FREEPORT, Pa. (BRN) – There were a lot of roadblocks that Pastor Daniel McCrosky and the members of Expressway Baptist Church in Freeport, Pennsylvania, had to overcome to conduct a three-day Backyard Bible Club at the Sheldon Park Housing Project in Natrona Heights, just a few miles from the church.
“There is a very sweet lady to runs the community center in the middle of the housing project and for months we just couldn’t get our communications lined up, so we were kinda late in our preparation,” said McCrosky.
“We did the Backyard Bible Club last year and she loved it. So, once she gave the ‘ok’, we only had six weeks to get things organized.”
Once the church had all the volunteers in place, another hurdle appeared.
“A week before the start, a couple of faithful members went through some real hard times with COVID.
“So, that was a little set back, but I am so proud of our church as everyone pitched in and I couldn’t have been happier with the results.”
Using the Sparks Studio Backyard Bible School curriculum, the church welcomed 39 children from ages four to sixth grade on Monday, June 6. In preparation for the Backyard Bible Club, the church placed flyers around the community and the day before they prayed that God would bless the effort.
“We started every day with a light dinner. The kitchen crew did a wonderful job of feeding anyone who walked up. I couldn’t have been happier with the turnout and the sacrifice our members made to love on the children and tell them about Jesus,” said McCrosky.
The memory verse for the week was Ephesians 2:10: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.”
Pastor McCrosky thought he had a good incentive for the children to memorize the Scripture verse, but he didn’t know how good.
” I challenged the kids to memorize Ephesians 2:10 and I told them if they were able to tell it to their teacher by Wednesday night I would give them five dollars,” McCrosky laughed. “Oh man, that cost me 165 dollars – worthy every penny.”
The last hurdle set before the church was weather. For weeks, the weather forecast was predicting rain all day on the day of the event.
“Well, it did rain but it stopped around two and we didn’t start until 5:30 p.m. We were able to get all of the lessons done when the rain came back at 7:30,” explained McCrosky.
Despite a few challenges here and there, Expressway Baptist Church was able to successfully pull off another Backyard Bible Club.
“What a wonderful week. We were able to share Jesus with a bunch of kids {and} our members were able to minister to some adults – including fixing a mom’s car and putting gas in it. The Good News that Jesus came to save those who are lost by His death, burial and resurrection was shared with adults and children alike,” said McCrosky.
“The church members are so fired up to reach this community for Jesus [and] we are praying that God would be gracious to give us a van so we can bring them to our church. We had four truck drivers in our church, [so] all we need is a van.”
