A Revival for Rural Churches

The full story of rural North Carolina’s churches and towns can sometimes be lost in a barrage of bad news and worrisome statistics. Manufacturing jobs have disappeared by the tens of thousands in the last decade. The poverty rate is significantly higher in rural areas than in the rest of the state – 45 percent higher among children.

Yet, even as they face great challenges, North Carolina’s rural areas are home to some of the state’s most vibrant ministries, says Jeremy Troxler, director of Thriving Rural Communities, a Duke Divinity School-based program that works to support and strengthen rural congregations.

Consider Solid Rock United Methodist church, which opened in 2001 in Spout Springs, N.C., just a few miles north of Fort Bragg, the U.S. Army base near Fayetteville, N.C. Worship attendance at the church, housed in a blue metal building, has grown from a single family to more than 300 on most Sundays.

Solid Rock’s ministries include two daycare programs; Angel Food, a pantry that feeds nearly 500 people each week; and a prison ministry that reaches 240 inmates. At a time when churches worry about aging parishioners, Solid Rock’s congregation, which includes many military families, has a growing membership of those 20 or younger.

“Part of my job is to inspire people to believe that they can do big things right where they are,” says Gil Wise, lead pastor at Solid Rock. “They’re making a difference in the Kingdom, and they don’t have to go to a bigger place for that.”

The Thriving Rural Communities program recently named seven United Methodist churches across the state, including Solid Rock, as partner congregations. While they are all in rural settings, these churches exhibit diverse and creative approaches as they minister to the needs of their communities. They have also agreed to serve as sites where divinity students, clergy and laity grow as leaders and can be inspired by the gifts and possibilities of rural ministry.

“At the heart of Thriving Rural Communities is our belief in a God of abundant grace who is present in these communities and churches,” Troxler says. “All of us will be strengthened in our ministries and in our witness by sharing the gifts and the stories of what God is doing here.”

At Solid Rock, the prison ministry began six years ago with letters written to a single inmate: a member of Solid Rock’s worship band who had landed in Moore County jail. Over time, members of the congregation began writing to his cellmates as well, and the program grew. Now Solid Rock sends individual cards and letters to inmates across the state and beyond. The church also organizes monthly birthday celebrations for the guards.

Wise and lay leaders periodically host visits from other congregations to talk about their ministries, share ideas and dream about possibilities. The idea is not to push change on rural congregations, or to portray the model churches as ideals to be copied. “Every one of these churches is living its own mission,” Troxler says. “There is not just one way to be the body of Christ in a rural setting.”

Reprinted with permission from Divinity Magazine.