For Northview Church Executive Pastor Mark Crull, it’s all about being the kind of neighbor everyone cherishes.
“The heartbeat of our church is the idea if our church packed up its bags and left town, would anybody care? Would anybody notice?” Crull said. “We want to be the kind of church that if we left town not only would they care, but they would cry because they would miss the value.”
So, the church uses its large Carmel campus for others to use for sports events and other activities. It features a top-notch cross country course.
The Big East will hold its men’s and women’s cross country meet at Northview Church’s course at 11 a.m. Oct. 27. Admission is free. Butler University, which has used the course for early season meets for several years, is the host school. The Big East previously held its meet at Northview in 2014.
“We’ve never charged to use our course,” Crull said. “The only expenses we pass on to the event organizers are the expenses such as hiring police officers to manage the traffic.”
Church staff and volunteers maintain the property.
Crull, who lived in Carmel for several years before moving to Westfield this past summer, joined Northview 16 years ago. After his first few years at Northview, he said leaders talked about the church’s 80-acre property in Carmel.
“We said all we really do is mow the grass. What if we create something on the church property that is inviting to our community?” Crull said.
During brainstorming for other uses, a cross country course was suggested to Crull.
“I’m personally a runner, so I had been to a lot of cross country meets, but it never occurred to me that a course would work on our grounds there,” Crull said. “That got the wheels turning.”
After the church developed its first 5-kilometer course, Heritage Christian School held an invitational in the fall of 2006.
“That really got the ball rolling,” Crull said. “The original design of the course is not the course design it has been for quite a while now. It took us awhile to get it dialed so that it flowed well.”
Crull said there were two baseball diamonds on the property before the cross country course was added.
“After the cross country course, we developed a football and soccer field,” Crull said. “We developed an 18-hole disc golf course on the property. We have some family friendly exercise equipment.”
Crull said middle school and high school teams use the course to practice as well as hosting meets.
“It grew to the point over the years that we are regularly turning down requests to use the course because our church calendar can only manage so many events,” he said.
