Related articles and links |  1 of 4

When I stepped back into the steepled brick church building of my childhood in Denver, what surprised me most was all that remained the same. There were the same pews, half empty, the same sanctuary with organ on stage left and piano on stage right. I pointed out the hymnals to my young daughters (who had no idea what they were).

As the room filled, though, I noticed things I had never seen at West Side Christian Church. The people who assembled for worship came in a wide range of colors and ages. A worship band began to play popular praise choruses as lyrics and grainy art videos looped on a screen hanging from the ceiling. The second verse of "Shout to the Lord" came up in Spanish.

So things have changed, I thought.

Until last year, West Side was one of thousands of U.S. churches in decline. Stuck somewhere in the churchy traditions of the 1950s, the 91-year-old ministry was literally dying.

The minister of vision and teaching, 29-year-old Cody Moore, says he realized something had to change when he began burying more and more members in an aging, 100-plus-member congregation that rarely added newcomers.

The budget also was shrinking. A financial crisis in March 2004 finally prompted the board of elders to make a life-or-death decision. Could the church continue to sustain the ministry? Or should they close the church doors and sell the building? The church chose to replant itself, knowing that even the best efforts at transforming a congregation usually mean conflict and a loss of members.

"There are very few who do this and who do it well," church-planting consultant Rick Grover says.

Church leaders expected difficulties when they took out a $150,000 loan in the fall of 2004 to finance a new vision. They called it the Pearl, after the one of great price in Matthew 13. They budgeted $50,000 for marketing—billboards, direct mailers, newspapers, and local television. Grover came on board as a church-planting and urban-ministry consultant.

The leaders envisioned a dynamic urban church that would meet the needs of the racially diverse people in the community. Local Hispanics were attracted to the church that before had been primarily white. Younger people and families came.

"We're talking about God's kingdom," Moore told The Denver Post last year. "It's not about us. It's not about a social club. It's for you to know the Lord and serve others. Some people are getting it; some aren't."

That is, not everyone bought into the new vision.

The ministry team, all young 20- and 30-something friends from Dallas Christian College, put together a presentation for the elder board that led to the formation of the slogan, "The Pearl … a new experience, a new future, a new church."

But many saw the vision as a message of "In with the new and out with the old." Nearly half of the members left. Only a handful of seniors remained. Even some of those, after staying through the changes, eventually left.

"Our rate of attrition was pretty high," Moore says. "But it was either lose half of the people or lose all the people."

Church leaders had already tried other ministry options, such as a second service and a Spanish-speaking small group, with little success. Ismael Garcia, hired to help create an atmosphere where Hispanics would be valued as members rather than as a secondary contingent in a separate space, says the church wanted to avoid a segregated outreach.

"There are no basements in heaven where the Spanish-language church meets," Garcia says.

next page... |  1 of 4

July 2005, Vol. 49, No. 7