Why a New Church?

By Founding Pastors,
Gary Groves and Suzy Castle-Rolen:

It’s all about culture change, membership satisfaction and the Great Commission . . .

After some 30 years of combined ministry in the parish between the two of us, it has become crystal clear that the way we have “done” and “been” church for these many years no longer has the relevance or accessibility to the general population it once did. Please do not misunderstand; we are by no means labeling the established/institutional church as irrelevant. We are grateful products of these loving communities. We are saying, though, that there is a critical need for new methods to engage and capture the hearts of people now confronted with a runaway culture.

In our own little part of the world, namely out in the middle of a west Texas nowhere, we find ourselves in contact with more and more people—and not just the young—who have no Christian memories or language for church. The media/technology-driven culture we live in is instead creating a series of different memories and different languages for people to embrace. Just think what it must be like in areas outside the Bible Belt!

Gone are the days—if they ever really existed—when a church could open its doors and expect that people would come and worship just because it was a church. It’s a chilling thing to watch the wonder and disappointment in the eyes of our long-time committed church members who have opened those church doors for fifty years and listen to them ask why there are no visitors in worship on Sunday mornings. Sadly, far too many of these church saints are simply unable or unwilling to grasp the dilemma.

Our experience has shown that our entrenched church members are struggling with many things, but primarily with the conflict raging between their own need to hold onto what they have always valued and appreciated in worship/church life with that of living out Christ’s call to go out into the world and make disciples. It seems only yesterday for some of us when “membership satisfaction” and the Great Commission walked hand in hand in a near-perfect harmony. But over the years, the influence of a radically changing culture has helped to create this inevitable great divide. Instead of a willingness on the part of our church saints to meet the people of this new culture “where they are” with “the same Gospel message using a different method of delivery” (similar to the teachings of Jesus and his use of parables), we find entrenchment and a protectionist attitude bringing with it an inevitably permanent stunt in growth, both spiritually and numerically. Without the vision and leadership of those who have come before, the great divide can only widen.

And yet, is this too much to ask of our church saints? Is it really fair to expect them to throw away the traditions and church experiences they value in lieu of another church experience that some would consider nothing short of heresy? Their position is an understandable one.

We know from our own personal experience that to try and transform/revitalize a congregation that has a history of fifty or more years is tricky at best—requiring a clergy team with unique skills. Our combined skill sets indicate that the most effective way for us to reach the un-churched and the unbeliever is to simply start a new church from scratch—such simple words. And yet, we realize that there is nothing simple about this task! We don’t consider ourselves to be a later version of Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney who in those old 1930’s MGM movie revues would look at each other with wide-eyed enthusiasm, cry out and point, “Look, there’s a barn, let’s put on a show!” And just like that there’s a show and an audience.

But the reality is that we do have a wide-eyed enthusiasm. And we are two gifted and talented people who passionately love God. And even more compelling, this God has laid a vision on our hearts to “be” and “do” church in a new and extraordinary way. While we have both asked ourselves and each other, “Why us . . . why now . . . why period,” God continues to say to us, “Go and do it!”