Though definitions are likely to differ somewhat, a "church within a church" is exactly what it sounds like—a separate congregation within a larger, main congregation. Its mission is to exist as the church for a group or subculture that the main church cannot reach as effectively.

This concept has gained momentum in recent years, as evidenced by more and more congregations that have adopted it as a mission and ministry. Most of these churches-within-churches are trying to reach young people—postmoderns, busters, Xers. And due to the number of non-Christians in these target groups, the "church within a church" ideal often tends toward evangelism as much as worship or fellowship.

The following is a conversation with Dan Kimball, a former youth worker who pastors Graceland—the "church within a church" at Santa Cruz (Calif.) Bible Church.

YOUTHWORKER: What led you to explore the "church within a church" idea?
DAN KIMBALL: I led the high school youth group from 1990 to 1997, and we did the big-bang, midweek kind of thing with 300 kids. We also did a traditional Sunday youth gathering, which ran like a more serious youth church. We did dramas, videos—the works. But here’s what struck me—it was a fluke, actually. In the summer of 1995, we started holding services where we unplugged the instruments and lit candles—I thought we were being original! (laughs) But I was seeing something different—"harder" kids were participating. I thought we needed to use gizmos and gimmicks, but kids were responding to stripped-down, raw stuff.

After that, the idea of a reaching these kids through a service they could call their own haunted me. You see, we have a very gifted senior pastor and very modern church services, but apart from the most serious kids, high schoolers weren’t making the transition into the life of the main church—which really isn’t uncommon at all.

So Graceland began as a specific ministry and community for them, so they could continue together in their spiritual growth. But by the fall of 1996, we sensed that something even more different and radical was needed because of the postmodern shift that was taking place in youth culture. So we developed a new, unique church service and distinct community designed for those who identify with this cultural transition by using different approaches in communication, leadership, atmosphere, worship style, and ministry methodology. We launched on September 14, 1997.

How does Graceland operate in the context of the main church?
KIMBALL: Graceland meets twice on Sunday evenings and is considered a full church service and ministry, but it’s not like a church plant—it’s not designed to split off and become its own entity. Graceland remains within the Santa Cruz Bible Church body and is under its authority and leadership.

The relationship is really beneficial in many ways. There’s no need to find a new building, first of all. We immediately had use of all the church’s facilities. We also receive the benefit of the church’s support staff, such as receptionists and custodians. The custodians, for example, help us set up the sanctuary for our services.

We take an offering as well, and all the finances are overseen and distributed by the church financial director—so we’re accountable in that way. But it’s more like a separate church in that throughout the week we meet in small groups, and we perform baptisms and have regular communion.

So...do the Graceland services resemble large youth gatherings?
KIMBALL: Not exactly. We’ve always opened the service to all ages—and it now includes married couples, children, even parents. I’m seeing more and more parents who come and sit with their kids so they can learn about what we do. Really the Graceland service is for anybody of any age who identifies with postmodern culture—and that doesn’t necessarily mean just people under the age of 30.

Doesn’t this fragment the church?
KIMBALL: No, but it’s definitely a new way of looking at how a church operates. We’ve tried to focus on how we can actively integrate the communities of the church together. We had an all-church Memorial Day picnic, and everybody was invited to that. But even more, we encourage intergenerational relationships and ministry sharing—Graceland people serve in other parts of Santa Cruz Bible Church, such as the youth ministry, and people who attend the main church serve in the Graceland community. Older members of the church, for instance, have been extremely helpful and needed, doing things like leading Graceland home groups and mentoring younger people. So maybe an older person doesn’t feel comfortable worshiping at the Graceland service, but that person will work with the young people, mentoring them. And then a 21-year-old person who doesn’t go to the main church might contribute to non-Graceland ministries by being a junior high helper.

How many youth group kids come to Graceland?
KIMBALL: About 75 percent of the church’s high schoolers do. We’ve grown to more than 800 now—and we’re still getting teenagers in. We’re also seeing new teens who’re not part of any church and those who’d dropped out of church.

What’s different about the Graceland services?
KIMBALL: We’ll ask ourselves, "What does the environment speak when you walk through the door?" The Graceland sanctuary is dark and lit with candles. There are stained glass images on screens. In the modern church, many have removed the visual—but we want to bring that back.

A Campus Crusade leader from down south told me that Graceland seems the exact opposite of the typical seeker-sensitive, megachurch. There are no gimmicks. No Top-10 countdowns. It seems the more spiritual we get, the more response we get. All the comments I hear are that young people want more of the raw, spiritual, mystical aspects to church. The worship band will sometimes play from the back of the sanctuary and not the front, or in front for the beginning and in back for the second half, after the message—but always on the floor, for a cummunity feel. At that point we just have two crosses we built facing front, and that’s all people see—besides the lyrics. And the second half worship is extended. We also have a poet’s corner set up, and during many of our services—instead of me doing a reading—the person in the poet’s corner will. Others may tell stories behind old hymns before they’re sung. We’ll display visual art, have responsive readings, and sometimes read ancient creeds out loud.

We want to communicate that Christianity is an ancient thing, because kids tend to mistrust modern conventions. So while we’ll use Power Point for lyrics, we won’t have anything else.

