Welcome!
We're glad that you found our Website and
hope that you stop by often for updates.
But more important, we hope that you join us in person!
We welcome you to share with us the love of Jesus Christ through our Sunday morning worship services, church school classes - and through the many activities that keep us busy each week.
There are opportunities for everyone, regardless of your age, your interests or your abilities. (Our facility is handicap accessible.) So we invite you to browse through this site, then join us as we fellowship together. You'll be glad you did!
We're located on the southeast corner of SR 331 (Bremen Highway) and Jackson Road, just south of the US 20 Bypass and the Meijer store.
Our "Purpose" lays a heavy burden on us - a burden that is made lighter when we work together to make Coalbush Church a body of Christ's servants who have a vision and are willing to do everything possible to make that vision a reality.
Our goal is to uplift and sustain a generation that is fully committed to Jesus Christ. As singles, married couples, moms, dads, children, youth, grandmas and grandpas - and anyone in between - we reach out to touch, to teach and to give.
Vision
Our Vision for Children- To introduce children to the love of God in Jesus Christ at the earliest possible age.
- To help children know and appreciate the presence of God in their lives.
- To offer teens a place to belong.
- To foster life-changing relationships with Christ.
- To equip teens to live with faith and integrity at all times. We have a vibrant group of young people at Coalbush Church. They meet together as Christian teens who are faced with pressures and temptations of the modern world. They make use of their new indoor space - and our ample outside facilities - for their learning and recreation times.
Our Vision for Adults
- To help young adults become established in their faith and lives.
- To help young adults solidify the connection between faith, work, and life.
- To help them deal with life issues through the prism of their faith.
- To provide opportunities to be in ministry in the Coalbush Church, throughout our community, and beyond. We are a community of diversity - a community that seeks opportunities to strengthen its relationship with spouses, children, parents and friends through classes, discussion, meals and recreation within a Christian context.
- To empower senior adults with a renewed heart for ministries.
- To help senior adults use their continuing potential for service and care for others.
- To help families become established in their faith and life.
- To equip parents to be able to raise children of integrity and selflessness in a Christian home.
Our Vision for Our Facilities
- To provide opportunities for people to share the love of God with others.
- To provide forums for people to interact and develop relationships with others.
- To have a first-class facility that enhances and complements our outreach and ministry.
- To have a first-class facility that meets the spiritual and physical needs of those who use it.
Our active membership is 275 persons, with several more who are attending regularly. Our pastor, the Rev. Jim Davidson, has been in our pulpit since March of 1997, making him the second longest tenured pastor in the history of our church. The church employs an Office Manager, Organist, Director of Music, Pianist, Preschool Director and teachers, Custodians, and a Groundskeeper. Our church members are all considered "ministers" of the church as they live their lives for Christ.
The Administrative Council oversees the activities of the various church committees. These include the Laity Council (coordinating leadership for the activities of the church), Finance, Outreach (Missions and Evangelism), Youth Fellowship, Education, and Membership Care (Visitation, Worship and Newcomers). Our church Trustees oversee the care of our facility and the Staff/Parish Relations Committee coordinates the relationship between the church and its hired employees. A multitude of small committees organize numerous events and activities for the congregation and our community.
Coalbush Church has five adult Sunday School Classes, spanning all ages, interests, and styles of teaching. Our children's Sunday School Classes are divided by age group: Preschool, 1st through 5th grade, and Jr/Sr High.
The United Methodist Youth Fellowship (YF) meets on Sunday nights for devotions, games, and fellowship. On alternating summers, they go to Senior High Camp or on a mission trip. In the summer of 2009, they went on a mission trip to Louisiana to help with hurricane recovery, having previously visited Oklahoma, West Virginia, South Dakota, and South Carolina.
The Coalbush Christian Preschool is a vibrant Christ-centered kindergarten preparation school. Classes meet in the mornings or afternoons with the 3/4's meeting next year on Monday, Wednesday & Friday and the Pre-K meeting Monday thru Friday. An afternoon enrichment program is also available to morning students. With a proven curriculum that entertains, teaches, and preaches God's role in the world and in the lives of the children, our graduates get great reviews on their academic and social preparedness from our local Kindergarten teachers.
The Preschool is considered an outreach mission of the church.
Coalbush Church has many special activities and events during the year. We have fish fries, a salad luncheon, rummage sales, a cookie walk, and a trivia night each year. We have special services at Christmas and Easter, and an autumn celebration in October. Men's basketball plays on Mondays & Thursday nights at 7:30. The United Methodist Women have regular meetings and craft nights. Local Boy Scout and Girl Scout troops meet at our church in the evening, as well as a TOPS group Tuesday mornings. Walking to music meets on Wednesday mornings at 8:00am.
Our largest outreach activity of the year is our food booth at the St. Joseph County 4-H fair. This effort requires the work of a majority of our congregation and serves hundreds of meals to hungry fairgoers during the usually sweltering hot week of 4-H activities. Located between the livestock show arena and the Dairy Bar, we are a well-known fixture of the fair, serving exhibitors, families, fairgoers, and fair workers with love and respect uncommon on the fair circuit.
The Coalbush Church has existed at the corner of Bremen Highway and Jackson Road for decades.
Four Churches. One Site. One God.
Beginning in 1856 when the 36-member German evangelical church became known as the Kohl Busch Kirche, there has been a worshiping congregation at the corner of Jackson Road and Bremen Highway. A structure that measured just 32' x 36', the church was a simple building of poplar siding and oak shingles.
When a storm destroyed the first church in 1886, members used the same foundation and framework and completed the "new" church with a new roof and siding. Changes were also made to the entrance and windows. This church was dedicated in 1887.
In 1905, a brick church was built. The 1887 church was moved to the northwest corner of Jackson Road and Bremen Highway. The new church was 56' x 41' and had a bell tower containing a 1,200-pound bell. Total cost: $6000. There were 50 members of the Coalbush Evangelical church at the time it was dedicated. In 1946, with the merger of the Evangelical and United Brethren churches, Coalbush became known as Coalbush Evangelical United Brethren Church.
In 1950, a basement for a new church was begun south of the brick church, with a tunnel connecting the two structures. The basement phase cost $50,000. The upper portion of the limestone church was begun in June 1958 and completed in August 1959 at a cost of about $225,000. In 1968, the Methodist church merged with the Evangelical United Brethren church and our church is now known as Coalbush United Methodist Church.
The present church structure was erected in 1959. In the spring of 2005, ground was broken for the addition that holds our Family Life Center, which includes classrooms, offices, the Preschool, storage, a vaulted foyer, elevator, and the multipurpose room with full-court basketball and volleyball. Completed in March 2006, the Family Life Center has dramatically expanded our possibilities for outreach and ministry.
Through four buildings on one corner, there has always been one God. And as we look ahead to phase two of our building expansion, we look back on our forefathers (and mothers) who stepped out in faith and say "thank you" for their part in expanding God's kingdom.
