Church Experience #15 – April 17, 2011

First-Centenary United Methodist Church, Chattanooga

Desires, Hopes, and Goals

My desire for ChurchSurfer is to go in to each church that I visit and get blown away by God’s power and love, uniquely displayed by another group of Christians, and write about all the great things that I experienced.  My hope is that by being the person who goes to fifty different churches in a year, I might break down some of the barriers that exist between people of different denominations and open their eyes to the fact that there are true Christians engaging in true worship in every church.  I think this is a great tool to allow people who are happy in a church home to get a glimpse of what other churches in the area are doing, without having to physically go there and miss out on their own service.  My possibly naive goal is that somehow through this process I can begin a work in Chattanooga to bring churches and Christians together to focus on the many things that we have in common, the most important of which is serving our Lord Jesus, and inspire a culture of unity in the local Christian community.  It’s a big task, but I know all things are possible through Christ who strengthens me, and how would I ever live with myself knowing that God put this on my heart and I did nothing to accomplish it?  So here I am…going about it the best way I know how at the moment.  The prerequisite and challenge to this goal (that I mentioned in my opening sentence), is that at each church I attend I must be diligent in attempting to meet people, engage in conversation, and hopefully have a moving experience of God’s power and love.  Read more...