“Cross”-examination: Cottonwood Creek (and a little Grace Bible Church)

I neglected to do a “cross”-examination last week, not because we didn’t go to church (we did, and we have the pictures to prove it!), but rather because the church we attended isn’t really a serious option for us. We didn’t even fill out visitor cards. Since my brother David was in town, we joined Mom for a service at her church, Grace Bible Church in Dallas. The church has just completed a major building project including a new sanctuary. Very modern, very open and airy – not at all like the chapel they were meeting in previously. It’s a beautiful building and appeals to my architecturally minded husband.

Beyond that, though, GBC has a wonderfully rich heritage of solid Bible teaching because of their partnerships and connections with Dallas Theological Seminary. On any given Sunday, you’ll find DTS students leading Sunday school classes, working with the youth and children, or helping to lead in worship. Many of the staff members are DTS grads, or are spouses of DTS faculty. With this rich pool of scholars, teachers, and leaders to draw from, we always enjoy whoever the speaker is when we visit. We attended the second service, which was the contemporary service. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as energetic or inviting as I had hoped. The teaching was excellent – challenging, convicting, and applicable – but the worship portion left me feeling dissatisfied. I continue to pray that God will lead us to a church with not only great teaching, but also good music!!

Now, on to this week. We had determined when we left PCBC that we would take our time looking at churches and not rush into joining a new one. We had ideas of what churches we wanted to visit, but were keeping our minds and hearts open to wherever God would lead us. We did decide that we would choose one of the larger churches on our list to visit throughout the Christmas season – from Advent through Christmas Eve. We decided that Cottonwood Creek would be our church of choice for December.

Cottonwood Creek is a Baptist church (SBC), formerly First Baptist of Fairview (believe it or not). However, when they moved and built a new facility they were no longer located in Fairview but Allen, so they decided a name change was in order. Cottonwood Creek has grown to become one of the largest churches in Collin County, boasting a huge Upward Basketball program (around 800 kids) as well as Upward Soccer, and an average attendance of nearly 2,000 on Sunday morning in their 2 services. We weren’t sure how we would feel about such a large church – but it does serve the goal of allowing us to be “invisible” for awhile. Some former PCBC friends – and the current PCBC office administrator – attend Cottonwood Creek so we knew we would have a couple of friendly faces there.

What a morning it was! The music was great – both choir and praise team with full orchestra – the teaching was excellent, and the kids both enjoyed their classes. Trey had a couple of friends from school in his Sunday school class – a real answer to prayer for us! Thanks to our friend Vicky, we met the executive pastor, the senior pastor, and more friends than we knew what to do with. We were warmly invited to attend the Sunday school class Christmas party that evening (though we’ve never set foot in any Sunday school class here), and felt right at home even amidst the crowds. We spent some time visiting with the senior pastor following the service and felt genuinely welcomed by him.

At this point, we haven’t received any follow-up to report on, but I’m sure we will in the next day or so. Whether or not this church becomes our new “home”, I do know that this will be a special place to celebrate Christmas this year.

Follow up to our follow-up: Last week, nearly a month after visiting FBC Allen, we received:

1) a letter/card/note from the leader of the women’s ministry inviting me to join them for their upcoming activities,

2) a copy of their weekly newsletter (all 8 pages of information)

3) an email from a Sunday school class leader inviting us to join their Sunday school class.

Little hint: if we haven’t returned a month after visiting, we’re probably not going to. I do appreciate the efforts to follow up on all the various ministries we might possibly think about joining, but at this point it seems a little desperate.