A Brief History of Real Life Community Church

In October of 1997, a group of people met for a Bible study met in the College Avenue home of Eleanor Groves with a plan to plant a church in Hagerstown. That church would come to be known as Real Life Community Church.

A few months earlier, our first pastor, Jim Chevalier, and his wife, Chris, met with the pastor of Covenant Baptist Church in Shepherdstown, West Virginia to discuss the possibility of planting a church in Hagerstown, Maryland, which, according to research, was approximately 70% un-churched.

Real Life Community Church began holding worship services on Sunday, April 8, 1998—Palm Sunday—at Eastern Elementary School. RLCC incorporated and began a number of programs including Sunday School and children’s ministry. While at Eastern Elementary, Real Life grew to an approximate average of 98 people attending each week.

In March of 2005, a church building on Mulberry Street became available for lease. After the move, the dynamic of RLCC changed to that of an inner-city church. Being in the city, our members had the opportunity to minister to the poor, the homeless, and addicts. RLCC routinely fed over 100 people per week as part of our outreach. While in the city proper, our attendance grew to approximately 130 each week.

RLCC moved to Northern Middle School in September 2006, after the owners of the Mulberry Street building decided to sell the building. Needless to say, this was a difficult time. The church lost a significant amount of people and had to regroup and reorganize. A solid core group remained, committed to moving forward with ministry to the Hagerstown community.

On December 30th, 2007, Pastor Jim announced that he felt God was calling him to move on to another ministry. Almost immediately, the church began to seek a new pastor. RLCC called Tim Girdler, recently graduated from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, to be pastor on September 28, 2008.

On April 5, 2009—Palm Sunday—Real Life moved to our current location of 17805 Sherman Avenue.  We are tremendously blessed to be able to share space with a Spanish-speaking, Seventh-day Adventist Church in an actual church building as we minister to the Hagerstown community.

Real Life Community Church has come through, in the words of John Newton, many dangers, toils, and snares. Through it all, RLCC has renewed its commitment to the principles of God’s Word. We rejoice in the grace of God that has sustained us and we rejoice in hope that God will continue to bless our church as we seek to minister to the people of Hagerstown.