In the past few years, many of my local friends have asked me where we go to church and some have questioned why we drive so far to get to our church…why not just find one closer? Yes, an hours drive may seems like a long ways to go for church, but for Sean and I we feel that we go to a church where the Lord wants us to be. Some fun facts about our church: Millard Community Church—in Omaha, Nebraska.
1. I have been going to church in the same building since I was a baby. It has switched hands once and one of the current brothers who preaches has been there for around 24 years.
2. The people: Everybody knows your name- I think that is part of some song! Well it is pretty much true. At our Sunday meetings we currently have at last count 103 people in regular attendance. It varies on Wednesday nights. There are quite a few larger families with 5-13 kids and some families who are just getting started with just a few kids. I believe there is always someone pregnant at any given time. One week back in August 2007 we had 4 babies born in the same week…I was 3 weeks off of that…must have been something in the water. We pretty much all home school at some point. No it isn’t a requirement…we all just do. Some give their kids a choice to go to public high school. Because everyone pretty much knows everyone, it isn’t an easy place to hide if you are in sin…fornicating, adultery, homosexuality, lawlessness etc.—common things that go on in lots of churches that are accepted because the world accepts those things.
3. We don’t have a denomination. We are just a Bible based church. The brothers of the church preach from the Bible. They have studied, studied, and studied the Bible some more. Our doctrinal statement is what the Bible says and is a good enough one for us. We have no paid pastors or staff. We don’t take an offering.
4. We believe that the Bible teaches that we have salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ only. We believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins and rose again. We are all sinners. The Bible gives us four symbols only: one water baptism (as taught about in the book of Ephesians)—after we are saved (not as infants), the head covering for women during church (1 Corinthians 11), and the cup and loaf for communion (1 Corinthians 11:24-32).
5. We are not the only ones who drive an hour for church. Several other families make a similar commute—some drive farther than us. We have a potluck after church on Sundays to help the families out that have a drive.
6. Our typical Sunday morning—we start sometime between 10:00AM and 10:15AM. One of the brothers teaches for an hour. We take a break. Then we have another meeting. We sing three hymns, have announcements, and then have another hour of teaching from the bible. We get done around 1pm. My kids are usually sleepy and very hungry. Good thing we have a long drive home for them to nap! We also have bible study on Wednesday nights from 7:30pm-9:00PM.
I could go on and on. Some of my friends and families are lost…without Jesus Christ, don’t know what the Bible says, hear things over and over again that aren’t in the Bible or are made up. I just pray that if that is you, that one day you will accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior and understand what he has done for us.
If you want to find out more about our church or listen to podcasts of our messages you can visit: http://www.millardcommunitychurch.com or http://www.biblestudy.net
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