Church restart provides fertile ground for healthy growth

EULESS With fewer than 30 members in the congregation, Foundation Baptist Church in Euless held its first worship service in September 2014. But the humble start was the beginning of new life for a fellowship that nearly closed its doors altogether several months earlier. 

North Euless Baptist Church had been slowly dying when it came to a crossroads. 

“The church was barely functional, spiritually dead, and it had completely stopped growing,” said church member David Kennedy. 

After seeking direction from the SBTC church revitalization team, the church’s leaders decided not to close but instead to replant under the leadership of First Baptist Church Keller. 

“The whole goal when you restart a church—replant it—is that it will begin making a community impact once again for the cause of Christ,” said Kenneth Priest, who leads church revitalization efforts for the SBTC. 

In May 2014, North Euless Baptist Church held its final service and closed its doors. The following month renovations began on the church’s building, and members met Casey Lewis, who would become the pastor of the newly formed Foundation Baptist Church.

When Lewis, along with his wife and their family, took on the role of leading the church plant, he said the congregation was in a state of brokenness. 

“The Lord began the process of breaking them. They were to the point of being broken when I came on the scene,” Lewis said. 

Nearly two years after Foundation Baptist Church officially began, membership now stands at about 80, and attendance at Sunday worship services reaches more than 100 people. 

While the numerical growth is important, Lewis said the changes in the church are seen in more than only numbers. 

“The greatest thing God has been doing is spiritual growth,” he said. 

Once Foundation BC opened its doors as a new church, remaining members went through a new membership process that focused on being a healthy, growing church. 

Kennedy, who was part of North Euless Baptist Church for more than a decade, and remained through the replant, said the once-dying church now “strives to worship God and know him fully.”

“We are committed to sharing the gospel in our community, making disciples and studying the Word of God so that he may be glorified in everything we do,” Kennedy said.

In going from a dying church to a thriving church, Lewis said two emphases have been key—preaching the gospel and making disciples. 

The latter, he said, was an area in which the church formerly struggled. 

“We cannot become consumed with ourselves. We have to make disciples where we are as well,” Lewis said. “That was really the major problem. They weren’t known as a church who cared about the community.” 

The church now hosts regular community events and goes out into neighborhoods and apartment complexes to meet people and share the gospel with them. 

“I want these people to know that we love them and we truly care about them as individuals, but to be successful we have to share the good news,” Lewis said.

Because of the community involvement and evangelism, several new couples have joined the church, and church members have begun to share the gospel regularly with family members, friends, coworkers and acquaintances. 

“At the first event that we did with (Foundation), one of the elders came up and handed me a tract and said, ‘Ok, go share the gospel with that girl,’” Brittany Thompson, who joined Foundation BC with her husband last summer, recalled. “It was kind of scary, but I had never seen a church function like that before, where they pushed you to share the gospel.” 

Matt and Brittany Thompson were attending a large church, but after a couple of years there, decided to look for a smaller church where they could be more involved. In June, the Thompsons attended Foundation Baptist Church, and after one visit decided to stay. Though they were the youngest couple attending the church at the time, Matt and Brittany said they found true community there.

“We’re getting bigger, but we still have kept everybody together. Everybody is still one family, and that’s really cool to see among the ages,” Brittany said. 

The Thompsons now disciple another couple from the church who recently became believers, and they continue to be challenged to grow spiritually and to share the gospel with others. 

“It’s interesting to see at Foundation how in everything they do, their goal is to be biblically centered in doing it, and it’s really refreshing to hear the pastors and the other leaders in the church continuously going back to the Bible, and continuously ensuring that what they’re doing follows biblical principles and that they’re all in community with one another and abiding in Christ,” Matt Thompson said. 

Lewis said this emphasis is the basis for everything the church does now and the reason for its continued growth.

“We’ve just been faithful here to preach God’s Word. He’s the one who brings the growth. We can’t take any credit for that. We’re striving to be faithful,” he said.

Learn more about church revitalization at sbtexas.com/church-revitalization.