Church Updates
Welcome New Denver Church to the Ecclesia Network!
We are excited to welcome another new church plant to our growing community. New Denver Church began as a dream in the hearts of three families in late 2008. In early 2009, these families moved from Atlanta, Georgia, to Denver, Colorado, to begin a community of faith in the city. New Denver is co-pastored by Norton Herbst, Jason Malec, and Stephen Redden. All three served together on the staff of Northpoint Church in Alpharetta before moving to plant in Denver.
The mission of New Denver Church is simple: to lead people into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. And our strategy for accomplishing this is to create environments where people are encouraged and equipped to pursue restored relationships with God, themselves, others, and the world. In the past year, we have seen this mission come alive as people have connected with God in deep and transforming ways.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
Welcome Ecclesia Stockton (a bit about them too)
Ecclesia Stockton was a church birthed in March of 2009. It began with 11 friends in a living room with a desire to be a community that embodied the kingdom of Jesus. Our hope has been to deeply root our hearts within the gospel and root our hands and feet into the background of downtown Stockton.
They have recently join the Ecclesia Network so we thought we would take this opportunity to let them tell you a bit about themselves…
You can check read more about them on their website and on Facebook.
Why did you guys decide to plant in Stockton, CA?
Stockton is a city with a reputation. In 2009 when we planted our church the city of Stockton was rated as the most depressing city in America to live in according to Forbes magazine. The ratings are determined by violence, drugs, unemployment and that Stockton was the foreclosure capital of America during our latest economic pitfall. Our move to the downtown area was very intentional and had to do with the fact that most churches left this area because many of those factors are centralized in the downtown area.
However, our city counsel has made clear moves and decisions to pour resources into this area of our city and we wanted to be there when it happened. With these new found resources put into this area of our city has now created an amazingly diverse group of people who are part of the scene. Some addicted to drugs and part of cycles of abuse while others are addicted to money and the pursuit of the American dream. Both need the kingdom of Jesus to be made tangible and present.
How did you get your start?
In June of 2009 we moved out of our living room and began meeting in a room at the local university. This wasn’t in a geographical location in downtown Stockton but it allowed some of our friends who were interested in being the church differently then what they had experienced could join in on since we were out of space in my living room.
How did you get from the university to downtown?
We knew that because we didn’t live in downtown Stockton that just getting food downtown after service wasn’t enough. Somehow we needed to make downtown our home. Shortly after we decided that we must make it our number one priority to be downtown I ran into an Anglican Rector with a generous heart. We talked about downtown and he was excited that there were other people passionate about downtown. He said several times, “whatever is ours is yours.” We took him up on that offer and asked for use of their building for our Sunday gatherings. He said yes and wouldn’t accept a penny from us.
How have you developed this early group?
At this point our community began to grow. We quickly realized that we needed something to initiate these new people to church and keep gospel community as our focus and not a program or service that we offer to people. So for those who were knew to our community and the way we are church we lead them through an eight week Journaling Community that lead them through what we believed were core to being a missional church. We also found that being Missional meant that small groups as we knew them weren’t in our future. With the help within those of the Ecclesia Network we stumbled onto Missional Communities, which have felt like the missing piece of how a missional church does community.
At this point two thirds of the people who come on Sunday’s are in our Missional Communities. In fact we hold them so central to who we are that if someone does press for numbers in regards to the size of our church I tell them the number in our Missional Communites because it is this place that we believe we have created a pathway to discipleship and a pathway into our city.
What Missional Communities have done for us that I could never do is put power and imagination into the hands of our community. Instead of only a couple leaders saying “outreach” we have found that Missional Communities have empowered our people for mission and have changed their imagination in regards to what they think the church is.
What are a couple key ideas you use as you interact with the downtown community?
Proximity – We think of proximity as just being part of the backdrop of our downtown community. We make it a regular practice to read the local Downtowner paper monthly that talks about what is happening. We often read through it together and highlight and circle things that would be fun to do together. We encourage people to have their accountability groups, community groups and meals downtown as much as possible combined with prayer walks.
We have seen time and time again how just being downtown with no agenda, no strategic plans has opened doors. It has given us eyes to see and understand our community and on several occasions has allowed us to bump into a person of peace to make connections with different people groups within the neighborhood.
Presence – When we think of presence we think of presence as a very focused activity in which we desire to embody the kingdom. On a monthly basis we try to do something with our Missional Community to bless the neighborhood. We ask ourselves 5 filtering questions 1) Where is the shalom/peace broken? 2) What can we do to restore it? 3) Are there any groups in our city whether they have a church background or not that would like to join us? 4) Is it unarguably, unambiguously good? 5) Does it cause us to be known not just by the locals but as the locals?
How have you seen these two values lived out successfully?
These two things, proximity and presence, have combined to let us do several tangible things to connect with our city. We regularly have pizza and ice cream events with ice creams and school supplies during the summer and other needs throughout the year. We’ve had a Style Your Sole Party with TOMS Shoes, that benefited the local Rescue Mission where we offered manicures and pedicures and free TOMS Shoes to the women, that TOMS highlighted on their website. Recently we just had a Casino night for our local Child Abuse Prevention Center.
