By now you’ve figured out that I haven’t been updating the blog with much regularity. Some of it is due to the transition we are in at Crosspoint and some of it is simply because I’ve missed a few Sundays at Crosspoint and, well, it’s hard to comment on Sundays that I didn’t attend.

I want to thank all you bloggies for checking in and staying up to date with what God has been doing at Crosspoint. It’s been a God-sized ridiculous and fun ride these past 5 years. Thank you for your encouragement and for cheering us on. To God be the glory.

This is my ‘final post’ for this blog as an update on the ministry of Crosspoint. I may keep the domain and shift it to Moncton Wesleyan. Not sure yet…

Pastor Mark, Pastor Conard, myself, and our families appreciate your prayers as we transition. We know that God wants to continue the ministry of Crosspoint to see many more changed lives for Jesus! I look forward to seeing Crosspoint grow and go like never before!

Great days ahead! God bless you all.

Pastor Tim

We had a fantastic Sunday this week, wrapping up our ‘You Are Here’ series. Here’s some highlights: 

• AWESOME worship. The band seriously led us in a fantastic set from start to finish. And you guys were singing it out! Love it. Here’s the setlist, if you want to check these out on iTunes: 
• “All Because Of Jesus” Fee, We Shine
  “Forever Reign” Shane & Shane, Dare 2 Share – Unending Worship
  “Holy Spirit” Bryan & Katie Torwalt, Here On Earth
  “Lead Me To The Cross” Hillsong United, All Of The Above
• It was great to have our District Superintendent, Rev. David Leroy, with us; he shared about some very cool things that are happening in churches across our District (Maritimes and Maine), and had some great encouragement for us here at Crosspoint. 
• The message was focused on the future; we were asking the question ‘What’s Next?’ in terms of our relationship with Christ, and also as a church family. We looked at Acts 4:1-20 and discovered that ‘ordinary people who have been with Jesus can do extraordinary things.’ God is ultimately in control, and we’re holding on to Him; great days ahead! 

Also – kudos to Pastor Jamie and all his leaders who took 20+ teens to Rally in the Valley this weekend. It was an excellent event, and most of them were even awake enough to drag themselves to church on Sunday. Great job! 

This Sunday is Mother’s Day! This has historically been one of the top 3 biggest Sundays of the year @ Crosspoint, so make sure you’re here! It’d be great to have some families choose to attend 1st & 3rd service to help alleviate some parking spaces and seats for what’s sure to be a full-house in the 2nd service. Thanks!

Have a blessed week, CP!

- We kicked off a new 3-week series titled, “You Are Here”. May is the beginning of a new ‘church year’ in the Wesleyan world and we wanted to help everyone know where they are with Jesus and what they need to do to move forward.

- Sunday’s theme was from Philippians 3:1-14 ‘Focus, forget, forward.’ Forget means to ‘give over to oblivion’ and the way we do that is by staying focused on Jesus.

- I shared 3 of my near death experiences when I thought I was a goner. Hopefully it caused you to think of what’s really important in this world. That’s what Paul did in Philippians 3. When he looked back and thought about what other people think is important he said that it all comes down to Jesus. Everything else is worthless. If I have Jesus, plus nothing, I have everything! That’s perspective!

- Loved the energy of the worship set yesterday!
- LOVVVVVVVVVED Colton rocking the piano and the organ (keyboard) yesterday! Mercy! So goooood!

A few thoughts for your week:
We’re praying for you!
You and God can handle anything!
Remember to run everything through these two questions: Does this honor God? Would I take my grandmother?
Invite someone to church. You never know what God might do!
Look forward to Sunday. Expect something awesome to happen.

- Easter is always a pretty intense time of year in the church and so we decided to lighten things up the week after Easter and do a country Sunday we called the “Crosspoint Stampede”. We had been looking for a spot on the calendar to do a country sing fundraiser for missions and we rolled the two things into one and made a day out of it.

