Church marks 10 years at new location
CONNOQUENESSING — The Church of God at Connoquenessing has been streaming its worship services since 2020, at first just to church members, but then to the general public beginning with its Easter service in 2021.
As big a presence as it has become in the digital world, the church at 1247 Evans City Road, has made a bigger impression since moving to its current location in 2012.
To celebrate the 10th anniversary in its new building, said its pastor Keith Karns, the church will have an open house from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Saturday. “We will have a buffet going on. It’s open to the public. We’ll also have a slideshow of the construction,” he said.
The worship service at 11 a.m. Sunday will have a special message commemorating the 10 years.
“The sermon will be where we have been, and where are we going. We’ve been here 10 years, and where are we going to be in 10 years,” Karns said. He said whatever the future holds, he doubts he still will be the nondenominational Christian church’s pastor in 10 years.
Karns said he would have been pastor at the Church of God at Connoquenessing for 25 years in September.
He was pastor when the church decided to move from its cramped location at 800 S. Washington St., Evans City.
The church started in 1953 in “very humble beginnings" in an Evans City storefront, Karns said.
The church then met in a basement with a temporary roof until the building’s first story could be built.
By 2010, the congregation was getting cramped on the church’s 1.25-acre lot. The church bought 21 acres of land from Thomas and Cheryl Hilliard and retained Ligo Architects of Slippery Rock to design a new church.
Brett Ligo of Ligo Architects said, “We started out working with the pastor and the building committee. We wanted something that would fit the surroundings in Connoquenessing, a beautiful traditional church.”
Ligo said the church was in the Western Reserve style, meaning traditional materials and a symmetry among the doors, windows and cupola.
“We were able to pay the property off early, and then we started to build. We took a loan out for the land and self-financed the building,” Karns said.
The congregation’s members contributed their efforts during construction, along with contractors.
“We would have done more ourselves, but it would have taken longer,” Karns said.
The 14,000-square-foot building has a sanctuary in the middle with two wings: one containing Sunday school classes, and the other containing a fellowship hall, pastor’s study, music room and kitchen.
The space is needed, Karns said, because the 110-member congregation is supplemented by a 70-member Sunday school population swelled by children bused in by the church from Butler in an outreach effort.
“We’ve got quite a good congregation, a young congregation. We’ve got a lot of younger people and a lot of children,” he said.
The church has a 9:30 a.m. Sunday school; 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. Sunday worship services; a 7 p.m. Wednesday prayer and praise service; and a 7:30 p.m. Saturday youth service.
In addition, the property contains a playing field and a pavilion, recently used for the church’s Fourth of July picnic following the Zelienople parade in which the church band marched.
The pavilion will see use once again over the next summer holiday weekend when Church of God members from around the state and from Florida, Arizona and Ohio gather for an annual Labor Day fellowship.