Recently, one of the greatest compliment our community has received was when the Downtowner paper asked us to let them know whenever we are doing something downtown because they wanted to highlight it and make sure it was in their paper. That meant so much to our community because the Downtowner was the first resource we went to in trying to figure out this area of our city and now they were inviting us to be a part of it.
How “successful” have you been? How do you define “success”?
Kind of an odd question but people who know me often ask if the church is doing good. I’ve struggled with how to answer that question because I know that they are looking for a number to quantify what is good. I could tell them that we have grown by 350% but I don’t because a follow up question will reveal that we grew from 10-35 people, which has been great, but doesn’t quite sound as revivalistic as 350%. The number I have settled on is 2. The number is 2 because Forbes magazine in 2010 ranked Stockton as the second most depressed city in America. We beat Cleveland this year! How successful have we been as a church plant? You tell me, I think the numbers speak for themselves.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
Welcome Pathways Church to Ecclesia
Pathways is a missional community learning to follow Jesus in the northern suburbs of Baltimore. Loving God, loving others and making lovers, Pathways seeks to reveal the Kingdom through every day life and in every context it finds itself. “Doing life with God and others in public,” Pathways works to change the very nature of the conversations, actions and attitudes in homes, neighborhoods, employment centers and third places throughout Harford County.
Lately, God has opened the door to begin what we hope will be a new mid-sized community based out of Hanley’s Gym in Forest Hill, MD. The new congregation (as yet unnamed), along with Pathways will become the first two mid-sized groups in a larger, regional gathering not unlike that found in the Fresh Expression movement in the UK. We’ve also been blessed to see an increase in local interest in our ongoing work in West Africa. Two local businesses have recently partnered with Pathways to provide support to the local schools and small businesses in Tionk-Essil, Senegal.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
New Ecclesia Church Starting in Ft. Wayne, Indiana!!!
Ft. Wayne is home to many firsts, some you’ve probably heard of (the game of basketball) and some you’ve probably not (baking powder).
It’s also home to the first Ecclesia church plant in Indiana. Ben & Deb Sternke are walking with a small core team in starting Christ Church.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
Welcome Life on the Vine to the Ecclesia Network!!
We are excited to have Life on the Vine as a part of the Ecclesia Network. Their young congregation is located in the NW Suburbs of Chicago in the community of Long Grove, IL.
Life on the Vine is co-pastored by Geoff Holdsclaw, Matt Tebbe, and Dave Fitch. They are in the process of helping to start two new churches in the Chicago area in the next two years. We are excited to join with them in multiplying gospel communities throughout the Mid-West.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
Update from Crossroads Church in Odenton, MD
Preaching and teaching at Crossroads Church in Odenton, Maryland is a big part of the process of us helping our people understand God’s grace to us and how living on mission is a natural response to that grace. Almost all of the teaching times at Crossroads end with the exhortation to go out and “live and reveal the kingdom of God this week” and our people are beginning to get it and are enjoying living that out!
Besides preaching and teaching about what it means for us to be a missional people, Crossroads is offering a variety of opportunities for our people to get outside the church walls and practice actually doing missions. We know that people tend to get better at doing what is modeled for them and what they have a chance to practice, so we organize a monthly local mission activity in our community, doing things like serving at a homeless shelter, helping Habitat for Humanity build a home, or providing the music for an outreach activity at a local park. This way, our folks actually get to practice missions, and as they participate we encourage them to begin to listen to God and let him show them their own personal mission field.
We also offer a variety of other mission opportunities outside of our immediate community, like a trip to New Orleans to help rebuild after hurricane Katrina, a summer trip to Mexico to join with a Mexican church in spreading the story of God’s love, and other opportunities in the U.S. and overseas. We’re really not doing anything special, just what God’s people are supposed to be doing, but we sure are having fun doing it!
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News
Church Updates – Oct. 08
We’re excited to pride some updates, news on some of the newer churches in Ecclesia…
All Souls Community
All Souls is very much in its infant stage. We are taking things slow, hoping to ask good questions and begin good friendships that will allow us to form an indigenous community that takes pleasure in God by enjoying authentic relationships and working toward Charlottesville’s true good. We have had a couple locals join us, and we are still waiting for several members of our initial community to move. This city has captured our heart. A week or two ago, my wife Miska said, “It feels like we were made for this place.” At several moments, it has seemed obvious that God has gone before us, giving us favor. Personally, we are in need of finding spiritual rhythms, and of course, we are prayerfully hoping toward connecting with that small number of new friends who want to share Jesus-life with us here. We see God at work, and we want to pay attention to what he has for us.
East End Ecclesia
We are currently in the process of raising financial support and preparing to move to Pittsburgh on Nov,22 2008. Upon arrival to Pittsburgh we will begin the process of building a core team through outreach, service, and evangelism. Along with growing the core team we will also begin weekly meetings to develop those on the team by sharing the vision, mission, values, and core doctrinal beliefs that will shape East End Ecclesia. We will also be working on establishing multiple mission opportunities that will be offered during the upcoming summer.
Renew Community
The Renew Community is a newly forming faith community for skeptics and dreamers in Lansdale, PA. We are currently meeting as a launch team to pray, plan and prepare for the future direction and mission of our community. Renew has recently launched their website and is in the process of launching their house churches.
Posted in Church Updates → Ecclesia News