Church of the Table: A New Church Plant

Joshua Longbrake, an ordained minister in the Church of the Brethren, recently relocated from the Pacific Southwest District to Chicago. Joshua is excited about  church planting and provided a proposal to the District Leadership Team to begin the Church of the Table. The Leadership Team has enthusiastically endorsed Joshua’s proposal and gave approval by consensus for the ministry to move forward.

Church of the Table will be a Chicago-based, Church of the Brethren affiliated, church plant scheduled to begin in May and will meet, rent-free, in St. John’s Episcopal Church in the Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. Theologically, the church will be devoutly Trinitarian with a high Christology and a firm belief in the importance and reality of the cross, burial, and resurrection of Jesus and its modern day relevance and impact. There will also be an emphasis on the traditional ordinances: baptism, communion, and the washing of feet.

Church of the Table will be service-oriented and outward-focused, adhering to Jesus’ call to go into the world and make disciples.

The name, Church of the Table, comes from the idea that everything leads towards and away from the table, from communion, from the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. All are fed by Jesus and enough is available for any person who sits with the church. The table is open for everyone.

To learn more about Joshua and this new emerging ministry, visit www.churchofthetable.com and www.facebook.com/churchofthetable.