Grace Community Church

File:GraceChurchWorshipCenter.jpg

Grace Community Church Worship Center

Grace Community Church is a non-denominational, evangelical megachurch located in Sun Valley, California. John MacArthur is the pastor-teacher of the congregation, founded in 1956.

History

Grace Community Church Aerial View

Founded as Grace Community Church of the Valley, with an emphasis on the basics of Christianity, the congregation held its first public service on July 1, 1956, calling Don Householder to be its founding pastor. Within the first few years, the church had moved to the present location on Roscoe Boulevard and expanded to hold two Sunday morning services.

Following Householder's death 1965, Richard Elvee was called to be pastor and the church continued to grow under his leadership until he died in 1968, after which John F. MacArthur assumed the pastorate. During the early days of MacArthur's ministry, the church doubled in size every two years, building a new Family Life Center in 1971 and a new Worship Center in 1977.[1]

Distinctives

File:Grace Community Church sign.JPG

Grace sign

Grace Community Church has tightly-held theological positions regarding the sovereignty of God, the sufficiency of Scripture, Lordship Salvation, elder rule, the role of women in leadership, divorce and remarriage, church discipline and membership, the evangelization of children, the cessation of spiritual sign gifts (such as speaking in tongues), premillennial eschatology, and the doctrinal errors in Roman Catholicism.[2]

Anti-Catholicism

John MacArthur does not believe that Roman Catholics are Christians .

Quotes about Catholicism include.

• "This is a horrible satanic system."
• "Catholicism is a Satanic religious system that wants to engulf the earth."
• "The inmates, I call them inmates, of monasteries, are unmarried men. Its just bizarre and abnormal. I read today the 50% are homosexual when they get there. The rest have no chance. These people are predators.
• He speaks of convents: " I am surprised Amnesty International doesn't raid these places."

== References ==

See also

• The Master's College
• The Master's Seminary

External links

• Grace Community Church website
• Grace Books International
• Grace to You media ministry of John MacArthur
• Grace Community School