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Seeking God at the Mall
GRAND FORKS, ND (January 23, 2000) - Some people go to the mall to find Sears or K-Mart. If one Northwest Conference Covenant church has its way, a sizable number of individuals will go to one mall to find God.
Hope Covenant Church in Grand Forks will celebrate the first anniversary of its purchase of a 45,000-square-foot facility located at South Forks Mall on February 2. The church has been using that space since last April after paying $600,000 for the facility.
The $1.1 million first phase of a multi-phase project includes temporary offices and education space, a great hall to serve as a fellowship area and worship center, seating 300 as a banquet hall. Phase two will include more office and education space, a small worship chapel and a 680-seat sanctuary.
Since his arrival in 1991, pastor Paul Knight has watched church attendance increase from 80 to 306 per Sunday. He credits the dramatic increase to a committed group of prayer warriors and a risk-taking congregation. He admits, "We've really been blessed with what Christ did, not with what the church did."
Hope Covenant's first step in its building campaign came in 1997 when the church decided to purchase a seven-acre plot of land on the south side of town and sell the old church building, which was in East Grand Forks. "We had a church that seated 140 to 150 people comfortably," Knight said. "But, we knew we wanted to move to Grand Forks from East Grand Forks and had a stewardship campaign to pay off the land we purchased."
The church purchased the land, but the old facility didn't sell right away. "So, our chairman and his family painted the church and fixed it up during their vacation time, and a short time later it was sold to the Red Cross," Knight said. "Once the old building sold, we had about six weeks to find another place."
The congregation decided to lease 1,600 square feet of space in a struggling mall for a three-year period, thinking that services might attract interest on the part of shoppers visiting the nearby Sears and K-Mart stores. According to Knight, the idea couldn't have worked any better. In fact, the Grand Forks Herald put Hope Covenant Church on its front page when the congregation moved into the mall.
"We had people sitting out in the hallways on benches watching our services," Knight said. "We left the doors open so we could hear the noise of the mall and so the mall could hear us. Eventually, some of those people came into the church and now are members," the pastor said. Although the church liked the idea of staying in the mall, the mall ownership at the time wasn't convinced that making the church a key part of the mall was a good idea, according to Knight. Mall ownership changed and the current owner has been amenable to the church, the pastor said.
Meanwhile, the congregation has tried to be creative with the wealth of versatility its facility provides. Showers and a racquetball court, among other things, are part of the current building. The church has 1,000 parking spots at its disposal. Across the hall from the newly purchased facility is the 1,600-square-foot space the church used in the past. Knight hopes that someday the congregation will own that property as well. He envisions a gymnasium in that space, along with a cappuccino bar and another entrance, which will lead directly into the mall.
"This was a plan of God, because our plan was not to stay here," Knight said. "But, now we're connected to a facility that has people coming in and out of it all the time. From a stewardship perspective, this was a huge opportunity for God to maximize our dollars and to provide a
facility that's unique and enjoyable," Knight said. "It's different, but I think the church
thinks it's been a very successful move."
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