wfn.org | From death comes life

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Note #6064 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

29-June-2000
GA00117

	From death comes life

	New Church Development springs from a moribund urban congregation

	by Nancy Rodman

LONG BEACH, June 29 - This is the story of a church that wouldn't die and it
begins with Isaiah 43:19, "Behold I am doing a new thing ... I will make a
way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert."

	Highland Park Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis was losing members and
struggling to survive in a changed neighborhood.  The congregation knew that
God was leading them to do something new and so they did "the normal stuff,"
according to Robert Cross.  "They took surveys assessing community needs and
tried to respond, but as an Anglo congregation in a predominantly
African-American urban neighborhood, they realized they didn't have the
wherewithal to move in the community in the profound ways necessary."  They
decided to allow God to lead the way.

	The Highland Park congregation decided to seek a new church development
probe.  Once that decision was made and Cross was enlisted to conduct the
probe, Highland Park began to come back to life in its fellowship and desire
to do God's will.  The congregation began to focus not on what they could
not do, but on what they could do.  They realized that they could prepare
their church building for the new church.  So instead of liquidating the
church's assets, they began, according to Cross, "to do the wonderful work
of cleaning up the house.."

	Cross, on board as "the midwife" to do the probe, offered people of the
community an opportunity to celebrate their relationship with God in an
Afro-centric way.  As the probe documented the need for this kind of
ministry, the Presbytery of the Twin Cities, the Synod of Lakes and
Prairies, and the General Assembly began the new church development, Kwanzaa
Community Fellowship, in 1998, with the Revs. Ralph and Alika Galloway
serving as co-pastors.  By Pentecost 1999, the Kwanzaa Fellowship was
averaging 80 to 90 worshipers.

	On Pentecost Sunday that year, the congregations of the Highland Park
Church and the Kwanzaa Fellowship gathered in the morning to celebrate the
life and ministry of Highland Park and its transition to a new form of life
and in the afternoon to celebrate that new life in the Kwanzaa Community
Fellowship.  The Rev. Alika Galloway preached a sermon titled, "Matchmaker,
Matchmaker, Make Me a Match."

	 "People weren't at a funeral that day," Cross said.  "It was a re-birth, a
transition into a new life."

	Kwanzaa Community Fellowship has been granted the prestigious Walton Award
usually given to new church development after chartering, but given to
Kwanzaa while it is still a fellowship in recognition of its ministry.

	On Monday evening, the Highland Park Presbyterian Church received the 2000
Urban Network of Congregational Leadership Award, presented annually at the
General Assembly by the Presbyterian Health, Education and Welfare
Association (PHEWA), in recognition of its mission to serve as agents of
justice and change and as a model of urban ministry.  "The urban ministry
award," Cross said, "goes back to Habakkuk 2:2: 'And the Lord answered me:
write the vision; make it plain upon the tablets, so he may run who reads
it.'"

	The story of these two congregations is featured in the new book,
"Presbyterians: A Spiritual Journey."

	Cross noted that other churches are looking at the Highland Park-Kwanzaa
Fellowship model of urban ministry.  Of his experience with the Highland
Park Church and Kwanzaa Fellowship, Cross said, "This has been a time of
learning, how to give birth to something new and different in which the
spirit of ministry has been committed to community."

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