New church building on family values

Faith and family burn ever so bright in Chuck and Connie Simonson. They’ve raised four children who are prospering in adulthood. They’ve spent decades together working with families, helping them through the best and worst of times. And now, they’re taking their faith and experience to residents in Maricopa in the form of Discover Community Church.

Maricopa has no shortage of places to worship. There are many in the community, but building a congregation from scratch takes more than a little conviction. As pastor of a new non-denominational church, Simonson is passionate about what he can bring to the community.

“It was always my desire to start a church from ground level up,” Simonson said. “I’ve been in ministry for 35 years. I feel this is our calling.”

The Simonsons moved to Maricopa more than a year ago from Bakersfield, Calif. Chuck’s day job is as a hospice chaplin in Mesa, while Connie is a marriage and family therapist in Casa Grande.

“A lot of what we do is family ministry,” Chuck said. “We’ve seen the gamut, from young families to dealing with families at end-of-life experience. When you deal with end-of-life experience, you see a lot of family dynamics begin to happen because you’re dealing with a crisis.”

Until the congregation builds, Chuck has no initial plans to start building a physical church. He says he is in the process of forming a launch team, which will set the church in motion with three key themes: worship, grow and serve. The target for the church to start regular weekly services is August or September, he said.

Building stronger families is at the heart Discover Community Church. So, as part of the ministry, the church is offering parenting classes beginning Jan. 12, which will be held at the Maricopa Veterans Center every Tuesday at 7 p.m. for six weeks.

Connie will be teaching the series, which is based on the book by Dr. Kevin Leman, Have a New Kid by Friday. This is the second series of parenting classes for the church; the first was held in the fall, and was well-received in the community, Connie said.

“It’s about building a relationship with your children,” Connie said. “It’s all based on this whole idea of changing your child’s attitude, behavior and character. And you do that by making them understand another ABC: acceptance, belonging and competence. The concept of rules without relationships leads to rebellion. You have to have that balance of structure and family function, as well as being able to have fun with your kids.”

“I think family values are being challenged in our culture today,” Chuck added. “We feel having Christ in the center of the family is the key element of holding a family together.”

If you go:

What : Discover Community Church Parenting Classes
When : Jan. 12, at 7 p.m., each Tuesday for six weeks
Where : Maricopa Veterans Center (formerly the library building), 44240 W. Maricopa-Casa Grande Highway
Information : 520-413-7891 or DiscoverCommunity.net

Photo by Jim Williams