Josh and Michelle Baker are an enthusiastic couple who were married in 2004. Michelle teaches toddlers at a school in Bedford and Josh works as an automotive water leak specialist. They both enjoy outdoor activities including golf, fishing, mountain biking, and hiking.
Michelle has always had faith in her life, but Josh has not. Shortly after they were married, Michelle and Josh began to discuss their desire to become more involved with their community. "Since we didn’t have children, we had a lot of extra time and we both agreed that going to a church would be a great place to plug into the community." Since they were planning to have children, they wanted them to grow up in a church environment. They began their search online in 2005, and found CrossWay in a community where Josh had lived while attending school. "So we decided we would start there," they said.
"From the very first day we attended a service, we felt we were part of the church," they remarked. "We were welcomed and accepted for whom we were and it didn’t matter whether or not we had faith or where our relationship with God was. From that day we began to serve both our community and the church."
"We also began developing relationships and friendships throughout the church and even started attending a life group," they recalled. "Then, an amazing thing happened. Michelle’s faith and relationship with God grew stronger and Josh, a man with no faith, found himself on an unexpected, yet extraordinary, journey with Christ. CrossWay has been such a huge influence on our lives and because of CrossWay’s acceptance, we were able to develop our relationships with Christ within our timeframe and in our own way. CrossWay continues to give us great opportunities to develop our relationships with friends, with Christ, and with each other."
The Bakers have found a home in CrossWay. "We love going to service every Sunday. It’s an awesome time for us to worship and praise God for all the wonderful things he teaches and does for us." They use this time to reflect on the previous week as well as to prepare for the week ahead. "It is an opportunity to be with friends we don’t get to see during the week and to meet new friends that we can share our lives with. We feel so privileged to be at CrossWay. It is amazing to be part of something so much bigger than ourselves and all we had to do was walk through the door."