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1st Service in the Building

Photo Credit: Kristen Landon

After many long months of anticipation and delay, due to the virus, City Park Church officially opened its doors on June 21st, Father’s Day. Smiling faces greeted from the parking lot to the front door, while people filed inside, excited to be reunited inside the beautiful 105 year old building with stained glass windows and newly refinished hardwood floors. However it was not the building that brought excitement, rather the opportunity to be together as the body of Christ, worshiping collectively in a shared space, which we can now call “our church.” 

The service began with a video of children eagerly explaining why and how much they loved their dads, as many dads were wiping tears of joy. Many dads visited the church for the first time, celebrating Father’s day with their grown children. Not everyone could be in person for service, but those from home shared about their dads on the video as well. It was a sweet reflection of the dedication and love of so many fathers within the church and the fathers who have poured into the lives of those who attend. 

Worship began with “God is so Good” as voices echoed throughout the sanctuary and the congregation sang the line “God answers prayers,” a line that couldn’t have been a truer testimony of what God has done over the last year for City Park Church. Pastor Toby was overcome with emotion, as were many others, from hearing the beautiful sound of voices united in song, worshiping their savior. 

Pastor Toby continued his sermon series on the life of David “ A Shepherd to a King,” a series he had begun online during the stay at home order. He gave encouragement to the fathers in attendance as well as the rest of the church body, giving a challenge to remember our calling doesn’t outweigh our obedience to Christ. He gave examples from David’s life and his encounter with Saul in the text of 1 Samuel 24. Pastor Toby also reminded the congregation not to let our service within the church be what drives us, but rather the love we have for Christ. 

The worship band brought the service to close with the hymn, “There’s Something About That Name.” And Jesus was the sweet name that was given glory for the great day it was to be in worship together in the new building City Park Church could call home. Pastor Toby reflected on the day saying, “It was an exciting day. It was so nice to have everyone inside the building for the first time. It was bittersweet not to have every person there, due to the virus, but it was exciting to see how many were there and to hear their voices singing together in worship. It was an awesome first service.” 

Pastor Toby, Melissa and family ring the bell to start off the first service in the building.

City Park Church continues to meet at 10:45 AM on Sunday mornings in the Washington Park neighborhood. We would love for you to join us! Please thank God with us for the great things he has done!

Written by Melissa Pegram

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Sunday Services Update: Masks in Services

CPC Family,

I just wanted to give you an update about church worship services moving forward. Starting this Friday our Governor and Mayor have stated that we will be required to wear face masks in public gatherings. Obviously this will affect our services. This is why we are asking for you to wear a mask to service until this executive order has expired.

There are a few reasons for this:

1. Your safety and health is a big priority for us as a church. The medical experts think this will help curb the spread of Covid-19 and we want to help keep you safe.

2. We want to be good citizens and respect the leadership above us. We don’t have a spirit of rebellion but a spirit of respect and honor. If this was something that was against our beliefs or values, then we would have a different response. Since this is an effort to protect us from the virus we believe that this is an appropriate step for us.

3. People are afraid and fearful in our church and our community. In our love for one another and our community, we should sacrifice for them. I’m not a huge fan of wearing a mask and I know many others don’t like it either, but in love for you and our community I believe it is better for us to wear them.

My prayer is that you will continue to come and join us for worship. We will still have hand sanitizing station’s and self serve nursery. Please RSVP for us and continue to lean in during this time. Continue to pray for our community and our church. God has a plan through all of this! We just have to wait and see , but He is doing something for our good! Looking forward to Sunday!

-Pastor Toby

To RSVP: https://forms.gle/bJZkvNWkQh6oZs9HA

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CPC Tag Sale

Saturday, June 27 from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM at 236 W Banner Ave. Winston Salem, NC 27127. Vintage/antique church pews, chairs, rolltop desk, rotary phones, lamps, dishes, pictures, and more!

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CPC Building Re-Opening Guidelines

CPC has begun in-person services inside the church building. We are located at 236 W Banner Ave Winston Salem, NC 27127.

In-person worship services resumed on June 21 in the building.  We will continue to gather together online via Facebook Live, as well.

To ensure social distancing, we will be requiring you to RSVP to service each Sunday for the foreseeable future. You will have to sign up each week via our Reservation Form that will be sent out each Sunday evening following our Sunday morning service. The link to RSVP is below.

RSVP for Sunday Service 7/19

To ensure social distancing in the Sanctuary and help us to best lay out seating each week, we will be requiring you to RSVP to service each Sunday. To achieve this, we will have a reservation form that will be sent out each Sunday evening via email and on our website/social medias, that you can sign up to RSVP. This is to help us best plan and lay out the Sanctuary each week. At this time, we plan to keep our regularly scheduled 10:45 AM service, as we feel confident there is plenty of room within the Sanctuary to spread out and keep ample social distancing between families, but if an additional service time is needed in the future due to service RSVP’s, we will keep you informed. Once recommendations allow larger gatherings to be safely attended, we will discontinue RSVPing to the services.

