According to author and pastor James Emery White in his article, “Why New Churches Fail,” 40 percent of new church plants will fail before the end of their first year. Within five years, 80 percent will fail. Of the 20 percent that make it past the first five years, 80 percent of those will not survive past 10 years.
Apparently, a church, especially in its early years, is a very fragile thing. I have noticed, in the 31 years that I have lived in Georgia’s Fayette and Coweta counties, there have been many churches that have started only to disappear in a short period of time.
This weekend, the church I helped to plant, Christ the King, turns 18. On the second Sunday in September 1996, a few brave souls gathered in the chapel of a funeral home to see the birth of a new kind of church. New in the sense that it was to be a “convergence church.”
Most churches are either classified as evangelical, sacramental, or charismatic. A few combine two of those three. People refer to these classifications as the “three streams” of Christianity. “Convergence” is the blending of the three streams. So, our church would be different in that a serious endeavor would be made to have a congregation that was fully evangelical, fully sacramental, and fully charismatic.
The first service was preceded by a few home bible studies, the first of which saw members of my immediate family and 11 other people show up. The meeting was held in my living room and included music, a teaching, prayer for needs, the sharing of Holy Communion, and snacks. A few weeks later, the first Sunday service was held in the chapel of Peachtree City’s Carmichael-Hemperly Funeral Home. That first service was awkward, uninspiring, and attended by a few people with high hopes. Undaunted, a week later, we held a second service. Then a third. And off we went.
About two to three years into the project, we purchased just under 12 acres of land on Ga. Highway 34. Six years and two months after the first services, we left the funeral home and moved into our new sanctuary. A few years later, we added a Parish Life Center which included four classrooms, an industrial kitchen, and a fellowship area.
It has been quite an adventure, quite a ride. As far as churches go, we are still a young church, still learning new things, having new experiences, and looking forward to new challenges and opportunities. Just like any 18 year old, we believe that the best part of our life is still ahead of us. Like all churches, we have had our exciting times and our difficult days. We have had periods of growth and times of plateau. We have been cash abundant and we have had times where we were cash strapped. But we have survived, and learned, and grown as a family.
I have attended the birth of children who have grown up in our church, have never known another church, and are now off at college. I have married many happy couples, have baptized scores of people, and I have had the honor of being with some of our people as they drew their last breath. Over the years, some have moved away and others have come to join the family. We still have a lot of land that we haven’t yet fully used and a good many ministries that have yet to be born.
I read in the newspaper the other day that a local church just celebrated its 125th birthday. I hope and pray that ours will reach that milestone someday. I won’t be here to see it but, God willing, others who have yet to be born will continue the mission and the celebration.
In the meantime, we will cherish what God has done, continue to love those that God has brought together, and look forward to welcoming the others who wish to be included in what God is doing among us. We are not the only good church in our area but we are unique. Otherwise, why plant a church at all 18 years ago?
On Monday, we begin the first day of our 19th year as a church. But this weekend, we celebrate a milestone. By God’s grace and help, and with the faithfulness and hard work of many wonderful people, we have beaten the incredible odds against us.
We are among the 4 churches out of 100 that survive the first decade of existence. We are 18 years old. And like most 18 years old, we are excited about the days ahead.
[David Epps is the pastor of the Cathedral of Christ the King, Sharpsburg, GA (www.ctkcec.org) which meets Sundays at 8:30 and 10 a.m. He is the bishop of the Mid-South Diocese which consists of Georgia and Tennessee (www.midsouthdiocese.org) and the Associate Endorser for the Department of the Armed Forces, U. S. Military Chaplains, ICCEC. He may contacted at frepps@ctkcec.org.]
