Sunday, September 11, 2016 Embrace Church celebrated their tenth Birthday.

Embrace Church is recognized as one of the fastest growing churches in the country.

Outreach magazine ranked Embrace as 28 this year among all churches in the country.  This is the fourth year in a row that LifeWay research has found Embrace in the top 100 fastest growing churches. “Each year I honestly can't believe it, “ said Rev. Adam Weber, lead pastor at Embrace in a recent Facebook post. “Knowing how imperfect we are as a church. I'm in awe of God!”

Photo: Embrace is listed as 28 among the 100 fastest growing churches across the United States. Photo courtesy of Embrace Facebook page.

Embrace is listed number one on the list of “25 fastest growing United Methodist Churches” by Len Wilson.*  Wilson states, Embrace's rate of growth, 1437%, is not a misprint. Adam Weber was officially appointed as a church planter in 2007, and at the end of 2009 they averaged 137 people in worship.

Photo shows the top five of the "25 fastest growing United Methodist churches." Photo from lenwilson.us.

The Summit campus of Embrace relocated to downtown Sioux Falls on September 4, 2016.  Services are now held at the Washington Pavallion. The Washington Pavilion is known as a venue for the arts and sciences in Sioux Falls. Pastor Chris Haugan told Keloland news that the move to the Pavilion will help the multi-site church increase its reach. The campus is now known as Embrace Downtown.

"I think people are into that mission of going where the people are, rather than having people come to us, so the fact that we can go into other places and continue to be a presence in a different part of the town is just an awesome opportunity for us," Haugan said in an interview with Keloland.

Sunday, September 11th the Seratoma campus was launched. There were 534 who attended that day. That is the largest attendance that Embrace has experienced on a launch Sunday.  Seratoma marks the sixth campus for Embrace including: 57th St. in Sioux Falls; Tea, online, Downtown Sioux Falls, and the St. Croix campus in Lakeville, Minnesota.  The Sertoma campus is located on the west side of Sioux Falls at Memorial Middle School.

Photo: Worshippers at the September 11 launch of the Embrace Seratoma campus at Memorial Middle School in Sioux Falls, SD.  Photo courtesy of Embrace Facebook page.

Adam Weber, with the help of Cornerstone UMC in Watertown, SD and the Dakotas Conference began the worshipping community back in 2006.  Weber notes that it started, with a few emails, calls and a great deal of prayer, 32 people got together and worshiped for the first time on September 4, 2006.

“To be honest, we had no clue what the future held (or what we were doing), but we sensed God asking us to follow Him. This group would end up becoming Embrace. Soon after that service, small groups began gathering in homes and we began to meet for worship once a month… seeing new faces each time,” said Weber, as posted on iamembrace.com

*Len Wilson is an the author or co-author of ten books, has been featured in dozens of articles for major religious periodicals, and has acquired leadership books for Abingdon Press, a division of the United Methodist Publishing House. He currently serves as Creative Director at Peachtree, a large church in Atlanta, Georgia.

Our Story from Embrace Church on Vimeo.