WELCOME HOME!

Pictures from our “Soft Open” on 6/22/25

About our New Home!

We have gathered in a variety of places in our short history. We rented the beautiful Day Chapel in the State Botanical Garden for years before moving to the Foundry Building for a Tabernacle Phase of growth alongside building out the Parish House for offices and events.

Thanks be to God who has truly opened a door for us and gone ahead of us in every way!! We have now moved into the former home of Edwards Chapel Baptist Church and begun weekly worship! The church has transitioning to a non-profit ministry called City on the Hill Mission. We share some office space with them and our rent helps fund this great local ministry.

Coming out of our Tabernacle Phase of growth, this feels like a new Sanctuary Phase! We now have a Sanctuary set apart and dedicated for worship. We’ll have classrooms, grounds, a fellowship hall, and plenty of parking as a base for mission and ministry. It is truly miraculous what the Lord has done and how He has opened this door for us! Thanks be to God! Thanks also to our Facility Search Team for all of their hard work and time!

Fund-Raising & Next Steps (Updated Fall 2025)

We set an ambitious goal to raise at least $250,000 by Pentecost Sunday (6/8/25). Thanks be to God for his provision and the generosity of his people! We met our goal and we have been able to get started on many of the projects needed for our new church home!! This allowed us to completely update the Sanctuary and provided funds to remodel two hallways of classrooms on the main level and upstairs.

FALL UPDATE - We have been able to do so much with our initial list of projects and funding! We are now able to worship together in a beautiful sanctuary every week with ample parking and classroom space for St. Thomas Kids! But, we have run into some challenges that have delayed some of our phase 2 projects. This is disappointing, but also understandable given the overall scope and ambitious timelines we set. We are almost done with the upstairs hallway for St. Thomas Kids, but the HVAC has totally gone out. A replacement is on order and will be here soon. Once that is installed we can install the new flooring and finish everything on that level. We still hope to open it later this Fall. In the meantime, we are opening up additional rooms in the main hallway level to fully re-open St. Thomas Kids for birth - elementary on Sunday mornings starting in September.

MORE SPACE FOR MINISTRY - After we began our work, City on the Hill Mission came to us and opened up more of the campus for our use! We gained exclusive use of the upstairs hallway and the Fellowship Hall. Previously we were going to be sharing those areas and several classrooms were going to be exclusive use of City on the Hill Mission. This gives us much more space for meaningful ministry, but it has also adjusted our projects and overall timeline. We re-prioritized several items and have also needed to navigate some key repairs and deferred maintenance issues. We had hoped to avoid some of those, but were not overly surprised. We are still incredibly thankful for the provision of this new church home and everything we can do here together!

WHAT IS NEXT? Beyond finishing the upstairs for St. Thomas Kids (which we have funding for from the Sanctuary Fund), we have three key next steps. We will need additional funding for these projects and are working on exact figures as quotes come in. Two of these are urgent and we will begin working on them as soon as possible. The third set of items will be tackled once funds come in. They are needed for significant improvements, but aren’t as critical.

Our Next Set of Projects:

Fellowship Hall Remodel (In Process, More Funds Needed)

Replace Sanctuary HVAC (Needed By This Winter)

Exterior Projects (Grounds, Parking Lot, Playground)

MORE INFO - We are working on a budget for these upcoming projects and will communicate the additional financial need this Fall. Some of these would typically be handled by the landlord in a commercial lease. However, there are a few realities in play regarding our unique arrangement with City on the Hill Mission. First, they don’t have capital for these projects. If we want these improvements to fully utilize this space, we will need to be proactive. Second, our overall budget for capital improvements and monthly rent even with these additional projects is still significantly lower than other options that were considered in terms of overall affordability and stewardship. Finally, conversations have already started about what it could look like for us to acquire the campus permanently. City on the Hill Mission has agreed to take these capital investments and improvements into consideration as we prayerfully walk through those conversations together. Please continue to pray for wisdom and discernment regarding this area!

There are several frequently asked questions that we want to address:

How long will we be at this new home? We thought we would be at the Foundry Building for several years. However, it became apparent that we needed to look for a new option and the Lord clearly opened this door. Our initial agreement is for 5 years plus the option to renew for another 5 years. We also have a right of first refusal to purchase the church building and land. We hope this is a really long-term home for us! UPDATE - Conversations have already started about what it could look like for us to acquire the campus permanently. City on the Hill Mission has agreed to take these capital investments and improvements into consideration as we prayerfully walk through those conversations together.

What other options did we consider? We have looked at lots of options over the last few years including conversations with many churches, potential commercial leases, and even purchasing land and building. The commercial leases we were looking at were all 2-3 times the amount of rent each month and needed 2-4 times the amount of upfront costs to make them suitable for our purposes for a lot less square footage. We did look at the option to build, but buying land and building in the areas we would want to be would have required at least $5 million or more dollars. So we are really grateful for what the Lord has opened up at this new homel!