By Brian Blackwell, Message Staff Writer
ALEXANDRIA – The leadership of Baptist Temple Church had tried multiple attempts at growth.
They resurfaced the parking lot, placed a new roof on its building and made many changes to their facility, along with making staff, and ministry changes to try to propel growth.
But despite nearly a decade of efforts to revitalize their church, growth did not happen.
“We didn’t have the staff with a vision and we couldn’t replace or hire a staff with the ability to discern how to reach our community that was now a different type of demographic than when we first began as a church,” said Deacon Bob Mellon. “It was obvious to keep this site as one that was reaching others for Christ, we needed the right staff with the right vision in here.
“We had been praying for years about this,” he continued. “You could see the slide. Like a lot of churches we had become internally focused. We knew we had to change the way we reach our community but didn’t know how.”
At that point in February 2015, the congregation reached out to Bradd Webb, pastor of Family of Grace, another other LBC congregation in the community, at the prompting by Director of Missions Robert Daniel – with the idea of a possible merger.
According to Mellon, Webb suggested the two churches start with a partnership through an inner-city ministry called Undefeated held on the Baptist Temple property to see if there was a natural spirit of cooperation.
The congregation provided space for Family of Grace – a multi-ethnic church located in a neighborhood similar to Baptist Temple – to hold Wednesday night youth programs. By the end of the spring, around 200 were attending Wednesday activities and five youth made professions of faith in Christ at the Baptist Temple location, opening the hearts of both churches that a merger might be God’s will.
“From a Kingdom concept, that was big,” Mellon said. “It was a demonstration of what can happen when God takes control. This was the piece of evidence to show that this was something of Him.”
The Baptist Temple congregation voted to merge with Family of Grace July 26. One month later, a torch was lit at the Family of Grace property to symbolize a new day had come.
“When we lit the torch we commemorated that we are better together,” Mellon said. “The death for us was the system of doing church had to die. That’s not to say we didn’t have people who loved the people and giving to mission work. The governing system was beating an opportunity to grow.”
And grow they have, with an attendance of 250 today.
“The future holds an unlimited list of ministries and opportunities to reach people,” he said. “When you think of everything that can be done with Lord’s leadership and people following, anything can happen.”
