SECC helps Buffalo church launch
By Don Porterfield
After more than a year of planning, Village Church of Buffalo, N.Y., became a reality on Sunday, Oct. 9, when 127 people attended the inaugural service.
It is a church plant sponsored by the Orchard Group, Southeast Christian Church, and four other church congregations.
Jeremy Hazelton, with his wife, Audra, both graduates of Kentucky Christian University, and their two children, Harper, 3, and Aynsley, 5, relocated from Arundel, Md.,
in January to plant the church in the northern New York community.
Village Church meets in a private, Catholic girls school, Nardin Academy, in the heart of Buffalo’s Elmwood Village.
“We wanted to locate our church within easy walking distance of Elmwood Village,” Jeremy said.
A tour of the community would remind Louisville residents of Bardstown Road and Louisville’s Highlands neighborhood. With 1.3 million residents, the greater
Buffalo area is similar in size to Louisville. The city has six universities, with a student population of more than 100,000, which adds to its diversity.
“Audra and I always thought about planting a church,” Jeremy said. “We just didn’t think it would be in Buffalo.”
Jeremy’s most recent job was as worship pastor at Arundel Christian, where his family lived right across the street from Southeast member Carl Kuhl and his wife,
Lindsay.
The Hazeltons met the Kuhls at Mosaic Church, where Carl is in his third year of his own Maryland church plant.
Carl’s congregation is in the planning stages of moving from Mosaic’s current home in a movie theater to its own building. The congregation already has
committed about $180,000 to fund the move.
The neighborhood connection led Jeremy to learn about The Orchard Group, a church planting organization focused on planting churches in the northeastern
United States.
Soon after Jeremy made a connection with Orchard Group representatives, they began recruiting him to plant a church.
“I was sure they wanted me to plant a church in the Baltimore area, but for a number of reasons, Buffalo was their choice,” Jeremy said. “I told them that having
grown up in Detroit, there was no way I was moving to Buffalo.”
After being asked to at least visit, Jeremy and Audra boarded a plane for Buffalo.
“We were in town for less than half a day when we not only knew we could do this, but that we were supposed to do it,” Jeremy recalled. “We’ve found Buffalo to be
one of the best-kept secrets in the country.”
Prior to the move to Buffalo, Jeremy and his family moved in with his parents in Pittsburgh to save money.
“I sold jeans at the mall for 14 months,” Jeremy said. “But it’s been great to see all the moving parts come together.”
A chance conversation between a church staff member and a local optometrist led Village Church to secure ideal office space for the staff.
“We learned that a local business owner had just bought a three-story building in Elmwood Village, and needed a tenant for one of the upper floors,” Jeremy said.
“We were able to rent the very space we needed before it was ever advertised.”
Jeremy was convinced this was God showing the way. Village Church already has made use of the space for small-group meetings.
In the coming weeks, the church also will hold a dinner party for the public, sponsored by the church, and catered by Jeremy’s friend, who is a well-known
Canadian chef.
The staff of Village Church also includes Chris and Beth Hall, both Johnson University graduates, who relocated to Buffalo from New Orleans to join the Hazeltons
in the launch.
Chris, who is the creative director for the church, tells the story that it was love at first sight for him when he met Beth in school. He adds that she was very focused
on her ambitions.
“She told me early she was all about planting a church in the northeast and if I wasn’t about that I could keep moving,” Chris said. “I wasn’t sure how I felt about
that, but I was sure how I felt about her, so I decided to hang around.”
Chris also believes God intervened in the office search.
“God put us on this block for a reason. This isn’t just a place for desks, but also a place to do things we couldn’t do otherwise,” Chris said. “We’ve had several
prayer and worship gatherings before our first service, where evolving conversations with area residents have taken place.”
The third member of the staff is Sean Cronin, a Buffalo resident who graduated from Ozark Christian College.
Sean, who is in charge of the youth ministry, has had a vision since middle school for a church plant in Buffalo.
“All of us wanted to create an environment where people can encounter the whole Gospel; to take the whole gospel to the whole world,” Sean said. “People here
are genuinely concerned for each other. Compassion is high for a northeastern community, but many didn’t care about Jesus,” Sean said.
The Village Church ministry team mailed postcards throughout the community to announce the start of the church in early October. Jeremy and his team knew a
slice of the community could be described as hostile toward Christianity. Many described themselves as “post-Catholic.”
Comments from the postcard mailing were also eye-opening.
“I am not very close to God, but your postcard reminded me that it is time to fix that,” said one.
“Our family stopped going to our Catholic church a few years ago, not sure why…but we are glad we came today,” said another.
“I came because of your postcards, but saw two of my friends are a part of your church already,” said yet another.
“I didn’t know what to expect our first Sunday,” Jeremy said. “At 10 minutes to 10 I hadn’t seen anyone I didn’t know yet, then I saw one couple on the walk outside,
then another, and then several more in both directions. That’s when I knew all the time praying and working was showing that this is actually going to work.”
On Saturday, Oct. 15 and Sunday, Oct. 16, a work team of eight people from Southeast, led by Eugene DePorter, joined Village Church for its second weekend
service.
The Southeast team split into groups on Saturday afternoon. Volunteers worked on various projects, including closing a community vegetable garden for the winter,
building risers for the high-definition televisions used in worship, building shelves and cleaning at the church’s Elmwood Village office.
“We’re here to do whatever is needed to help get this congregation off the ground,” Eugene said. “God has put together a strong team to plant this church, and it’s
exciting to see the commitment these young people have made to move here and build it.”