- Pastor John Symonds (Conard’s bro) was out guest speaker. John is one of the my favorite all time preachers. He used the illustration of the Cross as a bridge and had a bridge in the front of the church for people to walk across if they were choosing to follow Jesus. After that he opened up the bridge for anyone who wanted to rededicate or just testify that they are following Jesus. Thanks for coming Pastor John and thanks for bringing a well timed message for all of us!

- You really got into the whole country thing. Loved the clothing, hats, boots, etc. I especially loved a couple of our families that went all out and had their entire families decked out in western apparel! That’s the spirit!

- Thanks to Debbie Symonds, Heidi Hoyt, and Gayla for decorating the church!

- I’m definitely not an expert on country music but I thought the music was done with excellence. Seriously. Pastor Jamie and Ruthie put a ton of hours into the morning and evening music. Big thanks to the band, the steel player, Pastor Conard, the vocalists, etc, etc, everyone who made an effort to make a difference. Thanks.

- Brandon Ingraham and AJ Guptill made the very hilarious video announcements. Crazeeee.

- The festivities carried on into the evening with the Crosspoint Country Sing. Our church has pulled off several very large and very successful country sings over the years. Sunday night was no different. It was a huge success. Thanks again to all who sang, played, showed up, gave, etc. We received around $2300 for our upcoming missions trip to Haiti!! Wooo Hoooo!!! Very cool.

Thanks for checking in and staying in touch with what’s happening at Crosspoint!

- Thanks to all of you who prayed for our Easter services and invited your friends and family. Even with the grr-snow we had well over 500 people and many guests!

- We had 3 people stand to their feet to say they’ve decided to follow the Resurrected Jesus!!! This is why we do what we do. This never gets old.

- 6 people were baptized including one person who stood at the end of the second service and stayed to be baptized in the third service!! It was a super powerful moment. Congratulations to all 6 who were baptized.

- Sunday was the 4th and final week of our Altaers series. Sunday’s theme was, “If it’s true, what do I need to do?” We used Paul and his transformation and his message about the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15. If Jesus is alive, everything matters. If he’s dead, nothing matters.

- OK, so, ‘Death In His Grave’ at the end of the service was one of the most epic, most intense moments we have ever had! Unreal awesome. Way to go Ruth Woodworth and the entire worship team for pulling it off. Band, choir, and Morgan MacGregor rapping it up!

- I need to go back and watch the video announcements. I missed them because I was getting changed for baptisms. I could hear people laughing out loud so I’ll assume they were up a notch or two for Easter.

- A big thank you to all who helped out with the Missions Breakfast on Easter Saturday! Thanks too if you came out to eat bacon for Jesus and donated to the cause. It was a ‘sizzling’ success.

- “Crosspoint Stampede” is this Sunday. Country Sunday in the morning and a Country Concert in the evening. Should be a foot stomping, toe tapping, plaid-denim day. Whatever that means. Looking forward to it!

Set List/Artist/Album
“Happy Day” Jesus Culture, Your Love Never Fails
“He Is Lord” Hillsong, This Is Our God
“To The Cross” Paul Baloche, Glorious
“Aftermath” Hillsong United, Aftermath
“Death In His Grave” John Mark McMillan, The Medicine

- Sunday was week 3/4 in our Altaers series. We’ve been following the altar theme from early Old Testament into the life of Jesus. The altar is the place where God alters me. No gimmicks. No hype. Just surrendering whatever we have to with God because we know that Jesus surrendered his life for us.

- Sunday’s texts were Romans 8:3 and 1 Peter 1:18-21. We used a credit card to illustrate how the Law of Moses was making our minimum payment just trying to keep up with our sin. 1 Peter says that we’re born with a balance and we all know that we wrack up a lot of debt/sin in a lifetime. Grace is a zero balance. Grace is being debt free. Jesus came to be the payment for our sins! That’s good news!

- Loved the video that Pastor Mark put together to highlight and congratulate Amy Vail for her photography win on Facebook and donating the winnings back to an orphanage in Haiti. Very cool. That’s the church being the church. Those are the things that people need to see the followers of Jesus doing.

