Last we were MIA because we were downtown cheering on our dad as he ran the Chicago Marathon! But we are back again this week and tried out a new church this morning.
Crossroads Community Church is 0.3 miles away, on my GPS on my phone it says that it literally takes 1 minutes to drive there and it would only take 5 minutes if we wanted to walk there on a nice morning. It is a HUGE plus for us, it was so nice going to a church that was so close! Crossroads is fairly new, this year it's celebrating its 10 year anniversary and they have only been in that church building since August 2008.
Crossroads has two services: 9am and 11am. We went to the 9am, because we both decided that going to later services probably aren't right for us because we feel like by the time we get out of church 1/2 the day is gone. When we first got there I swear there were maybe 20 cars in the parking lot, I think due to the fact that it was raining this morning and it was the earlier serivce. The first thing that really struck me was there were two men standing outside the church with umbrellas and they would walk to someone without an umbrella and lead them inside-- so nice!
The church itself is pretty small, the service was in their gym and there wasn't a huge crowd. We sat down towards the back in an empty row, two seats down a man sat down in the same row. When the worship leader said to greet someone around you the man came up to both of us and shook our hands and asked our names. It wasn't until after we started worshipping again that I realized that that man was the Senior pastor of the church. I just really liked the fact that the pastor was sitting with the rest of the congregation and was seated on stage or in the front row. Even after the pastor welcomed everyone he sat back in the same spot for more worship.
Speaking of worship... they had a contemporary and traditional mix of music- which I actually enjoyed. I'll be honest I'm usually not a huge fan of hymns but I liked the way the put their own "twist" on them. The pastor's message was really powerful and I felt like it was something I needed to hear. Here are some main points I took away from the sermon that I'd like to share...
I also like how there was a lot of scripture references in the sermon, and what the pastor was saying was being "backed up" by the Bible. As he was talking he didn't just stay in one spot he walked around the gym and he was looking at people while he spoke.
As far as possible involvment we found out there are a lot of ways to get involed through the childrens and student ministries to the many different small groups they have going on throughout the week. As we were walking out of the church we see the Senior pastor again at the door saying goodbye to people and he said to us, "Aubrey, Brooke, hope to see you again." I loved that the senior pastor was the one who was saying goodbye and also the fact that he remembered both our names.
Both Aubrey and I came out of the church today really liking it. I gave it a 8.3/10 and I think Aubrey gave it an 8. We both liked the atmosphere and the fact that it was a small and we could easily get to know people.
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