On January 19, 2025, nearly 100 people gathered at Crosswinds Church in Wilmington, North Carolina, for a launch-day service. Only a year earlier, the church — then called North Pointe — had shrunk to less than 20 congregants and closing the doors seemed a looming possibility.
But despite pastoral turnover and a trend of decline, North Pointe believed God had more in store for their church. North Carolina East’s District Superintendent (DS), Reverend Tim Jones, has similar hopes for the district as a whole: “I want to try to revitalize churches as much as possible without closing churches down.”
About 20 minutes from Wilmington in the town of Leland, Pastor Chris Vernon was leading Crosswinds Church, a vibrant congregation in one of North Carolina’s fastest-growing counties. Pastor Chris had connected with North Pointe’s founding pastor and after that pastor retired, he got to know the new pastor, too. When the second pastor stepped away and North Pointe was seeking new direction, Pastor Chris and his church reached out to offer help.
“The Wilmington church was kind of getting smaller all the time, and they had pretty good facilities,” said DS Jones. With his encouragement, North Pointe and Crosswinds began discussing options. They regularly met to pray.
During one of the last prayer meetings, Pastor Chris found himself asking the Lord for clear confirmation if partnering with the Wilmington church was the right choice. The church in Leland was in the middle of a building project, and connecting a new campus at the same time didn’t make sense. “The timing didn’t seem right from my perspective,” said Pastor Chris.
But that night, God gave him an answer. “We were praying, and I just really felt like the Lord gave me a vision of the church with the roof on fire. But the inside wasn’t burning up — it was just like flames coming from the roof,” Pastor Chris said. “And I felt like the Lord saying to me in that moment that he wanted to rekindle something that had once been there.”
Seconds later, a fire truck raced past outside, sirens blaring. To Pastor Chris, this was extra confirmation. The next night, both churches’ leaders met again, and mapped out North Pointe’s options. The church was not able to hire a full-time pastor, but they were determined to keep their doors open if they could.
“They were a small group of people who just had a heart for Jesus, and they didn’t want to give up. They said that they had seen what God had done all along the way, and … they didn’t feel like God was done yet. They didn’t know how to move forward, but they had just true servants’ hearts,” said Pastor Chris.
After careful consideration, in August 2024, North Pointe determined adoption by Crosswinds was their best path forward. A month later, Crosswinds Church’s executive team agreed to welcome North Pointe to the family and the District Board of Administration approved the partnership.
With their agreement made, they set out to prepare for relaunching the church in Wilmington. A handful of families from Crosswinds in Leland committed to serving in Wilmington for a few months, and Crosswinds also provided pulpit supply while they looked for a campus pastor.
Throughout the process, Pastor Chris said he was impressed to see how North Pointe recognized their needs and accepted changes. “A church can kind of get set in their ways of doing things in a certain way,” he said. “But they were very humble, kind of put their way of doing things to the side and knew that there had to be some new, fresh ways to be able to do things.”
A chance encounter at Starbucks led Pastor Chris to the pastor who eventually took on leadership of the new Crosswinds campus. In November 2024, the church in Wilmington temporarily closed for renovation. They reopened in January 2025 to a crowd of over 90 people coming to celebrate the beginning of Crosswinds Wilmington.
This pattern of larger, healthier churches coming alongside developing churches is one that DS Jones hopes to repeat in the North Carolina East District. He has already seen it carried out in several different ways, from campus partnerships to complete merging to sharing resources until the smaller church can continue on its own.
DS Jones stresses the importance of the weaker church inviting the larger church to help. The model they’ve set up is simple, he said, and “it honors a church that’s really had a great past, but now they’re struggling. It still honors their legacy.”
In Wilmington, the model met with resounding success. Both DS Jones and Pastor Chris are hopeful that similar opportunities will continue to arise as churches in the North Carolina East District grow and support each other.
Jerah Winn is a writer for The Wesleyan Church. She is passionate about sharing stories with others for the glory of God, and she currently resides in Central Indiana.
