2013-2023

The Church at Brook Hills

Over a decade ago, The Church at Brook Hills recognized that in God’s great sovereignty, He was bringing people from around the globe to Birmingham, Alabama… the city where George Barna says people are most likely to hear the gospel. In an effort to build friendships and show the love of Christ to the internationals in Birmingham, The Church at Brook Hills began providing free English classes. As the classes grew, so did the friendships. Teachers were having students to their homes for Bible study and students were inviting teachers to their homes for meals. It was an incredible picture of God’s good design that we should live in community together, loving our neighbors as ourselves.

Years of faithful labor has allowed us to see students come to faith in Christ, the addition of classes in Hoover, and the arrival of the first refugee resettlement agency in Birmingham. We have been to birthdays, mourned the loss of loved ones, and walked through a pandemic together. We have shared meals, discussed our different faiths, and gone to the grocery store together. We have also seen the population of immigrants and refugees in the city grow exponentially over the last ten years.

2023-Present

A new beginning

In 2023, volunteers and staff from The Church at Brook Hills recognized that many of the new families their ESL program was reaching had deep needs spiritually, emotionally, physically, and financially. They saw that the needs were far greater that one church could handle. Those same leaders also recognized that almost 30% of the students attending ESL classes were from least reached people groups. As volunteers and staff began to pray for guidance on how to care for their new friends well, God gave them a vision of a place where the sojourner could come for assistance, education, development, and hope. A place where the whole body of Christ could work in unity to care for the resident alien.

In the fall of 2023, the Lord called a group of leaders from multiple churches to partner together to fulfill that vision. After months of prayer and seeking the Lord’s wisdom, they launched Birmingham Cross Cultural Connections as a collaborative effort in December 2023.

Today, Cross Cultural Connections seeks to alleviate the burdens of immigrant and refugee families entering the city of Birmingham through resources, training, assistance, opportunities, and relationships that encourage self-sufficiency and promote holistic wellness. Our mission is to see all nationalities flourish in our great nation while finding and living out God’s good design for their lives.

How do we do this? Through a variety of programs that care for the whole person, spiritually, emotionally, physically, and relationally. Licensed Social Workers provide case managaement and help clients create development plans while our wrap-around services provide beds, furniture, driving lessons, english classes, food assistance, counseling, and much more. But at the core of all we do is friendship. We know the gospel travels through relationships and so the most essential part of what we do is facilitate relationship building. By building respect, trust, and love through friendship, we then have the opportunity to share the most important thing – the love of Christ!