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OUR
HISTORY.
Senior Pastors Marty & Sandy
Boller both grew up in mainline denominational churches and experienced the
power of God in the charismatic renewal of the mid-70's. While serving during
the mid-1980's as children's ministry pastors at Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Evanston, Illinois
(known then as Christ Church of the North Shore), Marty and Sandy were greatly impacted and influenced by John Wimber and his ministry.
Moving to Iowa in 1987, Marty & Sandy founded the first Iowa City Vineyard
in May 1988. After nearly two years of church planting efforts, which included
hosting the first-ever Vineyard conference in Iowa, God clearly guided Marty
& Sandy to lay down the church and re-locate to Cedar Rapids in the spring
of 1990. By the fall of 1991, Marty & Sandy had joined the
pastoral staff of River of Life Ministries under the direction of Pastor
Francis Frangipane. At the time, River of Life was closely related to John
Wimber and the Vineyard church family. As an associate pastor at ROL, Marty led such city-wide
ministries as March for Jesus and Promise Keepers. In 1995, Marty was brought on
staff by Promise Keepers to serve full time as an area manager for Iowa and
several other Midwestern states. In 2003, Marty & Sandy celebrated their
25th year in ministry, serving the Lord through a wonderful variety of ministry
opportunities over the last 25 years!
In 1997, God began
pouring out for Sandy & Marty and their family a vision for a new church
community here in Cedar Rapids. With a rich blessing from River of Life,
Father's House Vineyard Church started as a small group of 5 couples meeting in the Boller’s
home in January, 1998. On October 4, 1998, we held our first public worship
service in a storefront location next to the Paramount Theatre in downtown Cedar
Rapids. By the following summer, the church had already outgrown its’ first
meeting place. On September 5, 1999, we moved our worship services into the
newly remodeled World Theatre in downtown Cedar Rapids. Four
years later, in 2003, we’ve found a new permanent home in SW Cedar Rapids,
remodeling a former bar into a contemporary setting for worshipping and serving
Jesus. Our long-term goal is to plant four fully-functioning churches
throughout Linn County, with our first church planting effort focusing on the Marion area.
Here's a
timeline of our history at Father's
House Vineyard Church...
January, 1998. Marty
& Sandy Boller begin a small group in their home. Five couples attend. Over
the next eight weeks, Marty & Sandy cover the mission and purpose of The
Father’s House-Vineyard Christian Fellowship.
March, 1998. River
of Life serves as a host for the next eight week training session. Six new
households begin attending these meetings.
August, 1998. We
"unofficially" occupy a downtown storefront at 119 3rd Ave
SE (next to the Paramount Theatre) and begin construction & renovation of
the first floor.
October 4, 1998. Grand
Opening Sunday! Lifeline Ministries join us for the special day. With 80+ people
in the sanctuary (a great mixture of black & white) Marty gives a scriptural
teaching on "Introducing the Father of the Father’s House".
March, 1999. Now
with approximately 25 households calling TFH-Vineyard home, we sense a direction
from God for an expansion of facilities. The World Theatre, just two
blocks down
the street (316 3rd Ave) comes to our attention.
July, 1999. By
early summer, we’ve had numerous confirmations, both inside and outside the
camp, that The World Theatre was anointed of God and He was holding it for His
purposes in downtown Cedar Rapids. Renovation begins.
September 5, 1999.
We hold our first
Sunday Service in The World Theatre. With a rebuilt stage, a new sound system, a
coffee bar that included the gift of 80 free mugs from a church in Minnesota,
and a gift of 125 chairs from Heartland Vineyard in Cedar Falls, we can now seat
up to 350 in our new sanctuary.
January,
2000.
With nearly 60 households regularly worshipping at TFH-VCF, we
enter a year of transition. We hire Marty & Sandy Boller as full-time
pastors and begin raising up Healing Ministry Teams and additional Focus Groups.
May, 2000.
