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Adam Hamilton and his bright vision for United Methodism
by Kathleen K. Rutledge

“It’s possible that the next great movement of God in the United States is going to happen through the United Methodist Church.”

This is not George Whitfield prophesying the rise of the denomination of holiness believers in the 18th century, nor is it a line from a preacher’s tent meeting revival in the 19th century. It is Adam Hamilton—39-year-old visionary pastor of one of the fastest growing churches in the United States—at the beginning of the 21st century, an age when many have predicted the doom of mainline denominations.

    Sitting across from him now, in his modest, bookshelf-filled office in the booming southern part of Kansas City, it is clear that Hamilton believes what he is saying. There is no hint of salesman-like gusto that overstates the truth to make you buy something that you don’t really need. Neither is it political forecasting that tries to make you believe in something that will fall far short of what is promised. He has clear-eyed intensity, contagious passion, and resolute conviction. You can tell that Hamilton has answered his own, often touted, “three questions pastors must answer.”

• Why do people need Christ?

• Why do they need the Church?

• Why do they need this particular church?

Hamilton believes that Jesus Christ is the solution to the deepest longings of the human heart and the answer to the most serious problems in society. Furthermore, he believes that people need to be a part of the Church as a whole, and that the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection (COR), which he founded in 1990, offers something unique to area residents, and is the “best thing since sliced bread.”

More than 12,000 people agree with him. That is the current number of members of COR and three-quarters of them report that they were previously unchurched or nominally religious. Thousands flock to the seven worship services offered each weekend that range in style from contemporary to liturgical. The congregation takes in 125 new members every month and more than 4,000 children, youth, and adults participate in the hundreds of discipleship and fellowship events offered each week.

Not surprisingly, the church has already begun constructing a new facility that will double the sanctuary’s seating capacity to 3,200 and add 54 new classrooms to make space for “those who are not yet here.” In a reflection of Hamilton’s conviction that there is a desperate hunger for what his brand of Methodism has to offer, that sanctuary—which will open Easter 2004—is just an interim facility. It is one phase of several expansion phases planned for the future.

This is Adam Hamilton and United Methodism in the 21st century.  But in 1990, before Church of the Resurrection had held its first service, or had even been given a name, it was just a handful of believers, a 25-year-old pastor, and a sense that God was about to move.

A visit from Darth Vader

“I’d like to follow you, to be one of yours,” Hamilton prayed after the words in the book of Luke had “leapt off the pages” while he was reading one night. He was 15-years-old. He had never been a believer. Baptized a Roman Catholic, Hamilton had not attended Mass since he was six. In sixth grade, his parents divorced and Adam, who felt he had made attempts to reach out to God, decided God did not exist. Two years later, his mother had remarried and Adam had begun dabbling in drugs.

Then came a knock at the door that changed his life. It was his freshman year of high school and a friend was over at the house smoking marijuana with Adam. Then, the knock came. The man at the door was a neighbor who did not have any vocal chords and used a small machine, pressed up to his throat, in order to make the sounds of words. He had come to invite Adam to church.

When the man left, Adam and his friend laughed for a bit—joking about the visit from “Darth Vader”—but inside Adam had been reached. The man’s disability had made an impression on Adam and so did the fact that he had come to call on him. “He talked to me like I was someone,” he remembers.

Hamilton began to attend Faith Chapel Assembly of God with his neighbor.  A “thank you for attending, come again” letter from Sunday school encouraged him to make a return visit. Adam had found a church home. Realizing he didn’t know a single Bible story, he picked up a Thompson Chain Reference Bible and started with Genesis 1:1.  After nearly three months of reading through the Scriptures—Leviticus and all—he began to think, “maybe there is a God.”

Everything changed one night when the words in the book of Luke “jumped off the pages and into my life” and he had prayed to become one of God’s own. Up until then, he had been attending church on Sunday—playing football, doing academics, and partying the rest of the time. But then he began to seek “to live for Christ” alone.

What he was looking for

When Hamilton arrived at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he brought the passion of Pentecostalism, a calling to the pastorate instead of a law career, and his wife LaVon. He had met her on the metal folding-chairs of Faith Chapel’s gymnasium sanctuary on his very first visit to the church at age 15. They began dating and were married one week after high-school graduation.

