy of Knoxville). They were increasing the responsibility of the position by adding alumni affairs to the admissions director position and also preferred someone more technically savvy. Wanda would have completed 10 years on staff at CAK in August. Her last day with CAK was January 6. So, she has been packing our home in Knoxville as we will soon put it up for sale and getting to spend a little more time with our grandson, Brantley, before we make the move away from him, Brandon and Megan, and Melody and Mallory.
As I continue to build Back To The Basics Ministries, the move to pastoring full-time again will allow me to concentrate more on programs/ministries/book publishing/music recording than having to receive enough donations to supplement living expenses. And, I will be able to spend some quality and quantity time with my 87 year old mom.
I am thankful to have fulfilled a long time dream and vision to live and minister in the Greater Knoxville Area, and had planned to live in the area after retirement, and still may do so. But, through A Fresh Start TV program I can still proclaim the message of Christ to many over East Tennessee who might never be reached for Christ otherwise and whom I would never be able to preach to in person.
As I have stated before, one of my reasons for airing the TV program was to get the program and a Christian witness into the thousands of hotel/motel rooms and chalets/cabins in the Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge/Smoky Mountains corridor where hundreds of thousands of people vacation and attend conferences each year from all over the United States and the world. Now, I will also have that opportunity with thousands who come from across the United States to the Tunica casinos. Perhaps, when I get to heaven, I will meet some there who were spiritually influenced in a positive way, even saved, through viewing A Fresh Start TV program in a hotel room in the Smoky Mountain or Tunica areas.
YOUR GIVING IS MAKING A DIFFERENCE FOR CHRIST IN THE LIVES OF OTHERS
Even though I am pastoring full-time again, please don’t think that the purpose for which Back To The Basics Ministries exists is in any way diminished. With my having some guaranteed regular income now, and not being so dependent on stipends from the ministry, we will have more funds for ministry outreach, such as television expansion, and for the publication of the first book by Back To The Basics Ministries in a few months. Our outreach ministries will continue on and your financial support is needed as much as it has been from the day the ministry was founded in our effort to do our part in impacting the world, and especially the world around us, for Christ. With the expansion of the television ministry into the Memphis market, the potential viewers and opportunity for reaching people for Christ has more than doubled. And, your giving allows you to be a part of reaching souls you and I could not reach for Christ otherwise. Well, glory!
Blessings, Bobby Mullins
“Keep in the Word, on your knees, loving God, loving each other, worshiping together,
building godly homes, supporting the Lord’s work financially, sharing the faith.”
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P.O Box 32486; Knoxville, TN 37930