TFH-VCF "Conspiracy of Kindness" volunteers serve hundreds of
free cups of coffee & hot chocolate to participants of the first annual
Cedar Rapids Youth Arts (CRYA) Festival held in downtown Cedar Rapids.
September,
2000.
Focus group "Alpha" gets a great debut response at
TFH-VCF. Pastor Marty Boller begins a highly successful Sunday morning teaching
series on The Father's Love.
November,
2000. Internationally known Vineyard Worship Leader, Danny Daniels, is
our special guest for our first regional worship conference at TFH-VCF. Our
children's ministry expands by moving children's church into a larger room in
the Guaranty Bank Building around the corner from The World Theatre.
January,
2001. Pastors Marty Boller & Brian Brinkert begin a 15 week
teaching series on "The Kingdom of God"....bringing back the basics of
our Vineyard values.
April,
2001. Our extensive Easter season outreach pays off well....Sunday
morning attendance on Easter Sunday tops 185! We also debut our "Art for
the Heart" prodigal son art collection as part of our Easter celebration.
June,
2001. Freedom Fest brings thousands to downtown Cedar Rapids. This year
we not only handed out hundreds of free popsicles but entered our first-ever TFH
float in the KCRG Parade. Uniting Neighborhoods in The Father's Love was the
theme.
September, 2001
Our first-ever "Ministry Kick-Off Sunday" offers TFH attenders the
choice of plugging into a variety of ministry opportunities focusing on two
themes of "Drawing People In" and "Building People Up".
January, 2002
We begin our fifth year of existence with a newly defined commitment to
"discipleship-building". Our three year goal is to equip
an army of 100 fully devoted disciples of Jesus Christ who are committed to
becoming passionate worshippers of God and faithful encouragers of others. God
also calls Glenn and Beth Ann Kazan back into ministry serving TFH-VCF on
our pastoral staff.
October, 2002
TFH-VCF
is on the move again. We finalize the purchase agreement of our first building
and fund-raising of $200,000 begins. The building located at 5101 16th Ave
SW (formerly Shagnasty's) begins the transformation from being "a bar
serving liquor" to "a church serving God".
January, 2003
TFH-VCF
leaves The World Theatre and moves to their temporary church home at River of
Life. Renovations begin on our new building in SW Cedar Rapids.
February, 2003
Associate pastors Brian & Andrea Brinkert, with us from day one,
sell their home and relocate to Mankato, Minnesota with the commission to plant
a new Vineyard church. Our first baby church is birthed!
March, 2003
Associate
pastors Glenn & Beth Ann Kazan begin their search to relocate their family
back home in New England. Tony & Annette Nucaro and Rodney & Melissa
Dugan step up to the plate to assist Marty & Sandy with the pastoral duties
at TFH-VCF. Judd & Kendra Malcolm continue their role as pastors on
assignment with Pass The Rock Basketball Ministries in Linn County.
May, 2003
The
16th Ave Vineyard Farmer's Market opens our first season on Saturday, May 17th.
Five vendors join the vision to bring a full-fledged Farmer's Market to SW Cedar
Rapids. Let the "Conspiracy of Kindness" outreaches begin!
July, 2003
Phase
I of our new building project nears completion. First "un-official"
worship service is held in our new 10,000 sq. ft. facility on 16th Ave SW on
Sunday, July 6th! God is "in the house!".
October 19, 2003
Our gala Grand Opening Worship Service and High Porch Picnic
"officially" opens our new facility in SW Cedar Rapids. A crowd of
over 200 attends and Pastor Marty shares the theme of "What the Holy Spirit
is Saying to the Church Today".
October 31, 2003
First annual TRUNK OR TREAT Candy Give-Away successfully reaches out to
our new neighborhood. Lots of fun, fellowship, relationship-building, and of,
course, hot dogs & hot chocolate.
February, 2004 We
send our first 'Father's House' mission team (with a group from the Iowa City
Vineyard) to central Mexico. Amy Mich, Marie Compton & Denise Koch all had a
fabulous time and were able to distribute our "gifts", including
clothing, children's toys and two guitars!
