At River Hills Community Church, we believe that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. As Jonathan Edwards, the leader of the Great Awakening in the 18th century wrote:
"The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to Heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant experiences here. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives or children, or the company of earthly friends are but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams. God is the ocean."
We yearn to be a church that brings glory to God by displaying the joy and contentment that comes when He takes His place at the center of His people's lives.
Our Mission
Our purpose, or why we exist, is to display the greatness of God.
Isaiah 43:6-7 & I Corinthians 10:31; Ephesians 3:10-11
Our mission is to declare the greatness of God and serve others for joy and His honor.
II Corinthians 4:1-6
Our Vision
We are persuaded the surest road to joy is in the discovery that God himself, revealed in Jesus Christ, is the treasure we were meant to seek. We know there are many people in the greater Janesville area who are not connected to a local church. We want to be a place for them to find that God is worthy of energetic pursuit and then help them take the next appropriate step in that pursuit.
We hope, by the grace of God, to be joined by hundreds of people from Janesville who are not currently attending church. It is our intention to help establish churches in other parts of Rock County to help additional hundreds join in the happy pursuit of God.
We want to be a place where young and old and those in between join together in that quest. We are convinced that the generations need each other and that a glad fellowship of young and old clearly displays the greatness of our God. Our worship style reflects this commitment. We have a “blended” style of worship that seeks to honor both the traditional and the contemporary.
We aim to be a place where children grow to become faith-filled adults. We are convinced that motivating, equipping and supporting parents to “bring their children up in the training and instruction of the Lord” is the most important thing that we as a church can do to accomplish our aim.
If you already have a church, please pray for us as we seek to be a church that warmly invites all who desire to know God better to join us in seeking Him. If you have no church, come and join with us in discovering that God himself is the source of all happiness.
Our Values
We believe that sound biblical teaching creates and sustains love for God and people.
We believe that loving relationships should permeate every aspect of a Christ follower’s life. We aim for people to find friends and feel at home in our church.
We believe that without Christ we can do nothing, therefore, a growing devotion to both corporate and personal prayer is vital.
We believe in God-centered, Christ dependent, Holy Spirit empowered, biblically faithful, historically connected, musically diverse corporate worship.
We believe that God aims to use our church to bring some of his lost sheep in Rock County into his fold through proclaiming the gospel to those currently outside Christ’s church, through serving the needy (like the poor, the disabled, the elderly, etc.) and by planting other churches in Rock County.
We believe that coming to faith in Christ and growing in faith is a process. Therefore, our church will be a place where people are warmly accepted and helped, no matter where they are at in the process.
We believe participation in a small group is an essential means by which people grow spiritually in our church. We are a church OF small groups, not a church that HAS small groups.
We believe that parents are the best and primary teachers of spiritual truth to their children. We believe children become faith-filled adults by being with faith-filled adults.
We believe all we are and have comes from and belongs to God and is to be used for his purposes. Therefore, every follower of Christ is to use his or her gifts and abilities to serve God, his people and his world in every way he calls him or her. Also he calls each of us to generously and cheerfully give of our financial resources for the furthering of God’s work in the world.
We believe it is God’s will that people from every tribe, language, people and nation know and love Christ. Therefore, our church will fully participate in God’s global mission, which is to plant churches in every “people group” on earth.
For more information, view our Constitution and Bylaws.
For a look at our statement of faith, visit the Evangelical Free Church's web site at www.efca.org.