Continuing their mission
Friendship Community Church opens in former First Baptist Church
Zeb Thomas and Benjamin Marasco were handling pastoral duties at Friendship Community Church in Canton Township, but were running out of space to share their message.
The Washington residents prayed for a solution, as an expansion of that facility would be costly.
Their prayers were answered.
The two left Friendship Community and have brought their message to the city of Washington, at the newly formed Christ Fellowship Church, located at the former First Baptist Church building at the corner of East Wheeling and South College streets.
“First Baptist Church, which had been engaged in faithful gospel ministry for 210 years, was experiencing significant declines and began to realize their time was limited,” said Thomas, Christ Fellowship pastor. “This is a glorious building with such a rich and faithful history. They understandably didn’t want to see this place fall into disrepair or any of the other options that tend to happen when a church starts to dissolve, so they reached out to us.
“We really saw that as an answer to prayers. We are thrilled to be in the heartbeat of Washington. We’re excited about all of the opportunities that this particular location affords.”
Christ Fellowship Church’s first service Aug. 18 was attended by 255 people and had similar attendance the following week. Services are at 10 a.m. each Sunday.
“We’re so encouraged by what God’s doing,” Thomas said. “There’s a lot of people coming. We’ve got a lot of hope about what’s in store here. We’re interested in ministering folks for the long haul, and we’ll see who it is that wants to call Christ Fellowship Church home. Even the architecture of the building reflects what we’re trying to do. It’s timeless in so many ways, but it’s also relevant.”
Thomas said some of the parishioners from Friendship Community Church have come to Christ Fellowship, while others have remained at the Canton Township church. New members are always welcome.
“We just encouraged folks to pray and decide wherever they liked to go,” he said. “Our desire is for this to be a community church for a lot of people from Washington proper to call home.”
While the church is in its infancy, plans are to add programs to go along with the Sunday service.
Marasco, a 2012 graduate of Washington High School, said that includes a women’s Sunday School class, as well as discipleship opportunities for all ages.
“As of right now our commitment is to Sunday morning worship,” said Marasco, the church’s associate pastor. “We’re serious about making disciples and the Lord has given us a great space for folks to be serious about it.”
Children programming is in place. Nursery and preschoolers are dropped off in classrooms before the service while those in kindergarten through fifth grade start in the service and are dismissed to the classrooms.
Thomas and Marasco said more is planned for the building, including making it more handicapped-accessible and adding more restrooms.
“We have more to figure out,” Marasco said. “We’re just evaluating right now.”
Among staff members in place are office administrator Amanda Norman and music director Ruth-Ann Jones. Rich Woods and Bill Chappel are elders.
“We feel like the Lord has brought us a solid team of faithful people,” Thomas said. “We’re poised to do well. We serve a faithful God, and that’s really the footprint we’re looking to establish here.”