South Street Ministries

Akron, the awesome frontier. These are the voyages of the Wandering Reverend. His five year mission: to explore strange, new churches, to seek out crazy Christians and churches, to boldly go where no reverend has gone before!

Wowza. What a church we have this week.

My attendance at South Street Ministries was predestined for sure. First, my sister Anna's bible study group at Grace Brethren sponsors some of their activities and has done work with them in the past. She had told me to check them out some time ago and I never did. Second, the guy who put the tattoo on my left arm goes there and told me about it then. Finally, a couple of guys from First Glance brought it up at bible study last week and invited me out.

God was pretty much smacking me in the face telling me to go there. And let me tell you, sometimes it's good getting smacked in the face (not all time though, just to be clear.)

So on Sunday morning, I attended the early service at Grace with Robyn (woot!), had some breakfast, and headed over to South Street.

South Street is located on Grant Street (say whaaa?) near downtown, and very near the Summit County Jail. They meet in  the old Croatian club (at least I think that's what it used to be). When we walked up, there were kids playing outside and people talking. I think I've mentioned this before, but I love a church with a front door on the street. It just makes going in seem that much more inviting. Not like going in through the back door, like you're going into some secret club where you gotta tell some guy a password to get in. (The password to get into South Street is "The Rev sent me.", FYI.)

Once inside, what a lay out. They kept all the tables and chairs that came with the place. I'd say there were about 40 or so people in attendance. We made our way to a table with few people at it. A younger guy and woman with her maybe 6 month old baby.

What a hodge podge of people. There were black and white. Rich and poor. Saved and unsaved. All in this one room! I love this kind of random gathering of people! The people at the table next to us were stuffing envelopes wedding invitations. Ha!

Worship started and consisted of a couple of ladies with lovely voices singing with a CD providing the musical background. No lyrics on a projector or hymnals but it seemed that most people knew the songs (Amazing Grace and others). Yeah, it was bare bones, but for a guy that gets easily distracted by misprinted lyrics on the big screen, it was nice to just sing some songs from memory and let it really flow from the heart.

After this, Duane, the pastor of the church, came up and asked people how God had been working in their lives during the week. About three came up and talked. Again, no raising Sunday Christians here. Like he said, they wanted to know how God has been working in their lives throughout the week, not just on Sunday.

You wanna know what was awesome? The sermon. Why? Because there wasn't one.

Pastor Duane read the story of Zacchaeus, and then told us to split into small groups and discuss why Zacchaeus had a sudden change of heart. So the two guys we came with left (good riddance!) and a mom with two of her sons came over and sat down. After we talked for a little bit, Duane called everyone back.

Was he going to start preaching now? Heck no. He called on people to answer his question and see what their group had come up with. I can't really put into words how awesome this set up is. People reading and studying the Bible together and then discussing it together. And not at "bible study" time. Right here during church.

What really brought this to an apex was the last person to speak. He was a young kid, maybe 16, he said (paraphrasing), "Here's this guy Zacchaeus who had everything, and then there's Jesus who had nothing. But there was something that Jesus had that Zacchaeus wanted." Wow. In any other church setting, would a 16 year old kid feel comfortable or be given an opportunity to speak his mind about this?

South Street is awesome in so many kinds of ways. They have several outreach programs that go on during the week, check them all out here.

I will definitely be making my way back here a few times in the future and if you're looking for something different that will show how church should be, please check this place out. You will not be disappointed.

Rev.