- Pastor Mark and Ruth Woodworth led a membership class on Sunday and 16 new people signed up to join Crosspoint. Wooooooooo.

- What else happened on Sunday? 3 PEOPLE GAVE THEIR LIVES TO JESUS!!!!

- There was a meeting at the church on Sunday night but I can’t remember what is was about. I think they were voting on something. Probably voting to purchase new espresso machines for the lobby.

- Awesome turn out and a God-is-in-this result of the vote Sunday night to elect Pastor Mark and Pastor Conard Symonds as co-lead pastors for a 2 year term!! Congrats to both men. Big props too to Vice Chair Stephen Woodworth, the search team, and the church board for handling this transition with excellence. Over the next 2 years Pastor Mark will increase his responsibilities in a transitioning type role. God has been clearly leading, grooming, and raising Mark up in his wisdom, skill, and leadership. Pastor Conard is a highly, highly respected leader and man of God. Huge thanks to Conard for being willing to step up and let God use him for such a time as this. Great days ahead Crosspoint!!

GOOD FRIDAY SERVICE!
10:00 a.m. Corbett Avenue Wesleyan Church. Please help us get the word out on this! This is our annual combined service between the 3 Wesleyan churches in Fredericton. Crosspoint will be leading worship.

Easter Breakfast for Missions!
Crosspoint, this Saturday, 8:30-10:00.

Invite people to church for Easter. Seriously. Don’t be shy. People are interested in going to church for Easter. They are curious. Many people even feel they should be in church for Easter they just don’t know which church to go to. You have a great church! We won’t embarrass you! We’ll do our best. There will be baptisms. There will be unexpected awesomeness. There will be coffee. There will be tons of people. Found people find people. Let’s pack this place for Jesus!!

- Let’s begin with the end. At the end of the service our Vice Chair Deluxe, Stephen Woodworth took the stage and made an announcement. The Search Committee and the Board are unanimously recommending Mark Brewer and Conard Symonds as co-lead Pastors of Crosspoint for a 2 year period. Over that time Mark’s role will gradually increase. I love it. I’m pumped about the future of this church. I give huge props to the board for taking the unique culture of Crosspoint into consideration and taking a non-traditional approach for the future. There was loud applause and cheers each time Stephen made his announcement. God is good.

- We were in week 2 of our Altaers series. Some guy named Tim Guptill preached. Our theme was confession and repentance from Isaiah 6:1-7. It’s easier to see others sin than our own but Isaiah didn’t do that. He ‘fessed up. Don’t run. Don’t hide. Don’t justify or rationalize. Call it what it is and lay it on the altar. God will burn it away and set you free!

- Loved our communion time. Very cool. We intro’d communion after the first song or so and let you go to 1 of 4 stations in the sanctuary to take the elements. I thought it worked really well. The worship time was perfect and powerful.

- Huge crowd yesterday. One of our largest non-holiday attendances ever. Second service was absolutely crammed other than the front two rows. (558 for those of you dying to know what a large attendance is at CP)

- If you got to service late and missed the video announcements, where were you??!! You need to hit our vimeo site or facebook page and get the announcements. Lots going on that we don’t want you to miss.

Set list/Artist/Album
“Amazing Grace” The Almost, Southern Weather
“Hosanna” Paul Baloche, A Greater Song
“When I Survey” Kathryn Scott, Satisfy
“O The Blood” Kari Jobe, Gateway Worship: God Be Praised
“Take My Life” Chris Tomlin, Passion: Sacred Revolution

*Membership Class this Saturday, March 31st, 10-12:00 A.M. Overview of our history, the Wesleyan Church and key doctrines, beliefs, things you need to know. And coffee.

*Baptisms on Easter Sunday!! If you are a follower of Jesus and you have not yet been baptized there is no better time than Easter Sunday at Crosspoint!!! Let us know. We’d love to celebrate baptism with you.

- Sunday was week 1 of our Easter series, “Altaers”. Yes, that is spelled with some weird Greek letter that is both an a and an e. The altar is the place where God alters us. Altars alter. Really, seriously, looking forward to this series and its impact on our church. We need this. We need to get back to the altar – a place before God where God can change us.

