For the last six years, the members of Wallace Presbyterian Church had been awaiting their promised land.
They left their old building, started constructing a new one and have since met weekly at Northwestern High School in Hyattsville. Church members went through a weekly ritual of setting up and removing speakers, chairs and other equipment into the school's dimly-lit auditorium.
"It's been a nomadic lifestyle," said the Rev. Scott Bridges, the church's pastor. "But everybody was a good sport about it."
The patience of Bridges and his 400-member congregation was finally rewarded when the church opened its new building at 3725 Metzerott Road on Saturday afternoon in College Park.
The center of the new, uniquely round, seven-sided building is its worship area which has skylights, a high, steeple ceiling and seats as many as 450 people.
"The thing that I love is how bright and warm and friendly everything is," said Bridges, who moved to University Park from Santa Barbara, Calif. to head the church last August. "Everybody is able to see everybody else."
The worship center has a second-level balcony and is flanked by four modules — wings for child care, administration, utilities and a lobby. Church members hope to eventually add three more modules, including a large multi-purpose fellowship hall.
"I think it's wonderful," said Mabel Sawhill, 95, of Silver Spring, a church member since 1943. Sawhill liked the building's new kitchen, which will be used to prepare food for church events.
Wallace Presbyterian was founded in 1910 in Washington, D.C. and relocated to Hyattsville in 1959. Upon deciding a newer building was needed, the church sold its Hyattsville building in January 2003, which paid about half the cost of the new $6.5 million church. The other half was paid for by member donations.
The new church was expected to be completed in 2008, but construction was delayed by setbacks including soil quality issues, a contractor switch and a propane heater mishap that sprayed soot throughout the building and shut down construction for three months.
"This took a lot longer than we thought it was going to take," said Marty Rabenhorst, 55, of University Park, a 36-year church member and leader of the new building's design team. "But the Lord sort of blessed us and preserved us."
The congregation held its first worship service inside the church on Sunday. About 300 to 350 members attend weekly, ranging from decades-long members to students from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Bridges hopes the new building will attract new members and serve as a resource for not just the congregation but also surrounding residents. The church and its House at the Crossroads, an adjacent cultural center, will host exercise classes, art exhibitions, English language classes and other events.
"It'll be a place where we can bless the community and serve the community," Bridges said.
