It’s been just over two years since Pastor Ernest Smith, his family and his team have made their stake in Castle Rock, setting up a church. Feeling the need to reach more areas of the growing Town, they recently decided to launch another location to hold Sunday service.
In a place most wouldn’t expect, Front Range Christian Church has come to a theater near you…
We caught up with lead Pastor Ernest Smith to find out more about their choice to use Castle Rock’s AMC Movie Theater for a second campus.
- The AMC Movie Theater isn’t the most likely place to hold a church service. What made you pick that location?
We wanted to make sure we were in a place everyone knew where it was. Everyone knows where the movie theater is in Castle Rock, so it was the most known place we could find. In addition, we know a great church, Plum Creek Community Church, was there before and were able to minister to many people – they left a great impression in the movie theater – so we felt that helped set us up for success.
- What made you decide to expand Front Range in Castle Rock?
We want to go to where people are. We love being in the Founders Village neighborhood at Mesa Middle School and we wanted to be in other parts of our community as well. This gives us more opportunities to serve more of Castle Rock.
- Does the theater setting give Sunday church service a different feel?
No matter what location we are in, we want people to have a similar experience. We want community to be built and new friendships to be made. We want people to know they are a part of a larger mission. We believe we are seeing these things at the theater, as well as at Mesa Middle School.
- Are you sharing the same music worship and serve team for both locations?
We have great serve team members who serve at Front Range and we want them to serve where they live closest to that they can build relationships with their neighbors. We have such great people and great musicians, that we are able to utilize all of our musicians at both locations, depending on the need for the weekend.
- For now, are you the pastor people can expect to see at both locations?
Yes, I am speaking at both locations and am there at both locations at different times on Sunday. We do have a campus pastor, Steve Kloter, at the movie theater campus, that is responsible to make sure people are being taken care of and getting connected into community.
We want to be a church that is built on our four values (Authentic Community, Contagious Generosity, Develop & Deploy and Celebrating Family) rather than being built on the presence of one person (me). Everyone at Front Range is important and we are trying to build that truth at all of our campuses.