BB&B 7 (101611)

Greetings in the name of Jesus!  What a wonderful day we experienced this past Sunday as we engaged in Part Four of our current series Game Plan, then headed to the West Beach of Lake Tholocco for Crossroads 7th Beach, BBQ & Baptism celebration!  This event was a wonderful way to begin the Fall season and for many was a day they will never forget.  The sun was shining, the weather was beautiful and (unlike last year at this time) the water was warm!! 

Though it was a privilege to baptize ten people on Sunday, I must tell you my heart is heavy for the many who signed up to be baptized who did not make it out to the lake.  Some must have slipped through the cracks between noon and 3PM.  It happens.  There we several who made very recent decisions to be baptized, and then when there's time between the service and the event, you get home and get comfortable and sometimes as busy as we all are, it's hard to get motivated to get back out of the house.  I totally get that.  But there were also several that I know for certain, simply did not have a ride to the party.  As a church, we need to pay attention to that in the future and make sure that everyone who wants to be baptized can actually get there.  Next time we do this, there's three things we're going to make sure we do:

1. We're going to teach about Baptism the Sunday of the event.  What it is and why it matters.  Every time we've done that in the past, more people have made the decision to be baptized.  I won't make that mistake again.
2. We're going to send a team out ahead so we can all leave from church and go directly to lunch at the Lake.  After lunch, we'll baptize folks and then hang out.  That'll help people who might be apt to stay home once they get home.
3. We're going to have a couple of vans available to shuttle people from the church to the lake and back, so that no one is excluded from participating if they want to be there.

I think if we do those three things, we'll baptize more people than ever before.  All that said, this past Sunday was truly a wonderful day.  Biggest crowd in a month, great crowd out at the lake.  West Beach is WAY better than East Beach.  That's a keeper. 

We ran some numbers yesterday that I want to share with you.  They are fantastically encouraging and they demonstrate what I've been sharing with you for the past few months: God is really up to something big at Crossroads.  Here's just a bit of the evidence from the past 90 days alone:

• 156 First Time Attenders!
• 92 Second time Attenders!
• 63 Third Time Attenders!
• 42 became Regular Attenders (that's more than 25% sticking around and that's HUGE)!
• 63 people made high quality, life-changing decisions to renew their commitment to Christ, to trust Christ for the first time, or to go public with their faith through baptism! 

Guys, things are cooking at Crossroads, and God is about to blow the lid right off this place!  Look forward to some very exciting news for our church in the next 30 days.

God bless you and keep you and give you peace.  Have a GREAT week!