My name is Sharon
Barnes Tomlinson, born in Jackson, TN in 1953 to W.D.
"Jack" and Mae Barnes. I'm the youngest of six children.
My parents and all my siblings were/are christians. My
parents are both deceased. You may have read the December tribute I did in
honor of my mother. My husband, Michael "Mike", and
I have been married for 23 years and have three children. Brandon
is 21 and a junior at Georgia Tech, in Atlanta, majoring in aerospace
engineering. Brian is 19 and a freshman at Clemson University,
Clemson, SC. His plans are to become a mechanical engineer.
Our daughter, Amanda, is 15 and a sophomore in high school.
My husband has been
employed with the same company for over 28 years. When his factory
was closed in Lexington, TN in 1998, he transferred to Monroe, NC where
we lived for three years. He then transferred to South Carolina.
My children and I were
upset when we learned we would be moving from North Carolina and
I couldn't imagine why we would be uprooted from the place we had come
to love, from the good schools our children attended and especially
from our christian family. I prayed that Mike could find work
there but also prayed that God's will be done and that he would grant me
the willingness to accept His will for us. We worshipped here with the
local congregation a few times but there were practices that I could not ,
with good conscience, accept or uphold. I went online to find
other congregations in the state and contacted several of them.
Through this we met a faithful preacher and his wife near Columbia who
came to worship with us and began meeting in our livingroom. My
middle child became a christian and my husband, who is not a
christian and would not attend services with us, has been meeting
with us regularly. We have since rented a building for worship and have
had three faithful gospel preachers work with us. Could it be that
God's plan was to use an insignificant person such as myself for the
seed to be planted and the church flourish in this place? Please
pray for the effort here.
Hobbies...although I
haven't done much in a while, I'm interested in decorative painting.
Also, enjoy flower gardening and learning what will grow here in
this sandy region. I enjoy home and garden, craft and decorating
magazines. I really enjoy my time on the computer. I was
bitten by the genealogy bug a few years ago and became especially
interested when I learned my mother's family came from the area we were
living in North Carolina. We met over fifty cousins via the
internet and had a family reunion there. Although, I have met some
interesting and special people through family research, I keep in
mind that it isn't where we came from that matters but rather where
we are going.
Sharon Tomlinson
Orangeburg, SC
