This morning the kids and I attended Mars Hill church. As much good stuff as I've been hearing about Rob Bell and the work that Mars Hill is doing, I figured I'd kick myself if I didn't go and visit at least once before we vacate the area. As we got off of the freeway and into the long line of traffic headed for the parking lot, I knew this was going to be different than our normal Sunday morning routine just by virtue of the fact that there were a lot of people. Once we got inside the building, which used to be a mall, we found our way to the auditorium. (I suppose it was probably the anchor store at some point in history.) At the door we were offered an outline of the sermon and a copy of the bible if we needed it. (A TNIV bible.) The stage is a square in the middle of the room, with chairs on all four side facing towards it. We worked our way in and found a place to sit. They have a band, and it was playing as people were coming in and finding seats. The service started with about 30 minutes of singing. It didn't feel like 30 minutes of singing, though. (No repeating the same lines over and over, thankfully.) And, they sang one of my favorite Fernando Ortega songs! There was a short introduction to the church and it's set up for first time visitors, then Rob Bell spoke. Well, he tag team spoke with another fellow, Don Golden. They did a great job together and the 45 minutes of speaking went by very quickly and there was good food for thought. Rob Bell is getting ready to go on the road this summer and they ended the service by laying hands on him and praying for his ministry and for safety as he and his family travel around.
It's seems like a pretty incredible church. Recordings of the sermons are available online, if you are interested.
2 comments:
After I got your comment I was going to tell you my buddy Walter was there today and he heads back to Calif. this afternoon.
He begged me to come up and hang with him in Sandusky but of course I passed.
I wonder if I walked right past Walter and didn't even know it. Wouldn't it be cool if there was a way to just know that you had a common acquaintance with a stranger you were passing by?
Wow. I can't believe you passed on Sandusky. What were you thinking? :-)
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