| Wooddale Church | |
|---|---|
 Wooddale Church, Eden Prairie campus | |
 | |
| 44°52′52″N93°25′1″W / 44.88111°N 93.41694°W | |
| Location | Eden Prairie, Minnesota |
| Country | United States |
| Denomination | Baptist |
| Associations | Converge |
| Weekly attendance | 5,500 |
| Website | www |
| History | |
| Founded | 1943 |
Wooddale Church is a Baptist multi-site evangelical Christian church located in Eden Prairie, Edina and Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. It is affiliated with Converge and the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference.
Wooddale Church was founded in 1943 at an organizational meeting in a former Minneapolis tavern. [1] That meeting led to a Sunday School and morning and evening church services on April 12, 1943. The original congregation adopted the name “The Wayside Chapel.” Until January 1, 1949 students from the Northwestern Bible School and Bethel College and Seminary actively led the small church.
The congregation adopted the name "The Wayside Chapel," and for the first six years the church was run by students and faculty of Northwestern Bible School and Bethel College and Seminary.
On January 1, 1949, John D. Lundberg became the pastor of the church. During the early part of 1949 the church made plans to reorganize as a Baptist church because of a desire to affiliate with other churches and because of the need for financial assistance. The congregation affiliated itself with the Baptist General Conference.
On June 12, 1949, the church officially became "Wooddale Baptist Church" of Richfield. There were 32 charter members. That same month, the church broke ground for a permanent church building, albeit just a basement, which would be occupied November 13, 1949.
The church continued to grow and by 1954 the Sunday School had grown to an average attendance of 238. This led to further construction of a Christian Education space.
In the fall of 1955, Lundberg left to take a new position in Florida. In April 1955, Paul Thompson became the new pastor. He began his ministry on July 1, 1956. On February 1, 1957, Pastor Paul Thompson died from injuries received in an automobile accident.
In May 1957, Peter Unruh became the senior pastor. Continued growth led to duplicate Sunday morning worship services and plans for construction of new facilities which were ready for use September 13, 1959. In 1962, the church began having duplicate Sunday morning services again and began planning for additional expansion, completed on September 27, 1964.
On January 1, 1977, Leith Anderson began his ministry at Wooddale. Anderson retired as senior pastor on December 31, 2011. During Anderson's tenure, Wooddale expanded in size, relocated from Richfield to Eden Prairie and began multiple styles of worship.
In 2003, the Church joined the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference. [2]
Dale Hummel is the senior pastor of Wooddale as of August 1, 2013.
In 2018, the attendance is 5,500 people. [3]
In 1981 the church purchased 32 acres (13 ha) of undeveloped land in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, a nine-mile (14 km) move. It was at this time the church was renamed "Wooddale Church". Construction on the new site began in the fall of 1983 was partially occupied in July 1984 and finished and fully occupied in November 1985.
On October 30, 1988 construction started on a new 63,000 sq ft (5,900 m2), 2000-seat worship center, complete with pipe organ and a 199-foot-0.75-inch (60.6743 m) steeple (to avoid the need for a beacon light on the top), and was finished in November 1990.
The continued growth of the Church meant that more space was needed. In 1995, construction began to provide new classrooms for the church’s youth programs and office space for the expanding staff. In March 2000 a 34,600 sq ft (3,210 m2) addition was dedicated.
In the fall of 2000 the worship schedule was expanded to six services each weekend with a contemporary service on Saturday evening, and three contemporary services and two traditional services on Sunday morning. Attendance was soon averaging well over 4,000 each weekend, with about 2,000 children, youth and adults in Sunday School.[ citation needed ][ when? ]
As a performance venue for symphony orchestras the hall has been praised for its "bright, warm acoustics. [4]
The campus continues to grow with average weekly worship attendance of approximately 5,000 people.
On November 16, 2008, Wooddale expanded to a 2nd campus located in Edina, Minnesota. Ironically, this campus is located on Wooddale Avenue. Worship services including music, as well as children's programming, are held weekly on the campus.
On March 13, 2016, Wooddale expanded to a 3rd campus, located in Loring Park at the historic Music Box Theatre in downtown Minneapolis. Worship services including contemporary music, teaching, and children's programming are held weekly on the campus. The campus is involved in outreach to the local neighborhood.
A 4th location, 7 Corners Coffee, was added to serve students at the University of Minnesota just east of downtown Minneapolis.
Wooddale Church is a member of both Converge and the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference. It is listed as a member congregation on both denomination's websites.
Hennepin County is a county in the U.S. state of Minnesota. Its county seat is Minneapolis, the state's most populous city. The county is named in honor of the 17th-century explorer Father Louis Hennepin. The county extends from Minneapolis to the suburbs and outlying cities in the western part of the county. The county's natural areas are covered with extensive woods, hills, and lakes.
Edina is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States and a first-ring suburb of Minneapolis. The population was 53,494 at the 2020 census, making it the 18th most populous city in Minnesota.
