LAKELAND, Fla. (ABP) — Despite years of dwindling membership and subsequent closure, Indigo Community Church is going out in style — to the tune of almost half a million dollars.
On March 11, the Daytona Beach, Fla., congregation's remaining members gave $480,000 to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Florida. The money came from the sale of the church property following Indigo's dissolution. Florida CBF leaders said the money will be put in an endowment supporting new churches.
Founded by John Nichol as Indigo Lakes Baptist Church in 1989, the congregation was initially a splinter group from Central Baptist Church in Daytona Beach. Nichol, formerly the pastor of Oakhurst Baptist Church in Atlanta, planned to make his new church a “very egalitarian congregation on the Oakhurst model,” former pastor Jim Shoopman said.
It was an auspicious beginning. Indigo's new building, situated near Daytona Beach, sat on a five-acre lot originally used as a private school. According to Shoopman, the congregation began with around 100 members and was affiliated with the Alliance of Baptists and CBF. There was also some partnership with the Southern Baptist Convention's Florida Baptist Convention, Shoopman said.
Recent years, however, brought difficult times for the church. Serious troubles began in the early 1990s, after church secretary Hazel Fenty was murdered in the church building. The murder has never been solved.
Shoopman said the event so dispirited Nichol that he retired early, which led to the loss of more members. Over the next six years, two other pastors came and went as well.
“I don't think the church ever got over that initial loss or the loss of momentum it engendered,” Shoopman said in an email. “Many people were so rattled they were unable to return. The church was in deep anxiety, due to the loss of members from the death of the church secretary and subsequent retirement of the pastor with the founding vision.”
Shoopman arrived as Indigo's fourth pastor in 1998. By then, the church had 45 active worshipers. Children's programs were small, he said, which led to an even greater decrease in attendance. To counteract the negative image lingering from the murder, the congregation changed its name to Indigo Community Church.
“Many faithful seniors were funding the church well, but as they died without being replaced by new members, the church's finances began to suffer, and I was soon forced to seek part-time employment” as a university professor, Shoopman said.
The church began depending on income from rent for a cell phone tower sitting on its property, but it was too little too late. The mobile-phone company changed ownership, the terms of the agreement were changed, resulting in a decrease of income for the church.
Gloria Wilson, chair of the church's trustees, said attendance had dropped so low at that point that remaining members voted to close and sell the church building in early 2006, months after Shoopman officially resigned.
He had been unable to maintain the pace of having two demanding jobs, he said.
“During the time I was struggling about whether to resign, I felt the church might very well need to close but did not feel it was my place to lead them to that conclusion,” he said. “I talked about the matter with a friend, the pastor of a struggling new CBF church start in Florida .… As a pastor of a new church start himself, he was, of course, very aware of the depth of the need statewide and felt this would be a good way to honor the original dream of the church founders.”
Shoopman and his friend weren't alone. Other people associated with Indigo had also urged church members to consider giving money to new churches. According to Wilson, the church had its final service in June 2006. The building sold later that year for $1,607,000.
“Prior to closing, the active members voted as to how to disburse our equity from this sale,” Wilson said. “We had been very active in missions work from the beginning, and we voted to give various amounts to local non-profit organizations.”
The church also gave some of the proceeds to the Hispanic congregation that met in its building, to the Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond and the Alliance of Baptists.
Both Wilson and Shoopman said church members were especially happy to set aside money for new churches, “so that even if this one didn't eventually survive to long-term growth, some other group of dreamers will be given a better chance to achieve that.”
“They also believe, as I do, that the ministry of our church over its 17 years of life was a great one, and none of us would trade anything for all we learned and accomplished together during that journey,” Shoopman said. “We started well, and from a kingdom perspective, I think we ended well too.”
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