Clay United Methodist Church
United Methodist Church
52866 North Ironwood Road
South Bend, IN 46635
Clay United Methodist Church is a large church located in South Bend, IN. Our church was founded in x and is associated with the United Methodist Church (UMC).
What to Expect at Clay United Methodist Church
Leaders:
Herb Buwalda, Lead Pastor
Jim Elrod, Associate Pastor
Aaron Helman, Youth Pastor
Service Times:
Sunday Traditional Worship 9:15am
Sunday Contemporary Worship 10:45am
Service Details
- Formal and informal attire most common
- Contemporary service and traditional service
- Printed worship bulletin
- Communion
- Congregational readings
- Location: St Joseph County
Ministries and Programs
- Children's ministry
- Youth or teen ministry
- Weekly small groups
- Young adult ministry
- Men/women's ministry
Additional Info About Our Church
Our Vision:
Walking with Others by Living in Faith
If people can't see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves. (Proverbs 29:18, The Message)
God has given us a vision for ministry a clear, mental picture of God's preferable future. It imagines an entire congregation all moving together in the same direction walking with more people toward a transforming relationship with Jesus Christ. This is an external focus of concentrating on others, reaching others, serving others, and walking with others.
The foundation of this vision is God's incredible grace that finds us and accepts us where are and takes us on a journey to where God wants us to go. The profound understanding that we are loved without condition motivates us to accept God's grace, discover why we are here, embrace our own place of ministry, and walk with someone else on that path.
Our Mission:
I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of. (John 10:10, The Message)
We believe that the only way we can fulfill this vision of walking with more people is by living the mission of LIFE, Living In Faith Every day. Programs and ministries are important, but nothing is so powerful as a daily witness of God's love in action in our own lives. Our mission, our focus, is more about living that life than developing programs. Our goal is for every Christ Follower to see their own lives as a mission field and go into that field each day to walk with others.
We focus on three key aspects of the LIFE Discipleship Path at Clay: CONNECTING to God and Neighbor, GROWING as followers of Jesus Christ, and SHARING our lives with the world.
Two Campuses:
In 2002 the Clay Church began a year-long prayer and visioning process to seek God's direction for the future of Clay. Out of that profound and prayerful period the vision team (The Caleb Team) reported back to the leadership of the congregation. Among the many highlights of the report was this particularly challenging one: Seven acres can't contain the vision God has given us. Within 5 years a substantial part of our ministry will be on new land. The congregation embraced that vision process and a second campus was born.
Today our ministry takes shape on two campuses. The Firehouse Youth Center (South Campus, 17646 Cleveland Road) houses a growing ministry with teenagers of St. Joseph County. Youth Worship on Sunday mornings (9 a.m.), and the Wednesday night Live program during the school year (6:30 p.m.) is making a huge impact on the lives of young people. The South Campus also is the host site for our staff offices throughout the week. Clay North (N. Ironwood) is the new facility and is the site for adult worship, the FaithWorks! Children's Ministry, the Early Childhood (weekday) Program, the coffee café, and adult discipleship. We are very grateful to God for continued blessings in our work of walking with others by living in faith on two campuses!