Strike Up The Band

As you prepare to come and enjoy our special Christmas Services on December 23rd and on Christmas Eve, I wanted to share with you a great part of the experience you will enjoy. KC and our worship band have been working with the Marching Band at Porter Ridge High School. The Porter Ridge Band will be providing your favorite Christmas songs in the CSF Breeze Way area as you enjoy our Christmas Cafe before and after each service.

Your favorite songs will be done "Big Band" style as you Fellowship with family and friends in the cafe. Then during the Special Christmas Service the Porter Ridge Band will.......(sorry can't tell you. It would take all the surprise out of the special service.)

What I can tell you is this.....do whatever you can to make one of the five services we are offering. Also, be sure to invite family and friends to join you. Many CSF volunteers are serving in the Nursery and other places for one or more of the services and then attending another with invited guests.

I also wanted to take this time to THANK all the CSF staff and volunteers that will make our special Christmas services so awesome and life-changing. At CSF we have found that many non-churched and non-Christian people will attend a service on Christmas Eve. This is the major reason we are having five services on this special weekend. We could have just done the services on Sunday and called it a day. Be done by Sunday afternoon and start the Christmas celebration. However, our main purpose is to reach out to those who do not go to church and are not followers of Christ. If one of the best times to reach a non-churched person is Christmas Eve night....then we feel it is well worth our effort to provide it.

Every year we have people accept Christ on Christmas eve. Every year people who were not involved in any church before Dec 24th, come that night and continue to come in January and the following months. Every year we baptize people in the summer that came to Christ on Christmas Eve or their faith journey started on Dec 24th.

We will have hundreds of volunteers that serve graciously over those five services. Our band, tech and staff pastors will put in a lot of time in those two days. However, seeing people come and experience Christ at Christmas is worth the effort. I know for me and my family, our time around the tree on Christmas morning is much sweeter knowing we have been a small part of helping to change people's lives.

Christmas is about giving....Thank you for giving of your time and gifts to help change lives this Christmas. Of course, the reason we have never had Sunday services the following Sunday after Christmas is to allow our hard working staff and volunteers a chance to be with family and travel if needed, without feeling obligated to rush back for Sunday services.

It is a strategic win-win for everyone. We provide services at times when non-churched people are most likely to attend and then take a break and be with our families when most people are still traveling.

Jesus was clear as to why we should focus on those who are with out hope in Christ...

Luke 15:7 "I tell you..there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent"

Get ready to "strike up the band" and lets celebrate with all of heaven!