Sundays

We know people are busy, and often, we jam pack our weekends with events and get-aways as much as we can. Coloradans especially love to go into our gorgeous mountains as much as we can and enjoy the nature God created for us. Add in running our kids from sports event to sports event and the weekends are full!

Even if you are able to make a Sunday morning service, there are so many things on most of our agendas it’s difficult for us to be present and listen to what God is speaking to us. We also don’t have the time to hang around after which doesn’t seem to make church very restful or restoring. We believe it’s important for us to use our weekends and rest; however you find rest for your soul. And we also like not have to choose between the mountains and church. We want to provide a time where after you have enjoyed all you can in the weekend, you can wrap it up and kick start your week in the Word of God and with the church family.

Families don’t get a ton of together time. We have found that both the kids and parents benefit from worshiping together as a family.

For the kids, they get an opportunity to see what their adults are doing. They get to learn how they should worship and what it looks like. Plus, it can be a fun and joyful experience!

For the parents, there is something special about seeing a child shout out the lyrics to the songs. Children are much more surrendered and free during worship than most adults, and they can inspire us to worship and have the faith of a child. It also allows for the parents to have conversations with their children about what the songs mean, why we sing them, etc.

Why do we do table talks? For 2 reasons; first, we do this because we believe we learn best when we are engaged in conversation. After being in youth ministry for 10 years, we observed the learning style that was most common was a, “come learn WITH me” instead of “come teach AT me.” Top colleges and highschools are starting to switch to this format. (This is the format the STEAD high school teaches as well).

Why are people enjoying this format? Because In a learn WITH me environment, we hear each other’s voices, thoughts, and struggles. We get to really dive into the subject so we understand it. and it is the beginning point of creating community and belonging. We know God isn’t afraid of this style, and embraces the challenges and questions. (Isaiah 1:18)

The second reason we do this is because its a great introduction to discipleship. Discipleship, (learning the head, heart, and hands of Christian living), is allowing ourselves to be authentic with others and share our experiences. People are free to discuss the struggles they have theologically, and learn how to really apply the word of God to our day to day lives. Sadly, most Christians have never been discipled, and instead of asking you to join a group on another day in your already busy week, we create space in our service for you to come and see what discipleship is all about.

Most churches have coffee and donuts at the beginning. With us being an evening church, it didn’t make sense to have us start this way. So instead we end our time together with food.

The value for us is that when people eat together, conversations happen. That’s why we invite our neighbors over, it’s what most do on first dates, and that’s what we saw Jesus do multiple times in the Bible. Through conversations, we create community, and we create belonging. Our refreshments aren’t usually coffee and donuts, but more snacks or light dinner.