The Grove Church

The Grove Church Inviting ALL to Serve & Come Alive in Christ! Come worship with us at 10am on Sundays!

We are a multi-generational, multiethnic diverse community in East Charlotte committed to learning the ways of Jesus, caring for others, and taking risks to put the love of God on display.

05/31/2026

Dear Church,

This Sunday I am excited that the Rev. Ron McCelland is sharing the next installment of our Spirit Filled Church Pentecost journey through the book of Acts. The passage I invited Ron to preach happens to be one of his life-time favorite pieces of scripture. If we let it, this description of the early church will radically reshape our understanding of what it means to be a Spirit filled Christian community:

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

The early church was devoted to the teachings of Jesus--and that devotion wasn't expressed in construction of a large building or in the funding of a concert-worthy worship experience. In the first church, love of Jesus overflowed into generosity, table fellowship, friendship, praise, wonders & awe.

These days it's easy to believe the lie that we don't have enough people or money or attention to be a good and faithful church. But if the Bible is authoritative witness of what makes a 'good' church, then we already have everything we need to be faithful to Jesus in this season. The question is--will we take the leap into faithfulness?

Speaking of--I hope you'll join me in worship this week at 10am. You can connect on the live-stream, as always. But if you can, this is a day to join us in person as we will conclude worship outside by witnessing the full-immersion baptisms of several of our young people.

And if you skip ahead to Acts chapter 8, our Ethiopian friend will teach us to ask the question, 'What's to stop me from being baptized?' The answer, of course, is nothing. So if you'd like your life to be covered over by the holy water of Baptism, the answer is yes. And if you have any questions--reach out to me and we'll talk!

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Come and Worship with us Today!

To give online:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/giving

05/24/2026

Dear Church,

When Jesus sat at the table with his disciples the night before he died, he said and did a lot of incredible and, frankly, unbelievable things. He knelt and washed their feet and then told them they should serve one another in the same way. He told them that they were no longer servants and that from now on he would call them his friends. Then he told them that he was going to be arrested, tortured and killed and that they would all betray and deny him.

He told them that in the future they would feast on his body and drink his blood.

But perhaps the most incredible and unbelievable thing he said to them was, 'it is good for you that I am going.'

Jesus sat at the table with his closest friends, facing all he faced, and said that it was good--for the disciples--that he was leaving them.

How could that possibly be true?

Jesus immediately went on to explain, but I wonder if the disciples could even listen, let alone comprehend it. Certainly it's taken me years to really hear what Jesus said next.

He said, it is good for you that I am going, for when I return to the Father I will ask him and he will send you the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Helper--the Holy Spirit.

Jesus told his first disciples that the gift of the Holy Spirit would be even greater than the gift of sitting around the table with him. The Holy Spirit would bring an intimacy, an understanding, a power, a presence even greater than the disiciples had walking around with Jesus every day. Once they had the Holy Spirit, they would never be separated from him again.

This Sunday is Pentecost, and we celebrate that 50 days after resurrection, Jesus kept his promise and God poured out the Holy Spirit on all people. If you are a person who anticipates and rejoices in the promises of Jesus, if you find hope and strength in the celebration of Christmas and Easter, then, friend--Pentecost is the day you've been waiting for.

Even if you didn't know it.

Come and see, church. Come and see and rejoice and receive the gift that Jesus lived and died and rose again to give you. I hope to see you this Sunday at 10 in the sanctuary or on the livestream.

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Come and Worship with us Today!

To give online:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/giving

05/17/2026

Dear Church,

Sometimes scripture is a Rorschach test. In his psychology practice, Hermann Rorschach developed a series of inkblots that he would show to patients (they're actually quite beautiful, check them out). He'd ask them to describe what they saw in the figures and what kinds of feelings they inkblots stir up in them. Of course, the answers revealed very little about the inkblots but, the thinking goes, a whole lot about the patients' personalities and thought processing.

Rorschach tests are subjective and have largely fallen out of favor among practitioners. But I still think about them frequently when I am meditating on scripture. Because, like those inkblots, sometimes what we see in the Bible is not so much what God is showing us, but what we've been taught about God and holiness and ourselves.

We see what we expect to see. We see what we're looking for.

This week I've been studying one of Jesus' parables that is very familiar to me, and probably to a lot of you. A wealthy man goes on a years-long journey and entrusts each of his servants with a large amount of money--called talents. All my life, I've thought this was a story about stewardship and the right us of spiritual gifts and our God-given talents.

And this week, I learned that it's not.

It's wrecked me in the very best way. I hope you'll join me for worship this Sunday at 10 am, in the sanctuary or on the live-stream. I can't wait to share the good news with you about the vast and priceless treasure that the Lord has entrusted to each one of us!

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Come and Worship with us Today!

To give online:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/giving

Thank you to everyone who came out to clear out the old playground! Amazing and speedy work! Thank you also to the folks...
05/16/2026

Thank you to everyone who came out to clear out the old playground! Amazing and speedy work! Thank you also to the folks working indoors to declutter and prepare the building for freedom school. This community makes a great team and every little bit given by each adds up!