While studying at the charismatic-oriented ORU, he began to pursue a degree in pastoral ministry and to search for a denomination in which to minister. Knowing he could not minister, as a married man, in the Roman Catholic Church, he wrestled with the theological requirements to become ordained through the Assemblies of God. While he pondered his future, he also visited a United Methodist church.

It was “dull, boring, and lifeless,” Hamilton recalls. But the United Methodist Book of Discipline, which spells out the flesh and character of Methodism, was anything but that. He was captured by the theological statement and the “holding together” of the importance of heart and intellect, and the social and personal life of the Body.

“Maybe we can bring together the passion of our Pentecostal experience and the theology, tradition, and heritage of the United Methodist Church,” he told LaVon at the time.

This is what he had been looking for.

To seek and save the lost

The junior high school kids were allowed to smoke cigarettes and the camp counselors wanted to drink beer once the kids had gone to sleep. (There was even a lively debate about whether marshmallow roasting should be prohibited because of the starving people in the world.)

As a freshly graduated youth pastor, he knew that there were two kinds of youth camps for United Methodists. One was sponsored by evangelicals and the other was the denominationally approved camp for “the other folks.” He had a decision to make. In the summer of 1984, he chose to be a youth pastor at a camp for “the other folks.”

Instead of laboring in the security of the evangelical “camp,” Hamilton joined “the other folks” around the campfire. He was ready to listen and ready to love, with his own piety and passion for Christ intact. He was stunned by the moral contradictions that he saw displayed, but he was also moved with compassion for the hurts and suffering of those he came to know. Around the campfire in the woods, and around the dining table he saw the people there—as people. He listened to their stories and felt God’s passion for them. On the last day of the camp, he was invited to preach the closing message. Every person responded. The counselors. The campers. Everyone came forward and knelt at the altar.

That’s when Adam felt the vision solidifying. His mission was to seek and save the lost, to invite non-religious and nominal believers into a renewal of their faith in a way that created friendship and not alienation. He realized that if he had not been at that camp, the campers and counselors may not have come to faith. It happened because Adam felt, “I need to hang out with the rest of the folks.”

A dream and a funeral home

“I was wondering if your church would consider meeting in our funeral home,” the owner of the newly constructed facility in south Kansas City said to a rather stunned Adam Hamilton sitting on the other side of the table.  

After attending Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Hamilton was ordained in the Missouri West Conference and served as associate pastor at Central United Methodist Church in Kansas City for two years. All the while, a passion was forming to start a new United Methodist church in a part of Kansas City that was just beginning to develop. After finally getting the go-ahead from the district superintendent who told him there were no funds, people, land, or even buildings available to help him on his way—Adam was free to get started.

He was surprised to discover that though there were few church buildings in that area of town, there were already 25 churches in operation. These start-up churches occupied every available school building and public arena. With the competition among churches for the same facilities and the same worshippers, Hamilton began to wrestle with the previously mentioned “three questions” in a more intentional way. He wanted to be absolutely clear why people needed Christ, why they needed organized religion at all, and what was unique about what his church plant would have to offer.

Through this time of questioning, the overwhelming vision of the newly forming church crystallized. The church would seek to show non-religious and nominally religious people the relevance of the Christian faith for their lives. Every week the messages would be intelligent, Scriptural, and applicable to daily life. The church would invite them into a transforming relationship with Jesus Christ in a variety of accessible ways—emphasizing both personal and social holiness, engaging both mind and heart. And the church would strive to facilitate that experience, through prayer and by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Unlike many Willow Creek spin-offs that have formed in recent years with a guitar and an overhead projector, the new church would be distinctive. Hamilton envisioned incorporating the traditions of the faith—pulpit robes, acolytes, hymns—but infusing them with meaning and passion, interpreting them for the congregation, and praying for the filling of the Spirit. A core group of 24 from Adam’s former church (Central UM Church) had decided to come with him. All the fledgling church needed to begin was a place to meet.

Adam had watched the construction of a new funeral home in the area and had planned to call the owner of the chapel, ask him to lunch, and make a proposal.  “I had a sales pitch ready,” Adam recalls. Before he and the core group of members had finished praying about it, however, the owner of the chapel called him.

“We heard you’re starting a new church, and we want to take you out to lunch,” said the owner. Once at lunch, before Adam could say a word, the chapel owner said, “I was wondering if your church would consider meeting in our funeral home.” With those words, the fledgling congregation had a brand new 145-seat chapel at its disposal free-of-charge. That’s how the church got it’s home and, ironically, its name. “We were not afraid to meet there,” he said, “because (death’s) not the end.”