Your Web site says Graceland is geared to "new generations...for thousands and thousands of those who’ve been raised with no biblical background and may not normally attend a church service." How do you approach evangelism?
KIMBALL: We just spent four weeks teaching the Bible as "food for the soul," and there was great response to it. We discussed hard questions in an open forum: Where did the Bible come from? Was it divinely inspired? Can we trust it? We even had a seminary professor come in, and people turned in questions.
I believe the church has been somewhat wrong for making the Bible so easy to read. I mean, there are verses in church bulletins, verses on screens—everything geared for our ease, to the point where a lot of people don’t bring their Bibles to church anymore. We take the Bible seriously at Graceland. We talk about hell, Satan, all the controversial topics.

Don’t a lot of churches do that?
KIMBALL: Yes, but not in a postmodern context. For example, we leave mystery involved and let people wrestle with concepts instead of giving them the answers. There’s a greater emphasis on really knowing why you believe what you believe—but without a set of easy, systematic answers for every mystery of the faith.

The modern approach to Christianity is based on propositional truth—in other words, "This is truth, and let’s open the Bible, and I’ll show you why this is the truth." The postmodern approach is walking them through a process of discovering the truth on their own—and not telling them they’re wrong, but having a real, Socratic dialogue. I’ll say, "If I’m wrong, please let me know. Show me reasons why." It’s like Paul in Acts 17, taking people back to the beginning and reasoning with them. It’s a back and forth thing.

What have been some of the more significant struggles in getting Graceland off the ground?
KIMBALL: In the beginning it was defining what it is and how it fits in with rest of the church. Dealing with questions like, "Is this just a passing phase, and then they’ll grow up and go to the other service?"

But one of the major roadblocks with the "church within a church" model is conflict with the senior pastor. Because unless the senior pastor sees that something else needs to be done to reach young people, unless the senior pastor sees the new body as a missional venture, it won’t work. That’s the key. And our senior pastor sees this.

And for most of the people at Graceland, Chip [Ingram] is not the primary vision caster—although he does come to the Graceland services three times a year to preach. So his humility is key—and the health of my relationship with him is very important. I don’t let anything that I’m thinking or feeling build up without saying something to him, and he does the same.

Another thing is that we didn’t want the other staffers in the church, being so immersed in their own ministries, having a difficult time understanding what Graceland is. So we brought in Doug Pagitt from Leadership Network (www.leadnet.org), and he spoke to the whole staff so that everybody understood the cultural change and why a new type of service was needed.
It’s a shame that when churches "get older," all the young people and younger famalies leave and go to the new, hot church in town. With the "church within a church model" model, that’s not necessary. And the whole thing with youth pastors feeling as though they need to become college pastors or senior pastors to keep their careers alive? That’s not necessary with this model, either. Because you know the group and the culture your’re ministering to, you stay with them—as you get older and your people get older. I wish more youth pastors would consider this.

More Stuff
What Leaders of Santa Cruz Bible Church Say about Graceland
In my mind, if you say as a church you're committed to reaching lost people, and you do it in a way that's biblical, you're shaped by the giftedness of the people God's brought to you. With Dan, I thought, "Here's a guy who's 35 and gifted in reaching postmoderns. I know I'm not the person who's going to reach them. And we're going to lose them if we don't let Dan dream his dreams." So Graceland was not a big leap.

And we decided that a clearly generational church produces more problems than it solves—which is why Graceland is more mindset-targeted than generationally targeted. So we made it the fourth service and the fifth service, with the idea that it would model biblical relationships between generations—that older men and women would teach younger men and women. In fact, almost all of the Graceland Bible studies are led by baby boomers—moms and dads. It's really interesting.

Integration is very important, too. Last Easter was a good example. We decided that we'd integrate both services into one, so the Graceland people and the main church people came together and dreamed it up. It was very avant garde, people dressed in black, doing readings from the Bible that sounded like John Paul Satre in a '50s coffeehouse! But there was also an orchestra and a brass quintet—it was a highly creative collage. And 250 came to Christ. Yet it was so Graceland-oriented that it pushed the church in general too far past our limits. For me—and others—it was weird. For the postmoderns, it was meaningful.
We don't exactly know where Graceland is going. Maybe, as the people who go to Graceland get older and Dan gets older, they'll need to reinvent themselves. Or maybe in 10 years there'll be a need for a new service that'll attract post-high schoolers more effectively than Graceland.

For this model to work, I think pastors have to decide whether or not they believe Ephesians 4 and Romans 12. If they do, then success is not focusing on how many people think you're the hot shot, it's equipping your leaders to help others grow. That's the calling. It's not about who gets credit. At Graceland, Dan's the man—I don't think there's anyone who can reach them like Dan can. I'm like an old coach—I just like to win.
—Chip Ingram is the senior pastor of Santa Cruz Bible Church

I started here in February, so I'm pretty new to the church—but it helps that I already have a bent toward Gen-Xers. A lot of our students are invovled in Graceland—for them, it's their church service. Part of the appeal of Graceland is that older people go there—Graceland is the service I attend, too.

But for the high schoolers who go there, when it comes to breaking down into small groups, it's the high school ministry that connects them. They're student-led and adult-coached. There's also a student-led, Sunday morning high school service.

I find that Graceland—being that it's designed as a ministry for kids who've graduated from high school—appeals mostly to eleventh and twelfth graders. The ninth and tenth graders don't attend as much.

But the great thing about Graceland is that it's become a place from where we can draw adult leaders—an army of workers for junor and senior high ministries.
—Ron Marsh is the pastor of high school ministries at Santa Crua Bible Church

© 2001 CCM Communications
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