Church Visit #3

Yesterday we made our third visit in our church search.  I know that everyone is eagerly awaiting to hear about it, so here goes.

In many ways this was a very traditional Southern Baptist Church (we have always been in SBC churches).  It is an old school, “main” Baptist church of a town.  I only say that to mean that it has been a leader in much of the spiritual direction of the city and fought many fights over issues important to that community in the past.

One of the neatest things about going to this church today was that we were able to witness baptisms to start the service.  Four people of various ages were baptized.  I took it that the gentleman doing most of the baptizing was someone on the pastoral staff, but I never figured out who he was exactly.

The music would be described as a blend of contemporary and traditional.  Several people were on stage playing various instruments.  A choir backing a praise group led the singing part of the service.

The pastor preached without the aid of a pulpit.  I’m not sure if that is normal or was because children did a couple of special musical numbers.  I was mildly surprised that he wore a sweater and some pants instead of a suit.

As a point of interest, my children have been attending youth events with this church for about a year.  My daughter’s boyfriend and family attend this church.  So there is a connection there.

As a bonus, our community had its annual Thanksgiving service tonight.  It was held at our former church that we left three months or so ago.  It was rather awkward at first, but there were more people from the other churches in the community than this one.

It was an interesting day.  Not only was this the third Sunday we have been back to church, but the first time we have been to church twice on a Sunday in quite some time.

Next week we will visit the final church in our initial list of four.  At that point we will decide if we want to revisit any of these and decide if we want to add any others.

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