A church service is a formalized period of Christian communal worship, often held in a church building. It often but not exclusively occurs on Sunday, or Saturday in the case of those churches practicing seventh-day Sabbatarianism. The church service is the gathering together of Christians to be taught the "Word of God" and encouraged in their faith. Technically, the "church" in "church service" refers to the gathering of the faithful rather than to the building in which it takes place. In most Christian traditions, services are presided over by clergy wherever possible. Styles of service vary greatly, from the Anglican, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Reformed, Roman Catholic, and Lutheran traditions of liturgical worship to informal worship characterized by certain free church traditions, common among Methodists and Baptists, that often combine worship with teaching for the believers, which may also have an evangelistic component appealing to backsliders and the non-Christians in the congregation. Quakers and some other groups have no formal outline to their services, but allow the worship to develop as the participants present feel moved. The majority of Christian denominations hold church services on the Lord's Day ; a number of traditions have mid-week Wednesday evening services as well. In some Christian denominations, church services are held daily, with these including those in which the seven canonical hours are prayed, as well as the offering of the Mass, among other forms of worship. In addition to this, many Christians attend services on holy days such as Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, Ascension Thursday, among others depending on the Christian denomination.
Bellevue Baptist Church is a Baptist megachurch in the Cordova area of Memphis, Tennessee, United States. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Bellevue was once the largest church in the Memphis area. Bellevue's goals are to "Love God, Love People, Share Jesus, and Make Disciples." The church's head pastor has been Steve Gaines since 2005.
Bethlehem Baptist Church is a Baptist Evangelical megachurch based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is affiliated with Converge North Central and Converge.
Prestonwood Baptist Church is a Baptist multi-site megachurch based in Plano, Texas. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. It is one of the largest churches in America, with a membership of over 45,000 and a weekly attendance of around 17,000.
The Edina School District is the public school system for most of the city of Edina, Minnesota. It is also referred to as the Independent School District (ISD) 273. There are approximately 8,500 students, K-12, served by 1139 teachers and support staff in six elementary schools, two middle schools and one high school.
BattleCreek Church is the name and main campus of a moderately growing, Southern Baptist, multi-campus church located in Tulsa. SBC
Leith Anderson is an American evangelical Christian leader, author, and retired pastor. Anderson served as senior pastor of Wooddale Church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota from 1977 to 2011. He is pastor emeritus of Wooddale Church and president emeritus of the National Association of Evangelicals.
The Cathedral of Hope (CoH), a member congregation of the United Church of Christ, is an historically and predominantly LGBT congregation located in the Oak Lawn area of Dallas, Texas, in the United States. The Dallas Cathedral of Hope is said to be the world's largest inclusive "liberal Christian church with a primary outreach to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons", with a membership of over 4,000 local members.
Walnut Street Baptist Church is a Southern Baptist, Christian former megachurch in Louisville, Kentucky. It is associated with the Southern Baptist Convention, Kentucky Baptist Convention, and the Long Run Baptist Association.
Hunter Street Baptist Church is a Baptist Church located in Hoover, Alabama, a suburb of Birmingham. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.
Elmbrook Church is a non-denominational, evangelical Christian megachurch located in the Milwaukee suburb of Brookfield, Wisconsin, in Waukesha County. Since the church's founding in 1958, it has become one of the largest churches in the United States. Weekly church attendance averages 7,000, making it the largest church in Wisconsin and one of the 100-largest churches in the United States.
Triumph Church is a non-denominational evangelical multi-site megachurch based in Detroit, Michigan, USA. It was founded in the fall of 1920 by Reverend Claude Cummings as the Triumph Missionary Baptist Church. Reverend Solomon W. Kinloch, Jr. is currently the Senior Pastor. The church has six weekend and three midweek services and its average attendance makes it one of the largest churches in Detroit and Michigan.
Substance Church is a nondenominational, Evangelical Christian, megachurch in Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. In 2010, Outreach Magazine ranked the church as the 21st fastest growing congregation in the United States. Because the church has integrated ultra-contemporary worship, cell church, and cafe church methods into a singular megachurch setting, Substance is often cited as being "trend-setting".
Trinity Congregational Church, later known as Union Chapel, is a former place of worship for Congregationalists and Independent Christians in Arundel, an ancient town in the Arun district of West Sussex, England. Protestant Nonconformism has always been strong in the town, and the chapel's founding congregation emerged in the 1780s. After worshipping elsewhere in the town, they founded the present building in the 1830s and remained for many years. Former pastors included the poet George MacDonald. Robert Abraham's distinctive neo-Norman/Romanesque Revival building was converted into a market in the 1980s and has been renamed Nineveh House. The church is a Grade II Listed building.
NewSpring Church is a Baptist Evangelical multi-site megachurch based in Anderson, South Carolina, affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.
Eagle Brook Church is a Baptist Evangelical multi-site megachurch based in Centerville, Minnesota. It is affiliated with Converge. Weekly church attendance was 20,923 people in 2023. The senior pastor is Jason Strand.
Wooddale may refer to several places: