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Hudson Community Chapel to stream video messages during some services to smaller Aurora and Stow-Kent sites
By Colette M. Jenkins
Beacon Journal
Published on Saturday, Jul 05, 2008
The leadership at Hudson Community Chapel is working on a new way to be big enough to make a difference while small enough to care.
''I don't know if God ever intended for us to have megachurches. Everything that I have read in the Bible says that the church is a community and the Christian community is meant to be close,'' said the Rev. Joe Coffey, lead pastor at the church, which attracts more than 3,000 worshippers to its weekend services.
''There are some strengths that go with being a big church, like the resources, including a large pool of people with different gifts and talents. But sometimes you miss the closeness of community. That closeness is almost automatic in a small church because members know each other.''
To combine the strengths of a small church and those of a large church, Hudson Community Chapel plans to launch two new campuses this fall — one in Aurora and the other in the Stow-Kent area. Each campus will have its own pastor and feature live worship music and a video feed of the message being preached at Hudson Community Chapel.
The video message will be heard on 35 Sundays and the campus pastor will preach on the 17 remaining Sundays. The style of music at each campus will depend upon the preference of those attending the service.
Aurora campus
Plans for the Aurora campus are under way at Lakeview Chapel, 252 N. Chillicothe Road. The two churches have agreed to a partnership that allows Lakeview's pastor, the Rev. Nate Hunter, to join the staff at Hudson Community Chapel while remaining the campus pastor in Aurora. The smaller church will deed its property over to Hudson Community Chapel and change its name to reflect its connection to the megachurch.
Before an agreement to merge was reached, Lakeview attracted about 55 worshippers. In the last few weeks, its average attendance has grown to about 80. That growth is attributed to the influx of some of the Hudson Community Chapel families who live in Aurora, Streetsboro and Twinsburg.
''I foresee this church growing in a healthy way now that we are connecting with the excellence of Hudson Community Chapel. We're going to be just like Hudson Community Chapel but we'll have our own personality,'' Hunter said. ''We're simply renewing ourselves and recasting our vision. While we may not grow into a megachurch, we will be a larger church.''
Coffey said that although there is no master plan for each campus, the intention is to keep each between 200 and 300 worshippers. He said that it is possible for campus churches to become independent. If that happens, he said, Hudson Community Chapel has no plan to stake claim on the property.
''We really don't want another regional church because the goal here is to build community. Once they crest 500 in two services, it may be time to plant a new church,'' Coffey said. ''One of the drawbacks of a big church is the difficulty in forming community. We want people to be in a place called the church where they are cared for, held accountable and can learn about Jesus Christ and become disciples.''
Video worship venues
Hudson Community Chapel is using the model that was launched in 1998 by North Coast Church in Vista, Calif. North Coast's decision to use a combination of live services and video worship venues
started with a video cafe and blossomed into the national video-venue or multisite church movement.
Like the California church, which attracts more than 6,500 worshippers, the Hudson church offers two video cafes at 10 and 11:30 a.m. in its fellowship hall. The casual and contemporary cafe services feature a live band and worship team and a video broadcast of the message from the sanctuary. Each cafe service runs simultaneously with services in the sanctuary.
The cafe services started about three years ago. The church began live streaming of its services about 15 months ago at its Web site, http://www.hudsonchapel.org.
The live stream was started as a way for church members who were traveling to be part of the service and to give those interested in knowing more about the services a firsthand view. The first computer video broadcast went to Saudi Arabia, where the person who helped set up the live stream has a business and used his staff to test the broadcast.
Since then, a group in Indonesia has tuned in and dubbed itself ''HCC Cafe Indonesia.'' Computer problems in that region have led the group to gather on Sunday evenings and stay connected to the mother church via DVDs. Coffey went to Indonesia to minister to the group in April and plans future trips.
''Our goal is to share the message of Christ and have people come to know Jesus. We're willing to do whatever we can to make that happen,'' Coffey said. ''Our next step is the campus sites. We're not sure how it's all going to work out, but we hope it is a way to impact the world — one neighborhood at a time, one neighbor at a time.''
Colette Jenkins can be reached at 330-996-3731 or cjenkins@thebeaconjournal.com.
The leadership at Hudson Community Chapel is working on a new way to be big enough to make a difference while small enough to care.
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