We Are A Family Integrated Church We at Crossroads practice a form of church structure called 'family-integration' (sometimes also termed 'age-integration'). These terms are starting to be used by more and more churches so we want to help you understand what we mean when we say Crossroads is a family-integrated church.
In many churches today the primary model by which church activities are structured is one of age-grading. This is seen in most churches in the fact that the Sunday School is divided into classes based on age and stage of life. Typical Sunday School classes for kids follow the divisions of modern day schools from Elementary to Middle School and High School classes. Adults are similarly divided up according to age/stage of life. Hence, many churches will have classes for 'singles', 'young marrieds', 'young professionals', 'adults', and 'seniors'. This age-grading does not always end at the doors of the Sunday School. Many churches even have separate worship services. Typical divisions during worship include 'children's church', 'youth group', 'traditional service', and 'contemporary service'. We at Crossroads do not primarily structure ourselves according to age or stage of life. When we gather for our weekly worship service Sunday mornings we gather everyone from the oldest to the youngest. We do not have a separate "children's church". The Bible describes the church as a gathering of all of God's redeemed coming together to worship our Savior Jesus Christ. All the members of God's church are to be gathered together for the purpose of glorifying God and building up one another in the faith. In the early church, Jew and Gentile, slave and free, young and old all gathered together as a single body for worship (Eph 2:16, Eph 6:5-9, 1 Pet 5:5). Even children joined their parents in the meeting of the church (Eph 6:1). We seek to follow this biblical model for church. While we primarily seek to organize our ministries along family-integrated lines we do believe that there are certain times and situations where focused discipleship on certain members of the church is both wise and beneficial for the edification of the Body. We see the family-integrated model as a beneficial guide but not a strict rule that binds us. Weekly Fellowship Meal Each week we have a fellowship meal following the service. This encourages all families to grow in love and unity with one another, and to grow into one large family of Christ. Jesus teaches his disciples to love one another, for through loving one another the world will see the true disciples of Christ. We see the fellowship meal as one way for our church to encourage everyone to love one another by getting to know one another in more personal relationships. |