Christ Church opens South Campus

Offers contemporary service in Washington Twp.

With Warren County being one of the fastest growing counties in Ohio, the staff at Christ United Methodist Church in Kettering saw an opportunity a few years ago.

“We knew that this (Warren County) was an area of rapid growth and in 2007 we decided to start reaching out to people that did not have a church home,” said Wayne Botkin, pastor of the newly opened South Campus of Christ Church. According to Botkin, the Kettering church was an offspring of the original Grace United Methodist Church that began in 1951 on Salem Avenue and has grown to the 2,300 member congregation it is today.

“When we moved south 4½ years ago, just a handful of us started meeting at Dayton Christian school,” Botkin said.

But as the congregation started to grow, Botkin knew they needed a church of their own, so earlier this year, they were able to purchase a vacated building, located at 10227 Dayton Lebanon Pike (Ohio 48) in Washington Twp.

“When we started with the building, we had an ‘Answer the Call’ fund drive,’ ” Botkin said. “We raised $1.2 million and about half was for renovating and building and half for operating expenses. We did a complete ‘flip’ of the building with a few months.”

The result is a beautiful new church building, complete with several modern children’s areas, all new windows, and a contemporary worship area with a capacity for several hundred.

“Volunteers helped us complete the entire project, cutting our costs in half,” Botkin said. “And we were blessed to have companies like Trademark Electric donating product and services.”

Christ Church South Campus welcomes members and guests to one contemporary style 10 a.m. service every Sunday currently, but the hope is to add another service early in 2014. “We are growing so the goal is to have 500 or more members and eventually have three services. We are here to help families connect with God and connect with each other as well as serve the world. We want people to feel at home here. It’s just a good place to be,” Botkin said.

For more information, log on to Christumc.org/southcampus.

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