THIS SUNDAY

Sunday, October 11, 2026

Be here for worship at 10:00 am on this special Pastor Appreciation Sunday. Beth Polen and our choir will offer a joyful anthem, Pastor Mary Jo will present a special message entitled Letters From a Beloved One and Julie Smith and the Sunday School team will take charge of our young ones for their part of our Sunday celebration. After the service, we will congregate in Wesley Hall for coffee and cake to celebrate the first ten months of Pastor Mary Jo's leadership!


Our readings this Sunday are:

Philippians 1: 21 - 30
Matthew 22: 1 - 14

See Current and Past Sunday Bulletins

We need Communion Stewards to serve on the last two Communion Sundays of the year, the first Sunday of November and the first Sunday of December. If you would like to serve in this vital role of handing out the elements of Communion to your fellow church members, please text Nancy Pierson at 330-933-3683.

Everyone is always welcome to worship here at Crossroads, and when we take Communion, everyone is always welcome at the Lord's table. So please tell your friends, coworkers or neighbors who may be looking for a church home about us! We worship every week in our sanctuary at 10:00 am.

Also On Sundays

Oatmeal Breakfast

6:30 am - Wesley Hall

We serve a hearty breakfast of eggs, pancakes and lots of other food - not just oatmeal! -

every Sunday to the greater downtown community!
Anyone who wants to volunteer to help cook, serve and clean is always welcome!

Adult Bible Study

9:00 am - Wesley Hall

Our adult Bible study meets every Sunday in Wesley Hall just prior to the worship service!
Everyone is welcome to join our lively Biblical discussions!

The Crossroads Choir

8:30 am - Choir Room

Everyone is invited join the choir! 
Please email Beth Polen or just show up at a rehearsal on Sunday morning - you and your voice will be put to work!

Our Weekly Activities

Men's Prayer Breakfast

Most Wednesdays

The Village Needs Your Help

Please see the above image for items The Village is especially in need of right now, but know that any donation of any baby or toddler related items you can make will be used and appreciated.

Please bring your donations to the church during regular weekday office hours, or bring them with you on a Sunday morning.

And please speak to Erin Ackerman, Nancy Davis or Pastor Mary Jo on a Sunday morning for more information and to find out how you can help!

Meeting THIS Sunday

October 11, 2026

After Worship

Everyone in the church is always invited to our meetings! 

Memorial Celebration

of the life of Joanne Spees

Saturday, October 24 · 11:00 am

Here at Crossroads

Joanne's Obituary

All Saints' Sunday

All Saints' Sunday is coming up on Sunday, November 1.

Every year, we invite you to bring framed pictures of your loved ones who have joined the choir eternal and place those pictures, standing up (why they need to be framed), so that they can be seen by the congregation, along the Altar rail.

Your loved one(s) need not have died in the past year to be included in this special display, and please bring as many pictures of as many of your loved ones as you wish - the more, the better!

If a loved one of yours has just entered life eternal since the last All Saints' Sunday in 2025, please contact Jane Fleischer to confirm that their name will be read aloud as part of this year's service.

A New, Ongoing Volunteer Opportunity

Our sister organization, Canton for All People, along with the Akron/Canton Regional Food Bank, has a new, ongoing volunteer opportunity for you - if you have free time on every other Monday morning.

As you may know, Canton For All People's Shorb Market and Connection Center is open to the community for food and other resources on Tuesdays through Fridays. This means that the building sits unused most Mondays.

So, beginning on Monday, October 19 (and continuing every other week), the facility will be used by volunteers - maybe including you - to pack a hundred or more food packages which will be delivered to some of the most vulnerable people around Canton who can't leave their homes to get food themselves.

The scheduled volunteer time will be 10:00 am to noon, every other Monday, beginning October 19.

If you would like to volunteer for this joint effort between these three organizations - Crossroads, Canton For All People and the Food Bank - even for one Monday a month, please contact Canton For All People's Carrie Maletich. Carrie would like ten volunteers at least to start. If you used to volunteer for our former Gibbs backpack ministry, this could be a perfect opportunity for you!

What is UMVIM?

From the UMVIM website:

United Methodist Volunteers in Mission is a grassroots movement of United Methodists who seek to put their “Christian Love in Action.” Since the 1970s, UMVIM has offered a framework through which disciples can engage in short-term mission locally, nationally, and globally. Our volunteers are lay and clergy, young and old, with differing abilities and vocations, from all walks of life. Tens of thousands of United Methodists engage in short-term mission each year in ministries as varied as disaster response, community development, pastor training, microenterprise, agriculture, Vacation Bible School, building repair and construction, and medical/dental services. There is a place for everyone to serve.

This Methodist institution is celebrating its 50th anniversary, so please take a moment to watch this video to find out all about some of the amazing things they have been doing these past five decades!

And to donate specifically to this part of the United Methodist Church's work in the world, please go here.

This is From the Archives, where we present something from our extensive collection of archival photos, records and all manner of materials dating back to when the church was First Methodist Episcopal, to First Methodist, to Church of the Savior, to St. Paul's to Crossroads.

As you can see in this edition of the Chronicle Weekly, the United Methodist Church generally and the church that has stood on our corner in Canton specifically have always been involved in mission and service projects throughout the region, the country and the world. 

This week's Repository article from 1995 reminds us of one such venture, something called the Russia Initiative, which members of Church of the Savior took part in. This included actually travelling (at great length) to a remote part of Russia to help build a new building for a local Russian orphanage.

The article focuses on long-time church member Stan Spees. Stan has been featured in this section of the Chronicle Weekly before, appearing in photographs when he helped install the Wesley Trumpets for our organ in 1979. Stan was a long-time choir member and all-around active volunteer who was always doing something for the church. 

Stan passed away in 2000 at the age of 62, after a life of teaching and coaching. 

And Stan was just one member of the Spees family, who were all active at First Methodist/Church of the Savior for decades.

It is entirely possible that memories of Stan and his unique personality will resurface at the upcoming memorial celebration for Joanne, who became Stan's wife, this church is hosting on Saturday, October 24. 

Stan and Joanne were married at this church in 1959. Stan's memorial was held at this church in June of 2000, and Stan's sister Debra Ann's memorial was held here in 2004.

All such facts and dates in the lives of people remind us that church membership is far more important and involved than mere attendance, tithing and socializing, and that the love the church shares among its members and then spreads out into the community and the world through mission and service is just a foretaste of a far greater, eternal love that may indeed await us all.

(Click to open the image in a new window.)

Repository Article From October 1995

Our Website
cantoncrossroads.org


Visit our Events page to see upcoming church events

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Give to Crossroads or Canton For All People

We rely on your generous donations to continue our ministries

Thank you to those of you who already tithe or donate on a regular basis!

Contact us

The Reverend Mary Jo Yeakel 
Pastor


Beth Polen 
Director of Music Ministries 


Christopher Dazey

Organist, Director of Publications & Video Producer


Kristina Belliveau 
Finance Coordinator

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We hope to see you this and every Sunday at 10:00 am for worship!

You are welcome at Crossroads!