Cozy Congregation : New Valley Church Is at Home With Services in Member’s Living Room

Contemporary Christian song lyrics flashed on a computer screen set up in the living room of a Woodland Hills home.

Pastor Tom Shedd stood next to the screen and led his newly formed congregation in a spirited praise and worship period at a recent Sunday morning service.

Seated on deep sofas, overstuffed armchairs and metal folding chairs, the 30 church members have gathered each Sunday since January for an intimate worship experience with other believers, a spiritual connection they say is missing in many larger, mainline churches.

On Easter Sunday, Wings of Faith congregants will celebrate their belief in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ at a sunrise service at the Valley Christian Athletic Assn.’s softball diamonds, at Victory Boulevard and White Oak Avenue in Encino.

At the service, worshipers will listen to a choir and a brass ensemble before Shedd delivers his sermon, “Raised With Christ.” An Easter egg hunt, sausage and egg breakfast and a family softball game will follow.

The family oriented sunrise service reflects the Wings of Faith’s mission to create a church that ministers to congregants on a deeply personal level.

“Most people go to church, sit through a service and then go home,” Shedd said. “We are looking to break down barriers that prevent intimacy.”

To bring families closer together, Wings of Faith members literally break bread in the middle of Sunday worship. Brunch is served after the praise and worship session and before the morning message.

“I thought about what I would be doing if I wasn’t involved in church on Sunday mornings,” Shedd said, “and the one thing I thought about was brunch.”

While taking a bacon and egg break in the middle of a worship service may sound radical to some, Shedd said the practice has its roots in the early church.

The New Testament book of the Acts of the Apostles recounts the lament of widows who said they were not being adequately fed at the feasts that were a mainstay of regular worship services.

“We are not having the meal because of that,” Shedd said, “but rather to allow us some time to sit around and talk to one another over a meal.”

Church member Rick Shaw, who with wife Janet opens their home--and kitchen--to fellow congregants each week, agreed.

“We want to create an intimacy among people,” he said. “It is easier to love someone who you know, than you don’t know.”

In addition to the weekly meal, the church also has a youth group, Bible study classes and a family choir--where parents and children sing together.

By gathering in a small setting, Wings of Faith is embracing a practice as ancient as the Christian church: Jesus gathered his disciples in an upper room for the Last Supper to prepare them for his imminent arrest, trial and crucifixion.

Although Wings of Faith is small, leaders expect the church to grow in coming years, and they acknowledge their greatest challenge is to remain a close-knit fellowship.

Some who have studied church growth say that as small congregations bring in new members, they must be deliberate in establishing small-group activities--such as choirs, Bible study classes and ministry teams--if members are to maintain personal relationships.

“Among churches with an average year-round attendance of under 50 to 60 members, there is an intimacy and faith connection among people that happens without being planned,” said Alice Mann, a senior consultant for the Alban Institute in Bethesda, Md., an independent organization that tracks trends in churches nationwide.

“There is a tacit way of operating where everyone in the circle knows one another individually,” Mann said. “What gives them the familial character is that the dynamics are implicit rather than explicit. It is a face-to-face group; there are not a lot of things that are analyzed or planned.”

But as names are added to church rolls, Mann said, congregations must be very intentional in creating what she calls “cells of intimacy.”

In so-called mega-churches--where weekly attendance runs from 3,000 to 10,000 or more worshipers--cell group membership is as fundamental as Sunday morning worship.

“The key is that as a congregation changes in size, intimacy is achieved in different ways,” she said. “When congregations don’t change, they stop growing.”

Wings of Faith was born when Shedd, Shaw and members Mike Silva and Larry Larson left Cornerstone Christian Church in Northridge after the pastor retired in December and they disagreed with the direction the church was taking.

“The general feeling was that the people we wanted to serve weren’t being served,” Shaw said.

“We felt that we could start up a new church,” Shedd said. “It was really attractive to me to create a church the way we wanted it to be.”

Shedd, an ordained minister with a bachelor’s degree in music education from UCLA, a graduate degree in church music from USC and a master of divinity degree from Western Conservative Baptist Seminary in Portland, was named Wings of Faith pastor in January.

Shedd said he supports his wife, Mary Lou, and their four children through private piano, voice and French horn lessons.

“It’s scary,” he said. “Our financial success as a family is tied to the church . . . but we have the promises of God for provision and he is strong enough to keep his promises.”

The Easter sunrise service will be Wings of Faith’s debut into the larger community, and church leaders say they hope the family atmosphere will attract people who have no previous church experience and reclaim former churchgoers turned off by organized religion in the past.

“We are looking for people who want a family experience,” Shedd said. “They will become part of our family where they have a sense of belonging, a shared experience and a place where they can be ministered to.”