The Church of the Resurrection held its first service at the funeral home, October 7, 1990.

Praying for teachers

“Thank you Reverend Hamilton. I’m Jim Flink of KMBC-9 News,” the voice booms, as the local ABC-affiliate news anchor begins to address the Church of the Resurrection congregation via video production on two large screens in the front of the sanctuary.

“We look forward to joining you each week,” the anchor says, introducing the new sermon series called “The Gospel and Stories Making the News Today.”

“The story we have chosen to examine today…is one of the most troubling and important issues facing all of us,” the anchor continues, before the production segues into images of children. Children. Parents. Teachers. School leaders and workers. Each of them are a part of Kansas City’s urban public school system. At the time this story appeared, in May 2001, the school system had had 18 superintendents in 22 years and had just lost its accreditation. Most of those people affiliated with the school—36,000 students and 5,700 employees—are African-American and live in the urban area of metro Kansas City. Most of the 6,000 people sitting in the cushioned, straight back chairs of the COR sanctuary who watched the story unfold on the video screens during the worship service were Caucasian and lived miles from the “trouble.”

“What does this have to do with the Gospel? What does this story have to do with us?,” Hamilton asked his congregation. In his sermon research, he had discovered that public education in Kansas City began in the 1830s when two Methodist pastors planted schools in the area. He spoke of the congregation’s connection to the situation and their responsibility to do something about it.

By the end of the sermon—which was repeated at each of the weekend services—the worshippers had learned a lesson in social holiness and the heart of God for the suffering. They also learned how the hands of those in the Church can help make a tangible difference because of the love of Christ.

At Hamilton’s request, church members voluntarily sent letters of encouragement to each of the 5,700 workers affiliated with the urban school system. One woman who had served as a cook called the person who wrote to her and began crying over the phone. “I want you to know that I am framing your letter,” she said, “because I have never in my life received a thank you letter before and I want you to know how much that means to me.” 

Additionally, some teachers who had been working in other parts of Kansas City transferred into the broken-down system to be agents of care and change. Prayers were offered, school supplies and childcare goods were donated, and church members had witnessed what kind of effect the love of God could have on a bad situation.

The focus of COR sermons and its theological content go beyond social discipleship. Like the church itself, every sermon topic, every facet of church life is implemented purposefully and with COR’s purpose in mind. That concern spills over to the introduction of the worship service, the signage on the building, the safety precautions for childcare, and the discipleship programs that include Alpha and Disciples Bible Study. 

In recent months, Hamilton’s sermons have included topics such as the religions of the world, the life and journeys of Paul, ethics and current controversies, grief and suffering, as well as biblical perspectives on love, marriage, and sex. These topics were chosen and carefully planned over a two-year period and each sermon is accompanied with a daily study guide for more in-depth study of the issue for the following week. It is presented in a way that is passionate, relevant, and intentional.

Knowing that the Christmas celebrations are the most heavily attended services of the year—more than 13,000 people packed COR’s sanctuary on Christmas Eve last year alone—careful planning goes into selecting a sermon series for January that will address a “felt need” or “tough issue.” That upcoming sermon series is then announced during the Christmas Eve service, and full-color announcement postcards are sent out to area residents and are given to members to share with their non-Christian friends and relatives.

Wendy Christ was one of those who came to hear the sermon series on social ethics in January 2000. She now calls COR her church home. Previously, she was a nominal believer in Christ and schooled in the false doctrine of the Unity tradition. She has since participated in Bible studies and the Alpha course, a faith-defining discipleship program offered on-site at COR. She has even become a leader in the Alpha program.

Getting mugged

Stories like Wendy’s can be repeated hundreds of times by previously unchurched or nominally religious persons. When asked about the reasons for Church of the Resurrection’s success in reaching the unchurched, Hamilton is quick to praise his staff and lay leadership and to give God glory.

“It’s a God thing that happened here,” Adam says, reflecting on the past twelve-and-a-half years. “It is clear that God had something in mind, and I was lucky enough to be a part of it.”

Standing before the congregation now, wearing a knit shirt and khaki slacks as he leads the contemporary Saturday evening service (on Sunday morning there will be robes and acolytes), it is also clear that there is no substitute for hard work. In the first five years of COR’s existence, Hamilton delivered more than 800 mugs to first time visitors within hours of their first visit to the church. He then dropped in to hear life stories, share his own, and pray with every person after they had attended services three times.