CPC will be taking the following safety and sanitation efforts:

  • We always strive to maintain a clean and sanitary church building and have implemented additional measures out of extra caution. These measures include but are not limited to:
  • The sanctuary doors will be propped open for “no touch” entry. Our greeting and security team will station as they normally do to welcome you to church!
  • All surfaces and seats will be disinfected prior and post service.
  • The sanctuary seats will be “roped off” and divided into sections for seating per family to allow ample social distancing. RSVP’ing to service will allow the seating to be divided properly.
  • Hand sanitizer stations will be available. We also encourage you to bring your own hand sanitizer.
  • We will not “pass” our offering baskets just like during the on the lawn services. A basket will be available near the exit to place your giving. Online giving is available on our website also.
  • The coffee room will not be open as per normal but be available as an additional self-serve nursery room (see below for information).
  • Water fountains are available and required by law in public spaces. However, we recommend you consider not using them for a period of time unless absolutely necessary. Feel free to bring your own bottled water/drink to service.  
  • Masks are now required due to Governor Cooper’s Executive Order.

Nursery will not be available staffed by our CPC Children’s Ministry Team at this time.

Families are invited to sit together as a family during service. We understand that little ones are not used to sitting through services and may not make it through without having an amen or two to throw in of their own and that’s okay parents, we are completely fine with that! We are a church that embraces family and all the beautiful dynamics that encompasses. We want this to be a family service and welcome all ages to attend and want families, younger and older, to feel welcomed and included.

We will have our nursery room and coffee room open for any parent that needs to take their child into the room during service. We understand that littles ones may need to be changed, fed, or need to have a space to roam and we want to provide that in a safe way and with social distancing, so both rooms will be open to provide the space when needed. Both spaces will be cleaned prior to and after services. A specific safety, health and sanitation plan will be released for the nursery and children’s ministry when they re-open.

CPC Children’s Ministry Team will hold outside lessons, socially distanced, in the side yard of the church during their normal Children’s service time.

Children’s Church is for children ages K5- 5th grade. We would encourage you to allow your child to attend that time together with their peers, but understand and completely respect, if you prefer they stay with you during the service.

If you are not feeling well...
If you are not feeling well or someone in your home is not feeling well, please stay home for your health and the health of others. Service will still be streamed online for you to still join us and take part in worship.

If you are considered high risk…

We would recommend you consider not participating in group gatherings if you do not feel safe. We will still offer our online gathering on Facebook Live each week and plan to continue to livestream for the future of City Park Church.

The Student Ministry is meeting again in their Community Group.

They will meet every other week on Wednesday’s @ 6:45 pm beginning July 8.

As you look over our re-opening guidelines, please reach out to us with any questions/comments via email at info@cityparkws.org.

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May 17, 2020

After eight long weeks of being mandated to stay at home for worship, City Park Church was reunited on Sunday, May 17th. The church held an outdoor service on the lawn adjacent to the church. The atmosphere was overflowing with joy and excitement. Though six feet apart, people reunited in fellowship, prayer, worship and celebrated the church’s first baptism. It was a hot and sunny day, but no one minded.

Pastor Toby gave a lesson from his series, “Shepherd to a King,” a study of the life of David. He spoke about the friendship of David and Jonathan. He encouraged the congregation to see the parallels of Jonathan’s relationship with David as ours is with Christ. He explained, Jonathan sacrificed his own relationship with his father as well as his kingdom in order to serve his friend David, giving him his very best, and serving him in love, just as Christ did for us.

Following the sermon, the congregation witnessed their first baptism as City Park Church. Grayson Pegram, pastor Toby’s son, had accepted Christ as his Savior in February. He, along with a few others, had planned to be baptized on the church’s original launch date in April; however, due to the stay at home order, it was postponed. Grayson had anticipated his baptism everyday since, so when given the opportunity this first Sunday back together, pastor Toby made sure to make this happen. It was a sweet moment to watch our Pastor be able to baptize his own son. Tears flowed and the congregation rejoiced over the Lord’s goodness to witness Grayson’s public confession of faith in Jesus Christ.

Pastor Toby reflected on the day, saying, “It was so great to see everyone together after two months of being separated. It was amazing to be able to baptize my son, and for it to be our first baptism as a church.”

It was a wonderful day for City Park Church to be reunited again in worship and fellowship. People left with joy in their hearts and anticipation for the future.