Grace Community Church, Palm Harbor, Florida

What is the recipe for successfully revitalizing a dead church? A steady income? A growing community? Mature believers? An experienced pastor? If these are the necessary ingredients, then Grace Community Church doesn’t have a chance. 

When I accepted the call to pastor Grace Community not a single ingredient listed above was present. The church was forecast to be broke in six months—after having almost $380,000 in the bank only 4 years earlier; the Palm Harbor community was about to be hit by the crashing housing market; the core group consisted of only 20 people, and my pastoral experience consisted of three years as an assistant. Not the ideal circumstance to begin my pastoral career. Or was it?
 
The reason I accepted the call to Grace was because the core group believed that “God isn’t finished with us.” In the year and a half that I have been at Grace, I have been humbled by God’s goodness. I have often told the congregation that “This is God’s church. If it survives, it is because He has willed it.”  What better situation could a young pastor find himself, than that in which only Jesus Christ could bring success!
 
I believe that God sets up his people for success. If His people will be good stewards with the resources He has provided, obedient to the leading of the Holy Spirit, and faithful to preach the gospel, He will bless His people with health and growth.
 
I see at least 8 ways through which God will continue to heal and grow this church.
 
1)         A core group of prayer warriors.
2)         An unwavering commitment to the ordinary means of grace.
3)         A group of elders with keen, spiritual wisdom.
4)         The desire of the deacons to bring God’s mercy to our community.
5)         Discontent in other local churches because of liberal and irrelevant teaching.
6)         A Christian counseling practice begun by the pastor of a nearby PCA church plant  
7)         A culture that feels the emptiness of materialism and the need for something more
8)         FEAST, the food pantry of Palm Harbor rents our annex where they feed about 1300 family units each month.
 
What hurdles stand in our way? I see three things. First, as is the case in any spiritual battle, sin and its destructive ways continue to assault this body. Second, there is a lack of public exposure.   And third, the continuous weight of financial pressure just to pay the bills is exhausting.
 
So how can you help? Pray. Pray first for protection from sin and the evil one. With every movement of the Holy Spirit there will also come spiritual attacks from the devil. Unless the Lord protects us by exposing our own sinfulness and covering us with His grace, Satan’s attacks will be detrimental to the life of this church. 
 
Second, pray for wisdom in making this church more visible to our community. Our deacons are working towards adopting a street in historic downtown in order to make our town more beautiful. I have a desire to begin a book study at the local Books-A-Million. I have had to put it on hold for a variety of reasons, but the store is ready for it to begin.
 
Third, pray for our financial support. While we have cut our expenses and eliminated much unnecessary spending, we are still struggling to cover our expenses each month. Our monthly budget is $7500. Our expenses are usually about $6500, but our income is only about $5500. This means that each month we must dip into our reserves to make up the difference.
 
In October 2006 our weekly giving was about $700 a week. Our weekly giving now averages about $1200. It is considerably better than where we began but still short of the $1750 needed to meet the budget. I am currently praying for 5 more tithing families.
 
God has been faithful to this church. He has breathed life into a church that was practically dead. I have been encouraged about the growth that we have seen in the last year and a half and I am excited about what God will be doing through us in the year to come. 
 
The mission and vision of GCC is to be a church that is twice engaged. We are engaged to Christ as His bride. As an object of God’s undeserved love, we are striving to become a most beautiful bride. Not only are we engaged to Christ, but we are also engaging the culture with His love. As an object of God’s love, we are also carriers of God’s love and therefore we have the honor and the privilege of demonstrating God’s love to our community.
 
We are still in a scary place, though we are also in a good place.  I am reminded of David’s words in Psalm 23:4, “Even, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for You are with me.”  For Grace Community Church to be revived, we have no other option than to trust God to continue to build His church. This is the critical ingredient for any church revitalization work. “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it.” (Psalm 127:1) To God be all the glory.
 
 Brent Bergman