New City Resources

New City Announces a Sabbath Season at the Cafe

After seven years of fruitful ministry in Knoxville’s Old City, New City Café is preparing to enter a season of rest and reflection. While the Cafe will continue to host a number of special events in October and November, our last regular weekend of music in 2005 will be Friday, September 30 with Andrew Peterson and friends.

To mark the end of a long and blessed season and the beginning of a Sabbath period, we would like to invite everyone to gather with us at the Café for a unique celebration service on Sunday, October 2, at 4pm. Along our journey, since first meeting on the sidewalks of the Old City in 1996, we have endeavored to walk with God-neither rushing ahead nor lagging behind his leadership. Our sense now is that we are being asked to wait, to take a break from the sustained pace of the Cafe and pause in such a way that we can more clearly discern the shape of his future purposes for this essential aspect of New City’s work.

To the many musicians who have graced our stage and engaged ourimaginations and to the many artists who have enlivened our walls with their work, New City says THANK YOU. To the army of volunteers who have served faithfully over the years-motivated solely by a desire to serve God and others-New City says THANK YOU. To the countless guests who have sipped cappuccinos, slurped New City Frizzles, and indulged themselves with New City’s famousPeanut Butter Pie, we say THANK YOU. To those who risked their resources in the form of financial donations, investments in the kingdom for purposes of sharing the gospel, cultivating community and encouraging Christian creativity, New City says THANK YOU. To our dedicated and skilled staff-special souls willing to relocate, work bi-vocationally, and/or labor for little or no remuneration at all-men and women who tirelessly merged the work of ministry and the ministry of work, blending hospitality and service with a humble willingness to sacrifice so much for the cause, New City says THANK YOU.

With this said, we very much need your help in making the next few weeks-running up to our celebration service on October 2–the best ever at the Café. Like never before, we need lots of volunteers to serve and offer hospitality to our many guests. Since most of our operating expenses will continue through September (and to an extent through November), we also humbly request your continued financial support to help us end this season well and in away that will allow us to honor all our current obligations. If you’ve always wanted to help New City and you never could figure out how or when, now is the time to jump in.

We would also like to have your input, advice, and prayers as we explore options pertaining to the future shape of ministry at the Café. At the end of this reflective process, we look forward to serving you in a new and vital ministry that is both consistent with the character of our past and progressive in its commitment to listen and respond anew to the Lord. During the Café’s sabbatical period, New City Resources will continue to utilize our location at 116 S Central to cultivate a variety of initiatives promoting the arts, city-wide unity and discipleship.

And so, we pray: gracious Lord thank you for your abiding presence and generous provision over these eight years. We ask now your blessing on the Cafe’s Sabbath rest that we might in the near future and with renewed strength honor you and the vision you have asked us to steward.