New Places - New People: Mainesburg UMC “Messy Church”

At the 2024 Susquehanna Annual Conference, the New Places - New People Award was given to a church in each district that has experimented with new ways to build relationships and make new disciples. God is calling each of us to be in relationship with others and our churches are commissioned to go to our immediate neighbors as well as the ends of the earth to make new disciples. We celebrate with these churches and the ministries that they are engaging as they offer new places for new people. If you would like to learn more about New Places - New People, there are courses in Portico, our online learning platform that is located on the Conference website. You can access Portico directly here: https://susumc.org/portico/.

Mainesburg UMC “Messy Church” (Williamsport District)

In a small town, a small church felt the call to reconnect with its community. This church longed to better establish and reestablish relationships with families in the surrounding area, especially multi-generational families. This is how Mainesburg UMC began its ministry called “Messy Church.”

If you haven’t heard of Messy Church, I invite you to look online where you can find websites, books, and curriculum to help get this intergenerational experience started.

At Mainesburg, Messy Church meets once a month and engages 40-45 people at each gathering. From newborns to people 88 years old, this is a worship gathering that reflects the community around them. Each month families return because their kids insist that they go to Messy Church. 

It is in a gathering like this that a little child can learn about the cross that God used to save her and that this type of church allows for her to wander through all the spaces looking for the different crosses that adorn the church.

It is also in this Messy Church experience that a woman who has been hurt by a church and denied communion was finally able to find healing and receive this beautiful means of grace. Her journey has taken her beyond just Messy Church—she also connects to a weekday devotional group. 

Mainesburg has found a way to take the Messy Church model and make it their own. Through the activities, the worship, the meals and stepping out into this new place for new people, Mainesburg has been able to answer that call to better connect with their community. 

While churches really can be messy, Mainesburg has found a way to redeem the word messy and to help bring the healing and wholeness of Jesus to their community. In a small town, a small church didn’t let their size or the distance to their neighbors prevent them from creating an experience where people could not only encounter God, but that youngest among them would insist they go to worship at Messy Church. Thanks Mainesburg UMC for stepping out in faith to create New Places for New People.

Rockville Campus a Model Church Plant

The Rockville Campus of Linglestown Life in Harrisburg is a new and exciting model of church planting. Currently they have three successful initiatives underway that are reaching and serving their local community.

The first initiative, similar to The Journey Church in Harrisburg, was to provide 
community classrooms for students who needed a safe place for online schooling while their parents work, or access to Wi-Fi. Rockville campus has hosted more than 25 students over the past 6 months; students from various districts, various nationalities and ethnic backgrounds, and various English-speaking-levels. “These students have taught us about the resilience of kids and the power of education,” said Pastor Taylor Pfaff. The students and parents appreciate the supervision, support, Wi-Fi access, regular meals (many student families live with food insecurity), and personal attention. The community classrooms, supported by a grant from the Young People’s Ministry Council, have been a meaningful way for church members and volunteers to support local families. 

Second, Rockville campus started a community garden, intentionally networking with locals who were not [yet] part of the church. Four people having no relationship with Rockville church beforehand showed up to help build the garden beds. Local growers have messaged the church to provide seedlings for the garden. “There’s a clear sense we’ve tapped into a gardening community and that we can build great relationships while growing healthy food for our neighborhood,” said Pfaff. 

At the encouragement of Pfaff’s (conference-supplied) ministry coach, Paul Nixon, they’ve made this garden a grass-roots project and invited the community members to take ownership. 

Third, Rockville is economizing their church kitchen. Through an online system, they’ve opened the kitchen for rentals in order to make income for their Ray’s Place Community Center. “I had this idea after I was approached by a martial arts group who is renting our basement twice a week — a benefit to them and to our ministry. I realized that our whole church space is something that our community may want to use if we simply welcomed them in and named the value of the space,” said Pfaff, who anticipates a dim future for tithing. “Renting the church space for use as a launching-pad for local commerce is one way we can fund our locally-focused missions and ministry.”

So far, they’ve rented the space in partnership with Crafted Caramel, Comida De Fuego, Rogue Chef, and other local caterers and food trucks. This ‘small business incubator’ allows local entrepreneurs to start and grow their business from an affordable space. As for Rockville campus, “We can build meaningful relationships with people who’d never otherwise enter our space, and it provides income for our ministries.” A win-win. 

For more information or if you have other ideas for church-planting and community outreach contact Pastor Taylor Pfaff at tpfaff@susumc.org