- Pastor Jamie brought an amazing word from the Word on Sunday!! Whoooooo. I watched it this morning and grinned the whole time he was preaching. Thank you Jamie for listening to God, putting in the study time, and delivering the message with sincerity and excellence.

- Looked like a lot of you were genuinely participating in the worship service. Awesomesauce. That’s the way it should be. We know its a good Sunday when we can hear you singing. Hold nothing back Crosspoint. Go for it!

- Pastor Mark was the guest speaker at Deep Water church in Halifax. Deep Water has had a few special guests in to speak lately and they had booked Mark a long time ago. If you follow Twitter you’ll see that he didn’t do very well. *sarcasm* They almost broke Twitter with their enthusiasm for Mark and his message. No surprise there. Mark is a gifted communicator. Way to represent us and preach Jesus, Mark!

- I was also a guest speaker someplace last weekend.

Lots happening around Crosspoint. Lots of great things going on, new faces, and changed lives. Keep praying for us as we follow God’s lead through this transition.

Altaers week 2 this Sunday! Invite someone. Call someone who hasn’t been to church in a long time and invite them back. Looking forward to it!

- Sunday was the fourth and final week of our ‘LegoLand’ series. We had lots of fun with the lego theme, lego in the lobby, lego on the Hello desk, giant lego on the stage, lego heads on Mark and Jamie (some would say an improvement), etc. The real point was to study the book of Nehemiah and see the difference made by an unstoppable vision.

- It was the second Sunday of March break. We’ll look forward to seeing you all back in church this Sunday.

- Sunday’s theme was around the people’s response to God after God had helped them to accomplish something huge. They had a friend day, a potluck, a bignormous worship service, etc, etc. The people declared to God that they would follow all of his commands, everything, whatever he wanted them to do. Nehemiah 10:29b So, how do you respond to God when you think of all he’s done in your life? How have you responded since Sunday? Is he first in your life?

- Sunday was one of those days when the worship set really connected and people were singing out good and loud! We lovvvvvvvve to hear you sing in worship!!!

Sunday Set List/Artist/Album
“Holy Spirit” Bryan & Katie Torwalt, Here On Earth
“Today Is The Day” Lincoln Brewster, Today Is The Day
“Before The Throne Of God Above” Shane & Shane, Dare 2 Share – Unending Worship
“Lead Me To The Cross” Hillsong United, All Of The Above
“Jesus Paid It All” Kristian Stanfill, Passion: Everything Glorious

**Special Night of Prayer**
This Saturday eve, March 17, drop in prayer time at the church from 6-8. Come and pray for the church’s search for a new lead pastor and for the Guptill’s transition! Very important stuff peeps.

- Sunday was the third week of our “LegoLand” series in the book of Nehemiah. Pastor Mark brought a strong message encouraging us all to do God’s good work without distraction. Whenever. However. Whoever.

- It was the first weekeknd of our March break here in NB. I think I remember March break Sundays being low attendance Sundays with a lot of people away. Not last Sunday. Mercy. Great crowd. Tons of new guests. Lots of new families having a look around. Very awesome!

- Pastor Jamie led a fantastilicious worship set! Who loves Pastor Jamie?? Meeeeeeeeeeee.

- Work has already begun on the youth room reno’s thanks to the Ed Stratton Moustache Fund. Thanks again to all of you who supported this. We have a fantastic group of teens who are growing spiritually and leading others to Jesus. If you haven’t prayed for them yet today now would be a good time.

- Hard to believe but our Easter series, “Altaers” starts next Sunday, March 18th. Easter is an easy and natural time to invite others to church. As always, we’ll do our best to present the story of Jesus and the Resurrection in a way that makes sense and changes lives. Can’t wait!!

Sunday Set List/Artist/Album
“God Is Able” Hillsong, God Is Able
“You Alone” David Crowder Band, The Lime CD
“Saviour King” Hillsong United, The I Heart Revolution
“Always” One Sonic Society, Forever Reign