McKinney Memorial Bible Church changing name
What’s in a name? that which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet … – Juliet, Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene II, William Shakespeare, c.1594–96
McKinney Memorial Bible Church, a 3,000-person congregation at 4805 Arborlawn Drive in Fort Worth officially becomes Doxology Bible Church Sunday, Oct. 28.
“The new name for this 65-year-old congregation is intended to reflect its ever evolving mission of making a difference in Fort Worth, as well as eliminate increasingly frequent misunderstandings about the church’s location,” church officials said.
(Clue: It’s not in McKinney, Texas.)
The church formed Feb. 6, 1954, the church said on its website.
“The church was originally named “McKinney Memorial Church” in honor of Dr. Samuel McKinney, a Bible teacher in Fort Worth who had a passion for teaching the Bible in a winsome way, and for what God was doing all over the world. He was seen as a prototype of the kind of person McKinney Memorial Church was hoping to develop and launch. He broke ground on the church’s first building on his 91st birthday,” the website said.
The church voted June 24 to change the name.
In an extended website posting, the church noted that in 1954, McKinney, Texas was only a dot on a map, and “hardly a place a person from Southwest Fort Worth would think about on a regular basis. However, today that is no longer the case.”
The church explained the choice of the name Doxology Bible Church, saying “it is the story of God and our church,” and is derived from two different words – Doxa: The way God displays who He is and what He’s like and Logos: The way God declares who He is and what He’s like.
“Doxology means: To display and declare who God is and what He’s like everywhere we go,” the explanation on the website said.
The church listed three reasons for the name change:
Identity Confusion: “In the past few years the rise of video venues and multi-site churches has made our name increasingly confusing, and frequently a barrier. We consistently hear stories of neighbors who initially say “no” to an invitation because they don’t want to drive an hour to get there, relatives who mistakenly book a hotel room in the wrong city because of our name, people who decided not to come to our church because they believed we were a satellite campus of another church, and people who have driven all the way to McKinney, Texas for a funeral, wedding, or worship service. Like the early church in Acts 15, we want to be quick to remove anything that is a barrier to people who are turning to God.”
Vision: “From the very first day it was planted, McKinney Memorial Bible Church had a vision to be the best possible church for our city. Wendell Johnston, McKinney’s first full-time pastor still tells the story of prayer-walking through a brand-new neighborhood in Southwest Fort Worth called Wedgewood, praying that God would use the people of this new church to reach the people of Fort Worth. However, it’s increasingly hard to be the best church for a city whose first thought when they hear our name is of a city 60 miles away.”
Opportunity: “You rarely get a second chance to make a first impression. We believe God has given us that opportunity as a church. To re-introduce ourselves to a city, while standing on the shoulders of our past. And to re-dedicate ourselves to being a church who exists to proclaim the glory of God (Doxology) wherever we live, work, play and worship. From the city where we live, to the ends of the earth.”
The name change does not signal other planned changes in the church or its practices, it said on the web site.
“Though in some ways we hope to continue the tradition of continual change for the sake of reaching our city with the gospel, we currently have no other significant changes on the horizon. This is another reason why this is the perfect time to change our name. It allows us to remind ourselves that we are not changing our name in order to change who we are as a church, because nothing else is changing. We are changing our name to live into who we already are as a church,” the website said.
doxology.church
– FWBP Staff