Apex brings Burkle family first...

We went to Dayton this past weekend and did something that we haven't done in 3 years... go to Church together. And you know what... we actually liked it. Being on staff at a large church doesn't lend itself to going to Church as a family (at least in our situation). So when we took this past weekend off to go to Dayton to tell Christine's folks that baby Burkle #3 is on the way (I'm calling "it" Trey), we all went to church together.

We had heard of this this place called Apex Community Church so we did our homework and took in the Apex experience. So here are some of my reflections on the Apex experience.

A Network of Community Churches? Apex bills itself as network of House Churches. I'm not really sure what this exactly means. On Sunday it seemed like a regular church service, the "house church" thing was not publicly mentioned. But it appears that there is more to Apex that the weekend "gathering" and it involves houses.

Apex is relaxed. The first thing that we noticed when we walked in is that part of the building was vacant, the carpet was a bit tattered and duct-tape was involved in the interior decorating... but it didn't seem to bother anyone. We followed the crowd to the "free coffee" shop, filled up and headed into the service. People strolled in as the opening music played and many brought young kids and small babies into the main service. These things seemed natural and ok and acceptable. I was put at ease by the spirit of the place.

Apex is young. From my pew you could count the number of grey heads on both hands and feet. The average age must have been in the 30's... but I did see a number of elder brothers and sisters in the crowd. No one on stage was over 40. What I wondered the most about the older folks in the crowd was what they really thought of the really loud music. The worship band pounded out some grinding worship that went with the series on depression called "Downcast."

K-town screams family. In between the 2 Sunday morning services was this place called K-town made for kids & parents (is this church?). It was like a Christian version of a "Dora the Explorer" kids concert. The show combined singing, dancing, skits and a pint-size moral story about Honesty that even I could remember... "Remember kids, you can't cover-up a lie forever, cuz lies stink". I have been able to use that one already about 6 times with my boys in the last 24 hours.

Apex is Simple. The Sunday experience was really pretty simple. The band got up and led worship for 15 minutes. The teacher got up and taught for 45 minutes. Then the band got up and led worship for another 15 minutes. The message was from the bible, with a fair share of humor and sarcasm... but the message was simple... if you are depressed you need to need Jesus in the midst of the storm. Pretty simple.

This approach to church is not very formal yet seems to hold the Bible and Jesus in high regard and packages them in a way that is attractive to young families today.