Planting churches, two by two
EDMOND, Okla. — Chris McKeever knows how to franchise. He’s…
‘You are the church of right now’
Congregation dedicates itself to its children as it dedicates its first meeting place in an Oklahoma suburb.
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EDMOND, Okla. — Less than an hour into the Heritage Church of Christ’s grand opening worship service, the first Cheez-It crumbs appeared on the brand-new auditorium carpet.
No one seemed to mind.
Children listen (mostly) as men who regularly lead the Heritage church’s Kid’s Message Time read Bible verses during the congregation’s grand opening service.
On the contrary, the 296 church members and visitors spent part of the morning celebrating their children, crumbs and all, as they dedicated Heritage’s new facility.
Bobby Kern, a founding member of the 6-year-old church plant, gathered the youngsters on stage for the weekly Kids Message Time. The church is one body with many parts, he told them as he pointed out a few of their individual gifts. Wiley has the gift of inclusion. Lilly has the gift of encouragement. Josiah, Kern’s son, has the gift of energy. Lots of energy.
“Every single one of you is a part of this body,” Kern said as the children sat — a few, including Josiah, squirming — around the pulpit. “You are not the church of tomorrow. You are the church of right now.”
@christianchronicle EDMOND, Okla. — Members of the Heritage Church of Christ sing “Shout Hallelujah” during the grand opening worship service in their newly completed building. The congregation, planted by the Memorial Road Church of Christ in Oklahoma City, met in the cafeteria of a nearby public school for nearly six years as the facility was built. #edmondoklahoma #edmondok #visitedmond #heritagechurchofchrist #churchofchrist #memorialroadchurchofchrist #memorialroadokc #churchplant #shouthallelujah ♬ original sound – The Christian Chronicle
‘Everyone really knows everyone’
The church, planted by the Memorial Road Church of Christ in nearby Oklahoma City, met in the Heritage Elementary School cafeteria before moving into its 12,750-square-foot facility. Memorial Road purchased 9.5 acres in an under-construction subdivision and gifted it to the new congregation.
Related: Planting churches, two by two
Heritage’s building committee had its first meeting in March 2020. Two days later, the Oklahoma City Thunder’s home game against the Utah Jazz was canceled at the last minute after a player tested positive for COVID-19. For Oklahoma, it was the unofficial start of the pandemic.
The virus shut down schools and moved church services online. It drove up building costs and delayed construction about a year, said Jeff Bingham, one of the Heritage church’s four elders.
The pandemic also brought the Estes family to the congregation.
Morgan and Jessica Estes, members of Memorial Road, needed a safe place for their daughter, Joanna, who was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma, a soft tissue cancer, in 2021. The large cafeteria at Heritage Elementary, plus the public school’s masking requirement, made the Heritage church a nice alternative to worshiping exclusively online, Jessica Estes said.
The Estes family — Morgan, Jessica and Joanna — says hello during the Heritage Church of Christ’s grand opening.
The church’s children’s ministry did meet online, and Joanna became a regular attendee. As her friendships grew, her parents became increasingly involved.
“This is about the size of the congregation I grew up in in California,” Morgan Estes said. “Everyone really knows everyone.”
His wife added, “and everyone needs to be doing something for the church to work.”
That “something” for the Estes parents was teaching the third and fourth grade class, which they didn’t think they’d be good at. “We enjoyed it more than we thought we would,” Jessica Estes said.
Joanna, now 12, is part of the fifth and sixth grade class, LiveWires, which has nine kids. She said she enjoys the tight-knit family. The class participates in service projects, including an upcoming dinner and game night they’ll host for the “Classics” class.
Jack Rowe leads a Lord’s Supper devotional during the Heritage Church of Christ’s grand opening service.
Among the church’s “classics” is Jack Rowe, a longtime church member from San Diego. Rowe, 93, led the communion devotional during the grand opening service.
“As we dedicate this building today, we hear a voice … beyond time and distance,” Rowe said. “The voice is from the very heart of God, and it was delivered to us in the person of his son and our savior. Hear him now as he declares, ‘This is my body, given for you.’”
Stop ‘maintenancing’ the church
Standing on the Heritage church’s brand-new stage, minister Travis Akins preached about the Israelites crossing the Jordan in Joshua 4 and placing stones to remember what God had done for them.
The Akins family, right, worship alongside family and visitors during the Heritage Church of Christ grand opening in Edmond, Okla.
He also quoted from “At the Blue Hole: Elegy for a Church on the Edge” by Jack Reese, one of his professors at Abilene Christian University in Texas. The book laments the rapid decline of Churches of Christ in the U.S.
Related: Jack Reese offers church a hopeful elegy
But Reese also cites the example of the Blue Hole, a tiny spring from which flows the life-giving San Antonio River. The source of that spring is the massive Edwards Aquifer that, though unseen, spans much of the state.
Churches, like springs, get all of the credit, all of the attention, Akins said. “We’ve got to maintenance it. We’ve got to take care of it. But it is not the spring that gives life. It is the water that lives beneath it.”
Instead of focusing on a building, or the Cheez-It crumbs on its floor, he urged his church to “stop maintenancing the springs … and live knowing where the water comes from.”
website: edmondheritage.church
