Agencies Help New Church Buy Building
February 23, 2009 -- Financial support from two Christian Reformed Church agencies played a big role in helping a new congregation whose focus is on serving the needs of Spanish-speaking people to purchase and move into a former Methodist church in the Patterson, N.J., area.
With the help of the CRC Loan Fund and some funding from Christian Reformed Home Missions and contributions and pledges from church members, New Horizon CRC now has a permanent home that includes the church building, an activities and educational center, and a parsonage.
The complex is in a residential area that is home to Hispanics, some African Americans and a few white families, says Rev. Marco Avila, pastor of New Horizon CRC.
“We are very grateful that the Loan Fund and Home Missions have been helping to understand our special needs and to make this possible,” says Avila. “This just comes at the right time for our church to grow and do community development.”
Avila began working with Home Missions soon after he graduated in 2000 from Calvin Theological Seminary.
Allen Likkel, ministry teams director for CRHM, says it is fairly unusual for new church to be able to move into a permanent facility so soon after its formation. “Marco is an excellent leader,” Likkel says, noting that the church was able to purchase a classic, old brick building that had been sitting vacant for a few years.
Carl Gronsman, director of the CRC Loan Fund, says he is excited about the ministry possibilities that New Horizon can now undertake, with the assistance of loans from the Loan Fund and Home Missions.
“New Horizon is a Hispanic ministry that was started in 2000 with help from Home Missions and was organized in 2008,” says Gronsman. The church had been using rented facilities until this purchase.
The loan from Home Missions was from a special fund, the Missions Facilities Loan Fund, established to provide down payment assistance to new church starts to help them purchase or construct their first facilities.
“We have a wonderful relationship with the Loan Fund. It is a great partnership,” Likkel says.
Working closely with Avila as he has developed his ministry has been Viviana Cornejo, Hispanic small-group ministry coordinator for CRHM. “Marco and his family are fully engaged in the ministry and that is an absolutely crucial part of it,” she says.
Between 30 and 40 families regularly attend services at New Horizon, and many of them are involved in cleaning and where necessary repairing the facilities, says Avila. Plans are to institute a range of programs and classes for people in the surrounding neighborhood this summer, he says.
Last Friday, church members gathered to hold a night-long prayer vigil, giving thanks to God and to everyone who has helped the congregation find a permanent place to worship.
This Sunday at 2 p.m., the congregation will hold an open house for people from others churches and others places who have played a role in the move and have shown support for New Horizon. Normally the service is in Spanish, but this Sunday the service will be bi-lingual, Avila says.
—Chris Meehan, CRC Communications