Wow, another incredible weekend at The Crossroads. On Friday evening, several of us got together and canvassed a neighborhood passing out fliers about our family movie night coming up on Saturday.
The movie night is something we discovered last summer as a fun and successful outreach to families in Anna. Some of the needs we have heard expressed from people about Anna are: there isn't really a sense of community, people don't know their neighbors, and there's nothing for families to do. So, we found that putting on a movie for families is a great way to meet these needs.
We have a twelve foot, inflatable movie screen that we set up outdoors. We also serve popcorn, drinks, and movie candy, and we set up a bounce house for the kids to play in, all this under the stars on a hot Texas evening. People really dig getting out with their families to watch the movie. This time, my awesome, beautiful, and super intelligent wife came up with the idea of showing "The Wizard of Oz." It was perfect. Many of the parents are the right age to remember when The Wizard of Oz came on television once a year, and families gathered to watch it. Many of their children, in turn, have never seen it. So, with one movie, we got children, parents, and grandparents out to watch a movie. We had about 100 people turn out for the event, and had a really amazing time.
Our team did an awesome job, as always, meeting people and serving the community.
Then, on Sunday, we geared up for another hot Sunday in the cheer gym. Middle of the summer, and we had almost 75 people in attendance. Awesome! This week, in lieu of the typical Sunday sermon, I did a thing called "The Hot Seat." I sat on a stool, and people submitted questions about life, God, and the Bible. They could ask questions vocally, by writing them out, or by twittering questions to us. We posted each of these on the screen, and I answered them as they came in. It's always fun for me, and people really tend to enjoy it.
I did discover, however, that this exercise is a little more difficult now that I am in a new church plant reaching people who haven't been plugged in to church. My answers had to be a little bit longer because I could not automatically assume that people knew the Bible stories. I'm not sure I was entirely successful with that. I will have to work on that a little more in the future. On the other hand, it is a good way to expose people to an awful lot of bible teaching/doctrine/scripture in one setting.
This was a different experience, too, from when I have done it in the past because of the nature of the questions. In traditional church, the questions often tended to focus on matters of Bible trivia, minutiae of biblical knowledge, or apologetic (defending the faith) types of questions. In the church plant setting, however, the questions tended more toward questions about dealing with life and struggles with faith and being a Christian. I thought that was very cool. It shows we really are impacting people right where they are living. Anyhow, it was a lot of fun, and made for a great service. The podcast will be up at www.welcometothecrossroads.com later this week.
Then, on Sunday afternoon, we went to the Collin County Adventure Camp and baptized four people, two husbands and their wives. One of them was a guy who is in our men's group and decided it was time to go public with his decision to follow Christ. His wife was baptized as a child, but wanted to be baptized together with her husband to reaffirm her faith in Christ and in support of her husband's decision. The other couple was a guy who is getting ready to go into active duty in the army and his wife. They came to our church for the first time just last week. She committed her life to Christ in the service and the two of them wanted to be baptized. Awesome! Afterwards, we went over to one of the couples' home to have a cookout and celebrate. Great way to cap off an incredible weekend.
Next week we kick off our new message series "God at the Movies." We are going to be looking at some of the biblical themes that run through some of this summer's biggest blockbusters. I hope to see you there.
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