Snow, Mars Hill, and the Colts!

Well today started off kind rough. I left Dayton around 8:30am to drive up to Grand Rapids for a conference at Mars Hill Bible Church, where Rob Bell is the teaching minister. The roads were pretty bad all the way here. There were patches of clear pavement, but for the most part it was ugly.

I finally got to my hotel at 5:30pm, checked in and walked across the parking lot to Mars Hill for their 6:00pm gathering. That's right, the hotel and the church share a parking lot. I had always heard that the church met in a renovated mall, so I expected it to be really big. To be honest, it isn't that big. Sure they meet in an old mall, but as far as megachurches go, they have the same amount of space as any other one. I would have posted pictures, but I couldn't find my camera before I left home. Sorry.

I sat down and looked around. There was a stage in the center of the room with sections of chairs around it. The music started and I took it all in. Their band is exceptional. Without a doubt they are one of the tightest, and best sounding worship bands I have been witness to. They sang several hymns (rocked out a bit) and a few originals written by their band members. There is nothing sweeter than hearing 4000 people sing together. They average about 10,000 people on a weekend. This service was the last one of the weekend and had several conference-goers attending.

Rob taught on a passage from Luke 17. The basic thought was that we cannot come to God with an attitude of entitlement. It was a good message, and was pretty cool to hear him teach in his element.

I made it back to the hotel in time to watch the 2nd quarter of the Colts vs. Patriots game. It didn't look good going into halftime, but they were able to pull off a come from behind victory!

All in all it was a good day.

The conference start tomorrow. I will post my thoughts as soon as I can.