History
It’s hard to believe that what began in a mobile chapel located on Spillway Road in February of 1971 would grow to become the church that we experience today, where people from all over Mississippi join together in multiple locations for worship each Sunday.
The story of Pinelake Church is the work of a great and powerful God, who in His mercy determined He would pour out His blessing on a group of simple people who committed to His fame. That journey has involved three Senior Pastors since the inception of the church, all providing timely and providential leadership during their tenure.
It was in January of 1999 that God brought Dr. Chip Henderson, the current pastor, to lead the congregation. It was quickly apparent there would not be enough space at the Spillway Road location for what God intended to do through the congregation. A little over a year later, in February 2000, the leadership of the church was led to begin an aggressive search for a new location that would provide the necessary room to reach more people.
In November 2000, the church met on land off of Lakeland Drive to dedicate the immense and beautiful 170 acres that God had provided as a new location. The property was strategically located in the growth corridor of Rankin County and was connected to the main highway that bisects the Reservoir community.
As the new facility was built and the church prepared itself for relocation, God was busy adding to the church body. He continued to work through the leadership reminding His people that church isn’t about physical buildings; it’s about God working in His people. In the next three years, the church would grow to five services and welcome almost 2,500 people to worship every weekend.
By November 2003, the new facility was completed and the Pinelake congregation held its first services at the new Lakeland location. And while the new facilities were wonderful, it was the journey with God over the previous five years that would forever mark the people.
Through 2004 and 2005, God would add more than 1500 weekly attendees to the church, bringing the Sunday attendance to more than 4,000 people. Through that incredible growth the church discovered that the joy was not in the number of people, but in the individuals that were being changed through the power of a life-altering encounter with Jesus Christ.
In 2006, the Pinelake Elders and Senior Leadership Team felt God leading the church to expand through launching additional campuses in Central Mississippi. This emphasis would drive the church to pursue the vision of “expanding its Jerusalem.” In the fall of 2006, the church launched the second Pinelake campus in the Madison/Ridgeland area, meeting in Ridgeland High School. In January of 2009, Pinelake launched its third campus in Clinton, Mississippi. In 2011, the fourth campus in the Starkville area launched. And in April 2012, Pinelake Madison opened its long-awaited permant home in the Gluckstadt community in Madison County. Today, more than 9000 people attend weekly worship at one of Pinelake's four campuses.
In addition, the church has made a significant commitment to further multiply the blessing that God had brought by significant investment in next generation ministry training, church planting, global mission expansion and resource development.
Pinelake remains a church committed to being a movement of God where its people expectantly live out Christ-centered, Spirit-led, ongoing stories of Life Change. Our mission is to help people in Mississippi and around the world live out this vision of Life Change by developing Christ-followers who Learn from Christ, Live for Christ, and Lead others to Christ (L3).
via pinelake.org
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