Pictured above: Alex Chatman, pastor of Pillar Church Crestview, leads a Sunday morning service where the church convenes at a local elementary school near Eglin Air Force Base.
Editor’s Note: Noah Clifton and Alex Chatman are two of the featured church planters in 2024 Maguire State Mission Offering resources. The statewide 2024 offering goal of $900,000 is earmarked to help reach the 16.7 million Florida residents who do not have a saving relationship with Jesus Christ, with 100% of all receipts designated to help launch church plants in the state.
CRESTVIEW–“In the Book of Acts, Jesus sends out the disciples in twos, so the biblical pattern of church planting is sending guys out in twos,” said Noah Clifton, church planter and pastor at Pillar Church of Crestview.
Alex Chatman, church planter and pastor of Pillar Church of Crestview, spent 26 years in active duty with the United States Marine Corps and has a heart to unite the family of God with his military family. Seeking a church that engaged in church planting, he and his wife found themselves among a dozen members of a church in Virginia that focused on planting churches and reaching military servicemen and women.
The two pastors, along with six families, moved from Virginia to Florida to start Pillar Church of Crestview, which exists to reach U.S. military service members and their families with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The pastors agree that the Lord has blessed the church at every corner. “Every time we turn around, it’s like the Lord has been preparing years in advance, long before we were ever in Florida,” said Clifton, who noted that Chatman was his youth pastor when he was growing up.
Pillar Church meets at a local elementary school just 26 miles north of Eglin Air Force Base.
The location opened the door to the community where they have seen strongholds of sin overcome and lives changed.
“The Lord has blessed us far beyond what we could ever imagine.”
One young student began attending services and fervently inviting others to church. A young couple struggling with addiction to drugs and alcohol couldn’t refuse his persistence. Through discipleship at Pillar Church, they recognized their need for Jesus and found saving faith that broke their addiction. They will be among one dozen new believers baptized this year.
Amid the blessings have been challenges in connecting with the special forces community they’ve hoped to engage with the gospel message. Receiving Maguire State Mission Offering funds will provide freedom for the church to focus on outreach through special events on and off base, provide Bibles for military men and women, and host Bible studies on base.
The two church planters are grateful for ongoing support from the Florida Baptist Convention and Send Network Florida who are “encouraging us and pushing us forward in the work that we have before us,” said Clifton.
“We have a whole organization, a network that is nationwide. We‘re not alone in this church planting effort. We’re part of a larger church family who’s all focused on obeying the Great Commission,” added Clifton.
The church plans to host a children’s STEM camp as an opportunity to share the gospel with the community and display God’s goodness through His creation.
“As we give to the Maguire State Mission Offering, this is what it’s given for, we’re giving it to the expansion of God’s kingdom and the obedience of the Great Commission,” emphasized Clifton, encouraging Florida Baptist churches to continue to give generously to the mission offering.
“The Lord has blessed us far beyond what we could ever imagine.”