ACC Changes It Name

We celebrated our church’s 110 birthday celebration this year on the day of Pentecost. Pentecost is the Sunday that we are reminded of how Jesus sent into His Church the Holy Spirit and how miraculously things changed. It was the time when God’s people were moved from the Jewish law, tradition, and the Abrahamic Covenant to the church, and its new fulfillment of the Law through the New Covenant. In some ways you could say that God’s people changed their name from Abraham Community Temple to Christ Community Church.

This change did not negate all that happened under the Abrahamic Covenant. If it wasn’t for the Abrahamic Covenant, we would not understand the richness of the New Covenant. The Abrahamic Covenant was a foundation for the renewed mission of the New Covenant that God was empowering His people to perform. Over the last two and a half years we have moved forward renewing a mission given to us some 110 years ago. One of the multiple ways we are doing it is through changing our name. Not as unusual an event as you might think.

Teri Weeks, a wonderful member of ours, has spent a great deal of time with our church’s history and took the time to write about the different name changes our church has gone through over the years. I used her information for the story I am about to tell here, and in the short video you can see here: https://youtu.be/Zosu6Lanbmk

In 1903, a country village was incorporated as the City of Arcadia. There were no churches or schools but a number of saloons, gambling places, a large hotel and the infamous Baldwin Ranch and racetrack.

By 1906, in that country village of Arcadia a small Sunday School was meeting under an oak Tree. As the Sunday School grew it moved to a school and then to an abandoned storeroom. By May 22, 1914, 24 members of the Sunday School chartered the first church in Arcadia naming it First Presbyterian Church of Arcadia.

Over the years there have been quite a few names changes and some location changes, but the church has stayed true to its mission to embrace and enhance service to a growing and changing community.

Sometimes referred to as the Community Church of Arcadia, but by the end of World War 1 had officially changes its name to Arcadia Community Church having completed its first building where the Windmill Denny’s now stands on the corner of Huntington and Santa Anita.

By 1935 a new building had replaced the old one and by 1948 that building was moved to our present location on First and Alice. In 1948, Following World War 2, the church changed its name to Arcadia Presbyterian Church, and built the Christian Education building and Fellowship Hall. 

On August 19, 1962, our present Sanctuary was dedicated, and 45 years later remodeled.

Then in 2015, the church reached back into its past and changed its name back to Arcadia Community Church.

As the church celebrates 110 years of ministry, we hold on to the same commitment of embracing and enhancing service as they did in the past. Only now it has expanded to a vision of serving the regional community of the San Gabriel Valley. This is a vision given to us by the Lord, and we already see it taking shape. We have some families that live in Arcadia, but we now have many families living in places well beyond Arcadia’s borders. We certainly want to serve both and evangelize wherever God has led his people.

The Lord has naturally given this to us, so what better thing to do than gratefully accept this blessing and live into the mission. Nothing recognizes the past better than following the tradition set over the last 110 years! And that tradition is changing our name to better live into what God has called us to do, which is a mission set so many years before, of welcoming people on a spiritual journey to become fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ.

On Sunday, May 19th, we followed our history and let it inform our future by taking on the new name of Journey Community Church.

In our time it is something powerful; something different. But not something we haven’t done before. It is exactly what God was sharing with Israel through Isaiah the prophet. “Behold, I will do something new, now it will spring forth; will you be aware of it?” (Isaiah 43:19)

In the days of old, God saved His people out of Egypt, but in the new day God would save as He had in the past, but this time even greater. He would send His Son to save ALL his people both Jew and Gentile.

I hope you will not only perceive what this change means to us as a congregation but live into it as we lean deeper into our mission.

Grace to you and Peace,

Pastor John