March 7,
2004 With children's ministry rooms crowded to capacity, we
decide to expand to two Sunday AM worship services...9:15 and 10:45 AM. The
results were astounding as we drew in over 220 attenders! Pastor Marty continues
his eight-week Lenten & Easter season "Meet the Cast" teaching
series based Mel Gibson's block-buster movie, "The Passion of the
Christ".
May,
2004 Derk Stevenson, former Vineyard pastor from Sioux Falls,
SD, who now heads up Words & Works Ministries, comes to Father's House
with a powerful weekend conference on "Learning to Minister Like
Jesus." God's power is fully evident and we see a wonderful impartation
of Jesus' transferable healing ministry in our midst.
October,
2004
Derk & Priscilla Stevenson return
to Father's House
for an unbelievably powerful Healing Weekend. Our healing ministry team, which
now has grown to 30 people, sees numerous power encounters with folks seeking
more of God's healing touch in their lives.
January,
2005 We celebrate our first seven years of growth &
expansion. From a group of five couples in January, 1998 to a church now
effectively ministering to 200+ people, Marty & Sandy Boller challenge our
present church community to a new seven-year goal of church expansion
throughout Linn County that includes the planting of four vibrant Vineyard
churches by 2012.
March 27,
2005 WOW!
What a wonderful celebration we have on Easter Morning @ The House! The
House is packed! With all the children's rooms now finally remodeled, we
figure our total attendance tops 265...our largest attendance in our 7 year
history! The Lord was with us & it is so rewarding to see everyone @ The
House enjoying the special day together!
June,
2005 Our Summer Vacation Bible School, Sergenti TREK, is a huge
success! Drawing at least 35 children per night, our five
evenings of programming reaches with the love of Jesus to 50 children, with many being new-comers to 'The House'.
October,
2005 Trunk'N'Treat
2005: A Huge SUCCESS! Over 200 hot dogs were served,
well over 150 kiddies were loaded down with candy and all in all
we met & loved up on LOTS & LOTS of neighborhood folks. It
seems that even without any coordinated advertising this year,
word-of-mouth is working well and many said this was a real
blessing to them to give their kids a safe Halloween alternative!
A few folks even wanted to come in and see how the "old
bar" had turned into a church!
November
- December 2005 Narnia
& CS Lewis' classic story, The Lion, The Witch & The
Wardrobe comes to The House as we begin a nine-week journey of
'Finding God in Narnia'. The nationwide movie release of LWW
combined with our Sunday morning Christmas Day celebration, 'Aslan
has Come', makes for a memorable holiday season @ The House. Over
300 attend our Christmas Eve & Christmas Day services! Our Narnia
Lamp Post makes its' first
appearance.
January-April
2006 Cedar
Rapid's first citywide evangelistic effort kicks off with nearly
50 churches working together on the theme of PrayerCareShare.
Serving as a pilot city for Mission America, over 10,000
Christians commit together to build bridges of Christ's love to
Linn County.
April
16, 2006 Our
BIG-TENT Easter celebration service proves to be a BIG-HIT! While
the weekend was full of thunderstorms & tornados, God holds
off all the bad weather on Sunday morning and over 320 people come
out to celebrate our RISEN LORD! Our first outdoor service proves
to be our biggest event yet in our eight years of Easter mornings!
June,
2006 Our Summer Vacation Bible School,
FIESTA, is a huge
success! Drawing at least 50 children per night, our five
evenings of programming reaches with the love of Jesus to over
60+ children, with many being new-comers to 'The House'.
September,
2006 We
celebrate our eighth year of ministry by kicking off seven
"Life-Groups" (located throughout the greater Cedar Rapids area),
community-oriented small
groups geared to give our growing church family a place to "come home"
and feel more closely attached to the Father's House Vineyard Church community!
Join
us and be an important part of 'our history' that God is
writing in our midst today!
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