Last November at the Alabama Baptist State Convention annual meeting in Mobile, Al Hood was challenged to do something bold for God.
The Winston Baptist Association director of missions took that leap of faith by planting Crossover Community Church, Double Springs. The congregation held its first worship service April 6.
"We aren’t after a church that has a worship service where everyone sings and just feels good," said Hood, pastor of the new Winston Association church. "This church will be about doing the Lord’s business."
That means going out and making disciples. "We will not be about just having fellowship with one another, but our main goal will be to be missionaries for God in our community," he said.
Hood first felt led to plant the church in October 2007, when he was reunited with a former member of the church he served as youth pastor in 1978. The man told Hood that he was traveling across the Winston County line to attend church since he could not find a contemporary worship service anywhere in the area.
Upon further research, Hood found that most of the churches within the county had only a traditional or southern gospel style of worship. When he attended the state convention meeting a month later, a sermon confirmed his desire to start a church in Double Springs.
By January, Hood had received support from the association’s pastors and the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions (SBOM) executive committee to plant the church.
"New churches help us reach people who are significantly different … from the ones who normally make up our church membership," said Gary Swafford, director of the SBOM office of associational missions and church planting.
He added that some of the roughly 40 churches that are started in the state each year target a certain ethnic or age group.
Crossover Community is geared toward reaching the 20- and 30-something crowd, though the core team of committed Christians that Hood assembled for the church plant ranges in age from early 20s to late 50s.
John Whaley, pastor of First Baptist Church, Double Springs, in Winston Association, said the fledgling congregation will serve as an outreach opportunity for believers throughout the association.
"This will be a vacuum for our association," he explained. "The church will reach those who have been falling between the cracks in this county and provide those in their 20s and 30s a service by us meeting them where they’re at."
Hood said Double Springs — population 1,500 — is geographically in the center of Winston County, which is one reason he chose to plant the church at the associational office. Between 70 and 80 people can worship in the building.
Though the membership eventually could surpass 80, Hood said his church’s desire is not to become a large congregation but to become a hub to plant other churches.
He hopes to mirror some South African churches with which he is familiar.
"Once churches in those countries reach 50 to 60 people, they start a new church," Hood explained. "We want to do the same.
"When we get 50 or so people, we’ll begin searching for a new area for some of our folks to plant a church."
Currently the church holds just a Sunday morning service. Eventually Wednesday evening discipleship programs in area homes will be added.
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