Impact Church - Jacksonville (FL)

5 /5 Miosoti.Prosperity.Blessed Bermudez: This is an amazing place to worship and feel the presence of the Spirit. You want a place that welcomes you with open arms and no judgment and truly means it when they say come as you are. Dress up or dress down. We care about your soul, not your clothes or where you have been. Its about where you are going. Come join us on Sundays 8am 10 am and 12 pm every first Wednesday at 7 pm every Saturday for prayer, 8 am Come get a good Godley word, Bishop will teach you, so come learn with us and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

3 /5 Linda H: I came to the area to visit my brother from Harrisburg PA and chose this church to visit. My experience was not welcoming at all. When I came to the entrance, I was greeted with , "not good morning nor how are you?"but "step over to the table so we can check your purse" What??? You havent even asked me my name or if Im ok and you want to look in my purse, in the church??? Huh? That was not a good first impression for me. Then the whole time I was there not one person said hello or even smiled at me. We as a body of believers must get better at showing Gods love everywhere we go instead of being guarded. You never know what people are going through. If security is tuned in to the Spirit of Christ enough theyll never need to check a persons bag because the Spirit will reveal not only what but who is a threat. Entering the church should never feel like entering a concert. If the presence of God is high enough in any place it will drive out every demon from hell because darkness cannot comprehend the Light. I speak as a person who served on the security team at a major ministry with a Bishop who had White House clearance to pray for the president and we NEVER had to check bags because we prayed before every service and stayed alert as watchmen on the wall so when the threats came we were tuned in by the Spirit and the wicked one had no other choice but to flee.

2 /5 N N: I really believe the Lead Pastor is anointed by Our God. He speaks and delivers what people (may) need to hear. This church led me to (publicly) accepting Christs salvation, Baptism and The Holy Heavenly Language. My loyalty has kept me going. The church needs a lot of improvement and the Lead Pastor cannot do it by himself. There is no real known medium to send feedback through. No channel works. Guests come here to leave comments and sadly, also members. This is a business, so the establishment needs to be open to receiving it. Some of the administrative departments of this business need quite a bit of brushing up. The building space is stuffy...too small. The music is way too loud, because the room/building is not designed to manage it. The music is offbeat and distracting during the closing prayer and during Saturday morning prayer. It drowns the speakers comments. Seems the musicians are playing the instruments like they have no consciousness. Please stop forcing people to hold hands and teach people to stop all the casual hugging. That resembles cuddling and fondling with anyone you meet for the first time. Some immature people think that a lack of wanting to participate in hugging, is prejudice or racism. Thats not always true. Please consider some people have traumas, different social/cultural customs and some people just dont practice good hygiene. Its a turn off and its discomforting when people invade personal space and frown on you when you dont want to hug. Its rude! Everyone who comes to church is not of Christ either and has unclean spirits!! How can a church this experienced not consider that?? Its easy for the person on the platform to promote hugging, because you know the people up there with you, or youre not hugging anyone and yet, when the congregation gets spiritually sick, theres no one there to call and talk to for help!!! No one even notices if their faithful members are not attending church, because no one (hardly) knows us! There is a high percentage of Black people who attend this church and sadly, it seems that it is territorial, as though people of other ethnic groups are not welcomed, but they may not want to outrightly display it, because this is a church environment and that wouldnt be a good look. You can feel the inclination that people of other races (other than Black) should probably look to attend another church. The Lead Pastor has asked the congregation to be welcoming of all. Doesnt really feel like church anymore. Really big here and one will be lucky to meet the Lead Pastor if youre someone who is in a high position in the organization or serving perhaps in a certain department, or if a hosted event creates the opportunity. It is difficult to reach anyone at the church if youre in need of anything. Small Groups are there to keep you connected, but after some time, I realized alot of the leaders do them as resume builders, to get promoted in the church, to receive ranking and to see how many people they can bring in and receive accolades for. A lot are inconsistent and many are just not anointed for that part of the ministry. I dont even know why there is a cigar group. I guess Im not familiar with that being okay in the sight of The God we worship. I believe the Lead Pastor is unaware of the flaws people are concerned about and he is busy and cannot fix everything, but unfortunately the people on staff are not the best support. They probably are like how I was when I used to serve...Tired, feeling overworked, stressed, no autonomy, seeing serving as a "job in Corporate America" & competitive, or just going along for a paycheck, because a lot of them look miserable, confused, tired, unhappy, unapproachable, fake & struggling to keep up a facade. Someone has to be responsible for making it feel that way and I dont know who is. Could this be "the shift" that many former faithful members refer to? Staying away from getting too involved in ministry due to fear of the unknown/hidden? Better to be a visitor for these reasons? Accept the new culture or move on?