Dimantling the Divide will welcome Andrew Willis Garces from Siembra NC to learn about the "Enough Should Be Enough List...
05/11/2026

Dimantling the Divide will welcome Andrew Willis Garces from Siembra NC to learn about the "Enough Should Be Enough Listening Tour" (Que lo Justo sea Justo)--a massive, grassroots effort Siembra NC launched in February to engage some of the 2 million North Carolinians who sat out the last election—to reclaim a state that serves all of us and not just the ultra-wealthy.

The Enough Should Be Enough Listening Tour will help collect the stories and priorities of our neighbors to draft a People’s Agenda for the July “Enough Should Be Enough” Convention. This agenda will be our mandate, forcing 2026 statewide candidates to answer for these costs at a major town hall in August demanding a North Carolina that works for everyone.

Too often when current events unfold at the federal level, it feels like there’s so little we can do to influence anything. Together we’ll learn how a campaign of listening and learning from our neighbors can reshape our future for the common good--and how we can be a part of it!

Join us on Tuesday May 12 from 5:30 - 7:00 pm at The Grove for food and fellowship. Please come out and enjoy a free mea...
05/11/2026

Join us on Tuesday May 12 from 5:30 - 7:00 pm at The Grove for food and fellowship. Please come out and enjoy a free meal - bring a friend or two! ! And if you're able to help, we could always use a few more servers and extra hands for clean up.

05/10/2026

Worship Service 5/10/26
YOU ARE WILDLY WELCOME!

05/03/2026

Dear Church,

About 30 years after the resurrection, Rome was devastated by a great fire that destroyed great swaths of the city, but curiously left the Emperor Nero's considerable properties untouched. To deflect attention, Nero began to flood the zone by scapegoating believers, accusing those who worshiped Jesus of canabalism and holding them responsible for the damage to the city and the decline of the Empire. He launched a horrific campaign of persecution against those he derisively labeled 'little Christs' or Christians. He held public executions where people were crucified, torn apart by wild animals and set on fire as living torches. He also seized burned land to build himself an opulent 100 room palace he called the Domus Areus or Golden House.

Ahem.

Peter wrote a letter from Rome (and tradition holds that he was killed in the persecutions soon after) to be circulated among the small scared churches in the provinces. Knowing they were terrified and that they felt powerless, he described the small, simple steps they could take to know the peace of Christ in the midst of their unprecedented suffering. And the good news is, we can follow the same steps to anchor our lives in Christ's peace.

Friends, I need Peter's hard-won wisdom in these days. It's not enough to know his words or even to. believe them, I need to drink them in and let them reform my daily life. And I need to be in community with other people who trust God and still struggle with fear and bitterness. I hope you will join me for worship this Sunday at 10am in the sanctuary or on the live-stream. We will worship God, we will hear Peter's words and, most importantly, we will receive the bread of life and drink from the cup of the new covenant at the Lord's table. Every Advent season we sing the refrain, 'there is hope for everyone.' That is true in all seasons, especially in this one. Come and see!

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Come and Worship with us Today!

To give online:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/giving

04/26/2026

Dear Church,

A friend of mine met a man this week who told her the world was ending. He ticked through the signs: 'wars and rumors of war' check, 'signs and protents in the heavens' check, Generation Z (not Biblical, but definitely ominous) check. I mean, he has a point.

But I don't think the world is ending. Or, more precisely, I think the world is always ending.

When God called Abram to leave his family and his homeland and travel to an unknown land, that was the beginning of new life, but it was also the end of the world as he knew it. When Moses led the enslaved Hebrews through the Red Sea out of captivity into the wilderness, it was deliverance, but it was also the end of the world as they knew it. Generations later, when the people cried out to God to give them a king so they could be like all the other nations and God relented, that was the end of a world.

When the Assyrian Empire conquered the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 721 BCE--the world ended. And it ended again when the Babylonian Empire conquered Judah, ransacked the capital city of Jerusalem, desecrated the temple and sent the people into exile. Nothing was ever the same again.

Did not the world end for Job when he got the message that all his children had been killed? I know many people who can tell you precisely when and where they were when their world ended--and how strange it was to see everyone else walking around unchanged.

The Bible bears witness to the end of the world, repeatedly. Scripture tells the story of people of faith living through events that created a fissure, a ''before' and 'after' by which they marked time forever after. The planet may still be moving on its axis, but the world ended. It is human to fear the end of the world, because we have an imagination. Because we know it has happened to others, because we know it can happen to us.

This Sunday, we will hear from the prophet Isaiah--who was called to preach to people who had lived through the end of the world. This portion of the book of Isaiah is often called 'the fifth gospel' because the news the prophet has to share is unfathomably good. There is real hope for people who are afraid the world is ending. Whether you have that fear or not, I hope you'll join me at 10am, in the sanctuary or on the live-stream to hear it.

Peace,
Pastor Kate

Come and Worship with us Today!

To give online:
https://www.thegrovecharlotte.org/giving

Address

5735 E WT Harris Boulevard
Charlotte, NC
28215

Telephone

+17045370710

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when The Grove Church posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Place Of Worship

Send a message to The Grove Church:

Shortcuts

Share

Category