Dear Rivertree Family,
We’re so thankful to share life with you and excited for the opportunities the Lord is bringing. We want to take a look back at where we’ve been and give glory to God for what He’s done as we pray about where He’s leading us to next. –Church Leadership
What’s Next?
One of Rivertree’s core values is “Pursuing What’s Next.” Throughout our history, we have demonstrated this value by continually looking for opportunities to connect individuals in our community to what God is doing in the world. A few years ago, this conviction compelled us to step into the new thing God was doing through the merging and opening of Rivertree Downtown.
Now, in just a few short years, both the Cove and Downtown campuses have grown in the middle of a city that continues to thrive. In fact, “Pursuing What’s Next” could adjust to “pursuing who’s next” because our calling as a church gets even more exciting when ‘next steps’ turn into ‘lives changed’ by the gospel. This calling is about life WITH one another and life FOR one another. Your staff, elders, and trustees are thankful to be entrusted with this gospel calling and are humbled to know that each of Rivertree’s campuses are regularly reaching 1,000 in attendance. Stories of conversions, baptisms, biblical community and new mission efforts are being shared every day. All of it compels us to once again take a posture of “Pursuing What’s Next” to make even more room for those God is leading us to reach.
Every Few Years
In 2010, Rivertree moved from a school cafeteria and opened the doors of the Cove campus, and every few years the church has been faced with the need to expand. Growth is a great problem and Rivertree has had capacity issues from the very beginning. In 2013, Rivertree built additional children’s ministry space dedicated to preschool on Sunday mornings and Treeschool through the week. In 2018, Rivertree opened “Rivertree South” in Goldsmith Schiffman Elementary and expanded Sunday morning ministries. In 2020, all efforts turned towards a four million dollar renovation and launch of the Downtown campus on the legacy and faithfulness of Southside Baptist Church. Now in 2024, we prayerfully consider how to increase ministry capacity again.
- Thousands of new people move to Huntsville every year.
- We have two campuses providentially located to reach people with the gospel.
- We are debt free with 2 million dollars saved and set aside to build.
- We have the recurring “great problem” of capacity issues at both campuses.
- It is not a question of which project we must pursue, but which is the best next step.
Possible Projects
Over the last year, your staff, elders, and trustees have spent time to determine what projects could meet these growth challenges; from revitalizing another church, opening a third campus, planting churches, and a series of medium and large current campus projects. Here are a few campus project highlights:
Potential Downtown Campus Projects:
- Renovate the existing second floor of the Downtown campus, to enlarge the current lobby, update worship overflow space, reconfigure offices and provide a medium size assembly space for student ministry. (Cost- approx. 5 million)
- Build a new worship center at the Downtown campus, add a new lobby and repurpose the existing worship space for student ministry. (Cost – Approx. 20 million)
Potential Cove Campus Projects:
- Add a second floor to the Cove campus for additional children and student ministry assembly
space (Cost – approx. 7 million). - Build a new worship center at the Cove campus, new church offices, a new lobby and
repurpose the existing worship center for children’s ministry. (Cost- Approx. 18 million)
The church leadership recognizes that both campuses will need new worship centers. The Cove campus offers 325 seats while Downtown campus has almost 400. An influential factor is that Cove Children’s ministry has been operating at over 100% capacity for years. Our parents have been patient and new families have been graceful, but this reality affects current and future ministry. The Downtown campus has large numbers in our preschool classes but has the use of additional rooms and can accommodate future growth in children’s ministry.
Through hours of study and prayer, your leadership proposes a first next step of building a new worship center at the Cove campus that will also provide additional space for children’s ministry with a Downtown campus project after.
Our trustees have always worked to borrow only what is needed and retire debt quickly and believe that Rivertree could borrow 9-10 million dollars without impacting other ministry resources. While we aren’t starting the initiative yet, we are considering a campaign to raise $8-10M above our regular giving to fund the next phase.
Reaching Huntsville
It is important to note that we are not starting any of the above projects without additional prayer and participation from everyone, across both campuses. We are entering a season of vision casting and sharing what we’ve learned and what we are excited about. We have gotten to moments just like this in the past and God redirected but everything indicates a building project is Rivertree’s next step in reaching Huntsville with the gospel. Pursuing What’s Next with these projects will allow us to truly welcome people into the church and make disciples, reach more homes and neighborhoods and see more churches planted. Our intentionality will engage everyone who calls Rivertree “My Church” to new seasons of prayer, evangelism and passionate service. A future project will remind us all that we have special purpose as God’s people and a distinct calling on our lives. It’s a special season and we are excited to see what God has for us NEXT.
Big Questions
In November of 2024, we participated in a survey as a congregation that served as a health assessment to see how we are doing as a church and how ready we are to take next steps in engaging and making room for our neighbors.
To see what the survey results showed, how they have changed our course of action, ask questions, and view answers to frequently asked questions, please click the button below.
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