Of the 400 families he met that way, only one did not become members of the congregation.

This personal outreach and pastoral care was coupled with intensive research and strategic marketing—telemarketing before the church began and repeat direct-mailings afterward to announce an upcoming sermon series and invite the ever-growing population of south Kansas City to attend. Added to that were hours of prayer, days, weeks, and sometimes months in sermon preparation and conducting all pastoral care ministries.

There are now 135 clergy and lay staff members who direct the literally hundreds of ministries—including the ongoing “mugging” ministry; an in-house audio-visual production agency; an on-site leadership institute; children, youth and adult music, education, and fellowship programs; urban ministry partnerships, disability fellowships; and healing and medical ministries, among others. Last year alone, church members logged an amazing 340,000 volunteer hours working at the church and in the local community.

Despite its size, individuals like Wendy Christ and Howard Vaughn—lay people who were drawn to the church by thoughtful sermons, the availability of intensive Bible studies, and warm acceptance of the people—use the words “family,” “personal,” and “close relationships” to describe their experience. Like Wendy, Howard has also become a COR member, participated in numerous Bible studies and discipleship courses, and has gone on to lead others in discipleship. Both are single adults who felt alone and isolated before joining the congregation. “This church has become my family,” says Christ as she stands in the narthex as the echoes from Adam’s preaching filters out through the doors of the sanctuary.

‘Sleeping giant’ no more

Though Adam Hamilton’s role has shifted from the early days, when one-on-one pastoral care of each parishioner was feasible, to pastoral care through preaching, mentoring leaders, and casting the vision for the church—it is clear that he is just getting started.

In a bulletin printed last year, as a part of the church’s fundraising campaign for the new $30 million facility under construction, Hamilton spelled out “three key areas of vision” that God has given the Church of the Resurrection:

1. Transforming individual lives as we continue to help non-religious and nominally religious people become deeply committed Christians.

2. Transforming our community and world as we seek to live the gospel by offering the love of Christ in tangible ways.

3. Transforming and renewing our denomination while helping to waken the “sleeping giant” of mainline Christianity by encouraging and fostering dynamic, growing mainline churches.

Though these goals are not revolutionary (“There is very little that we are doing that didn’t come directly out of Wesley’s playbook,” Hamilton says), his life and work defy modern day denominational categories.

Perhaps it is his breadth of experience in various denominational backgrounds. Perhaps it is his ability to listen and look for the positive in a variety of theological backgrounds that was developed during his time of study at two uniquely divergent institutions such as Oral Roberts University and Perkins Theological Seminary. Or perhaps, it is his innovation—one part entrepreneur, one part intellectual, one part pastor—that makes him able to live in the tension of Methodism at its fullest.

He is known to be a fervent believer that God is at work in a variety of places and denominations, yet Hamilton is an outspoken cheerleader for the truth of the gospel and the theology and tradition of United Methodism.

He cannot be easily pigeonholed into conservative-liberal categories on social issues because he can, at the same time, hold to the traditional stance on issues such as homosexuality but express dissent on issues such as the recent war in Iraq. In terms of denominational renewal, Hamilton does not focus on social issues or passing legislation. The heart of the denomination’s need, Hamilton believes, is the renewal of the church’s vision and mission.

The doctrines of grace and sanctification can be heard in his sermons. Ministries such as the weekly healing service reveal an intentional focus on physical needs and the belief in the miraculous. Furthermore, there is an equal emphasis on personal and social holiness, as well as intellectual and experiential encounters with Jesus Christ in all the church does. Hamilton believes it’s the ability to hold all of these things together—to live in the vibrancy between equally valid biblical principles—that “makes the United Methodist Church great.”

“This is who we are,” he said. “That’s our strength. It’s what 21st century, non-religious people are looking for.” And in Kansas City, it is what thousands have come to find.

Editor’s note: If you would like to learn more about the Church of the Resurrection, you can log on to their website at www.cor.org. Hamilton and his staff are hosting their next Leadership Institute on October 10-11. You may call Debi Nixon at 913-897-0120 for more information.

Kathleen K. Rutledge is a writer and overseas development worker, having dedicated several years to sharing the fullness of Christ with the people of Tabora, Tanzania, East Africa, through community-based health projects.

