St. Clair’s Men’s Weekend 2010 impacts hundreds

Learning the “disciplines of a godly man” is not an easy task. But it was the one taken up by the more than 450 men who attended the St. Clair Baptist Association Men’s Weekend 2010 Jan. 29–30.

“We sensed that the men of CrossPoint and the men of … this general area … were just yearning for more,” said Chris Howell, minister of adults at CrossPoint Baptist Church, Trussville. “They were desiring to grow and develop as Christ followers and we wanted to provide them with a resource for that goal.”

So in order to meet this need, CrossPoint Baptist, under the leadership of Pastor Ryan Whitley, hosted its first Men’s Weekend in January 2009. After receiving a positive response from last year’s participants, Whitley invited other churches in the St. Clair Association to help sponsor the event this year so that they could reach more men.

The result was that approximately 460 men attended the weekend event held on CrossPoint’s campus, doubling last year’s number. Featured speaker R. Kent Hughes, of Spokane, Washington, used his book “Disciplines of a Godly Man” as the text for the weekend. Everyone who attended received a copy of this book. The churches who helped sponsor the event in addition to CrossPoint were: Bethel Baptist Church, Moody; Cedar Grove Baptist Church, Leeds; Cropwell Baptist Church; First Baptist Church, Ashville; First Baptist Church, Moody; and First Baptist Church, Pell City.

“As a church staff member, I was excited to see all these churches working together,” said Howell who helped organize the weekend. “It laid the groundwork of doing events similar in the future.”