SPRING HILL — When Pastor Robert Barnes of Dayspring Presbyterian Church asked ministers in his denomination whether it was feasible to have two other churches share the building his church owns, the answer was unequivocally no.
"They said, 'Why would McDonald's invite Burger King to set up shop inside of their building?' " Barnes related. "The guys that gave me the advice are great guys that I would go to for advice every day. They're always right — except this time."
Two years ago, Providence Church began meeting in Dayspring's sanctuary on Sunday evenings. Journey Christian Center began using the building in December for a Saturday evening service.
The union has worked well for all three congregations.
"We started in the Airport Industrial Park in a conference room, and we outgrew it, so we went to two services and then we had the chance to go over and rent at Dayspring," said Greg Gunn, pastor of Providence Church. "Dayspring has been so sweet to us. We're so thankful to them."
Pastor Charley Lynn from Journey Christian Center believes God had a hand in opening the door for his 40-some-member congregation to rent Dayspring.
"It causes all three churches to be a little less selfish and a little more others-centered, which is something we all espouse," Lynn said. "I saw somebody with the same heart and the same goal. And it really has been a blessing."
Dayspring is a member of the Presbyterian Church in America, while Providence, a church plant from Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brooksville, is part of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church denomination. Journey is nondenominational.
"We share theological basis and a singular biblical commitment," Barnes said. "But we have a dramatically different worship style and philosophy of ministry. Because of that, we are able to reach very different groups of people."
Dayspring, with up to 250 people in attendance, is traditional in style and has a liturgical service. Providence is more casual and defines itself as contemporary. Lynn says Journey is even more contemporary, with "true charismatic tendencies."
"Of the three churches, ours is the most fluid," Lynn said. "You're more likely to see something different week to week than the other churches."
Barnes says his church uses organ music and is in some ways "like your grandma's church."
"We try to have the church have as few moving parts as possible so people can easily get involved in matters of great significance," he said. "You see a simple church in the New Testament. Often we have tried to remedy problems in communicating the Gospel to our culture through making the church more complicated, and we don't think that has been helpful by and large."
"While we have the night meeting and we're casual and we have expert musicians playing upbeat music, we're very committed to preaching God's word," Gunn said about Providence. "So while we're definitely approachable and our methodology may be a little contemporary, we are preaching the solid reformed theology, and we are having church nevertheless."
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Explore all your optionsProvidence has about 140 people at its services.
"This is such a sweet group of people," Gunn said. "Many have not been churched for a long time and came back. But yet nobody complains about the temperature or the sound or babies crying. If you have young children, Providence is where you should be."
The three churches have come together to minister to the community, including distributing more than 425 bags of school supplies last month. With the help of the other two churches, Dayspring distributes food to about 75 families from its food pantry from 10 a.m. to noon on Fridays.
As they did last year, the three congregations plan to join together to go Christmas caroling in December.
"We had some of Journey's praise and worship team, a lot of Providence's carolers and a lot of Dayspring's leadership. It really was a seamless thing," Lynn said about the caroling. "We might not agree on every minor detail, but no one ever agrees on every minor detail, and we desire the same thing. We can do it better together than we can apart."
For a new family moving into the community, Barnes suggests they look to the building at 6000 Mariner Blvd. for a church home.
"We've got three great churches that meet in one location," he said. "You can't miss. You're going to find one that God connects to your family."