Heritage Chattanooga

The vision for The Mission Cincinnati was birthed during the 4 years that Fr. William and his wife Savannah spent pastoring at The Mission Chattanooga. The Mission Chattanooga was started by a team of artists, musicians, woodworkers, and a pastor who renovated a warehouse they turned into a “culture engagement station,” a coffee shop and restaurant by day, and a music venue and civic event space by night. What’s more, countless young people who’d struggled to find a home in more traditional or big box churches were finding a safe space to grow spiritually at The Mission Chatt. The Eavensons LOVED The Mission Chattanooga, believed there were many places in the country that would benefit from having a church like this, and that they were called to plant one.

The Writing of a Spiritual Resume

In fall 2014, Abbot Chris Sorensen, the founder of The Mission Chattanooga blessed the Eavensons to lean into opportunities all around the country to see where God might be calling them to plant a church. In each place they visited, the Eavensons felt God saying, “It’s not HERE, but notice THIS ASPECT of this place.” They began to gather what they called a “spiritual resume” for the type of place they would be called. This resume included 3 distinct characteristics:

1. A major city with 300,000+ in the urban core so that the church could reach people from every vocation and make disciples who would be cultural influencers for God’s Kingdom in every profession.

2. A city with at least 1 university present so that the church could make reaching younger generations a priority and turn the tide on the statistics that the American Church increasingly is reaching younger generations less and less effectively.

3. A city with with racially and socio-economicly diverse neighborhoods so that prayerfully the church could be an agent of healing in these places of woundedness and division in our nation out of love for and obedience to Jesus.

Moving to Cincinnati

In spring of 2015, a friend put Cincinnati OH on the Eavensons’ radar screen. They had never been here before. They didn’t know anyone who lived there. But after spending a day walking around downtown, Fr. William felt God’s peace and Savannah confirmed it. They also learned that at the time there was not an ACNA congregation in the city, north of the river and inside the 275 loop. In January 2016, they moved to the city and began building relationships with people in a very grassroots way, seeking to learn what God was doing in Cincinnati, what is everyone doing that would be annoying if someone else copied, and what is no one doing where there might be Kingdom needs. They discerned an original focus region of Uptown Cincinnati and within that began to focus on the neighborhood of Evanston. Over the next few months, God gathered a small launch team, and in January 2017, the Mission Cincinnati held its first public worship service in the Evanston Recreation Center. Shortly thereafter, in 2017, Charles Dudley joined the staff and served as our Director of Community Engagement for 6 years, and Rev. Kristen joined the team in 2018 to serve as our Associate Pastor. The church met in the Rec Center for 3 years until displaced by the pandemic. After months of meeting online and in a local park, Bishop Todd O’Neal invited us to co-locate with his congregation House of Joy Christian Ministries where we worshiped for 3 years. During that time, our church and staff team grew, as Rebekah Burkhard, Christine Mitchell, and Shu-li Cheah joined our team. Now God has provided a new home for us in Norwood thanks to the hospitality of Grace UMC! We are thrilled to finally plant roots in an established home that is centrally located for mission to the city!

Stepping into the Future

Since launching, The Mission Cincinnati has continued to see slow but steady growth as we build a genuine spiritual family together. Currently, we are welcoming people who are joining us from all over the Greater Cincinnati area. As we remain the only ACNA church south of Mason, OH, we recognize that the future God is calling us to is to be a church that raises up new leaders and teams to plant more regional congregations in different parts of our city so we can grow more local and send our people back into their communities. As you read through our website, if anything about what God is doing in and through our church sounds intriguing to you, we’d love for you to join us for a service and grab coffee with us!