Unleashing the Word

“There is no one activity that a pastor does that can have a greater influence on the vitality of the congregation than preaching,” Adam Hamilton writes, in his 2002 book, Leading Beyond the Walls: Developing Congregations with a Heart for the Unchurched.

“If a pastor is a poor preacher and does not devote sufficient time to preparing sermons, the entire congregation will suffer,” he says. “If a pastor prepares well-researched and thoughtful sermons, with clear relevance and application for her or his congregants, and delivers them with passion, conviction, and clarity, the entire congregation will reap the benefits.”

This is never more true than when the church’s aim is to draw the unchurched or non-religious person into a committed relationship with Christ. And yet preaching carries a negative connotation and is often one of the deterrents to non-believers in their search for faith.

At Church of the Resurrection (COR), where 70 percent of the 12,000 members report that they were previously unchurched or nominally religious, one of the top reasons often given as a reason for joining the congregation is the preaching.

According to Hamilton, laypeople are looking for sermons that are “interesting, relevant, biblical, understandable, offer clear application to the hearer’s daily life, address real-life issues, and are preached with conviction, passion, love, integrity, and humility.”

He breaks sermons into five categories.

• Fishing expedition sermons. Careful attention is given to announcing the sermon series that follow high-attendance Sundays such as Christmas and Easter. These sermons should “offer something that will be so interesting, and will so clearly speak to the issues the unchurched have” that they will return.

For example, in January of 2000, a sermon series entitled “Controversial Issues of Our Time” (published as Confronting the Controversies by Abingdon Press in 2001) addressed such topics as the death penalty, homosexuality, and abortion. In January 2001, Hamilton preached on tragedy and grappled with the number one question that keeps unchurched people from faith: Where is God when tragedy strikes? Towards the end of the evangelistic series each year, an invitation is given for those in attendance to give their lives to Christ. “We believe it is important to give people the opportunity and the means to express to God their desire to be Christians,” he said.

• Discipleship, Equipping, and Sending. These are the sermons that seek to help both non-religious and fervent believers grow towards becoming “deeply committed disciples.” Comprising the majority of the sermons throughout the year, these sermons series are designed to best cultivate the “cognitive aspect” of the Christian life, the experience of a personal relationship with God that is “transforming in nature,” and an ability to discern God’s call for service combined with the inspiration to “do something about their faith by serving their neighbors and serving the world.”

Using a variety of audio-visual media, Hamilton seeks to help congregants grow in their understanding of theology, the Scriptures, worship, the sacraments and traditions, and history of the Church through teaching. Hamilton also helps draw attention to local and global social issues, presents the heart of a need, and then presents ways in which members might respond.

One series on baptism explored historical and biblical foundations, showed pictures of baptism from the third to sixth century, and looked at the meaning of the sacrament. It led to 140 children, youth, and adults requesting to be baptized on the night before Easter.

• Pastoral Care. “On any given Sunday, I count on the fact that 25 percent of the people coming to worship need pastoral care,” says Hamilton. They struggle with depression, marital infidelity, job loss, alcohol and drug addiction, divorce, rape, eating disorders, death of a loved one, and scores of other issues. “In your congregation there will be members wrestling with pastoral care issues this weekend. The question is, What will you do about it?” Hamilton asks.

In response, he has preached on subjects such as suicide, anxiety, and divorce. The goal, according to Hamilton, is to ask, “What are the implications of our faith in Christ and what help might the Scriptures offer for those wrestling with these concerns?”

• Institutional Development. As part of a healthy mix, there must also be sermons on the purpose of the church and stewardship, as well as sermons that cast vision for the congregation. These kinds of sermons “ensure the health and vitality of the church as an institution.”

Every September, Hamilton outlines the church’s expectations for members. He is intentional in referring to the church’s purpose statement once a month, and three times a year preaches sermons to re-ground COR members in the missional purposes of the church.

While these sermons are vital, they should also “be preached sparingly,” Hamilton admits. “If congregants, especially the non-religious and nominally religious, feel that the pastor is always preaching sermons about the church and its needs, they will soon recognize the congregation as one that is inwardly focused and primarily concerned about its own survival needs rather than the needs of the people.”

Hamilton’s upcoming book entitled Unleashing the Word: Preaching with Relevance, Purpose and Passion is set to be released this September by Abingdon Press.—KKR



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