How I ended up at Trinity Vineyard is a novel waiting to happen.
It’s really a long story so I’ll just skip those parts and say I’m a black girl in a white church.
It didn’t start out that way…that’s for sure. I spent my formative years growing up in the black church. That meant church was an all day affair. Sunday School at 9 AM, morning worship about 10:30 AM, and then afternoon and/or evening services. I called them church marathons.
I grew up baptist until 12 years old and then we converted and joined a pentecostal church then an apostolic one (yes there’s a difference).
I went to predominately black Christian schools until the 11th grade and then found myself in a racially mixed Catholic school for girls.
I can still recite the Our Father and Hail Mary with the best of them.
Our family moved to a suburb just outside of Houston and we went to a mega church in Houston for over a year. It was the first time I’d been in a true multi-ethnic church and I was hooked. This was a pretty good sample of what Heaven could look like and I loved it.
But traveling from the suburbs into the heart of Houston wasn’t working. I never got to a midweek service; the traffic was just too much to bear.
I wanted to attend a church in my neighborhood that reflected the diversity I craved and with music/worship I could identify with so the search began.
We went to quite a few churches and our search left us disappointed and in one case completely ignored!
Our family walked into Trinity and I thought OK, we could do this.
I liked the pastor and I loved that his wife had on shorts and tennis shoes. That’s my kind of first lady!
I talked to Mike and we’ve had a series of meetings. He’s asked about my experiences and shared his heart for Trinity to become a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic congregation. He wants it reflected in the church’s leadership, even in the music and I was impressed. I told him after all our experiences we knew what it would take to build such a diverse ministry but we weren’t the least bit interested in starting over. I’ll never forget his response…he said… “then help me build it.”
Today I did just that.
Mike’s message today was unique. He interviewed Hernando, another church leader, and I and asked us to share how we grew up and what church looked like for us growing up. Mike didn’t know how we would respond…just submitted the questions and I’m sure prayed that our words would be spoken and received with love and grace.
Here’s the Periscope of this special service. (Video is a bit fuzzy.)
I’m so honored to be apart of this movement in my community.
I’m committed to Mike’s vision for a diverse church and that diversity reflected in its leadership and its worship.
Come and visit us anytime. We’re on the corner of Spring Cypress and Skinner in Cypress, Texas.
Lisa N. Alexander is the author and founder of This Woman Knows and What Million-Dollar Brands Know. She is an award-winning filmmaker, director, producer, and writer and is the owner of PrettyWork Creative.