Three years ago, Gus Schill, a pastor of an established and successful church, was feeling the need for something new. “I found myself in a maintenance mode,” he says of his ministry, “I was open to some new possibilities.” Having developed a relationship with Dave Desforge, Gus was captivated by his vision for church planting. “The more Dave and I talked, we could see how God was shaping our hearts together in this vision of planting a church.” In April of 2005, after spending a year on Grace’s staff as a church-planting apprentice, Gus launched our first daughter church, Grace Biltmore. An update on Grace Biltmore and a Q & A with Gus follow.
Gus Schill would like you to know: Grace Biltmore is a bit of a mess.
As pastor of Grace’s first church plant, he can’t really find another way to express a central reality. He has no penchant for sugarcoating some hard and sometimes bitter realities. From week to week, for example, he hardly ever knows if there will be enough money to pay salary and rent. Long-term vision often means overlooking a pile of bills. Many of the people who come to his church actually reek of sin. Every day he walks a razor line between success and failure.
“A lot of time,” Schill says with a laugh, “my overriding concern is whether the locks will be changed on the doors Sunday.”
At the same time, Gus will tell you, he’s having the (unexpected) time of his life. “When I first started thinking about planting a church,” he says, “I had a much different picture of what it might look like. I was leaving a church where I had been a pastor for 11 years and had just gotten my doctorate. I was expecting I’d go start First Church, wear a tie and robe, lead my people to success, and work on my Scottish accent from my bully pulpit with my big salary.”
That was before he was struck by grace. And Grace. Having met Dave Desforge in 2000, the two pastors began a casual dialogue. As Gus and Dave began to share a vision and passion for starting a daughter church from Grace, Gus was ready to go. Immediately. Dave asked him to wait. In 2003, Gus came on Grace’s staff with the title of church planting apprentice. So much for the tie and robe.
“Dave wanted me to bask in Grace for a year,” Gus says. “That’s how he phrased it. That was an invaluable time for me. I was allowed to work on some real heart issues that I didn’t even realize were there. During that time, I rediscovered the fact I was a big-time sinner. That’s huge. You can go through years of successful church ministry, and preach and teach it all the time, and never really understand how deeply forgiven you are.”
During that time, Gus says his heart was deconstructed. “There was a graceful confrontation of prejudices, arrogance, and feelings of superiority.” In the environment of Grace, it left him feeling like a lovable mess. And totally dependent on God.
Which brings us back to Grace Biltmore. When Gus started the church in April 2005, the church was self-supportive from week one. The only connection to Grace was the sharing of core values. One and half years later, somewhere between 100 to 130 people gather each week at the Foster Community Center just off of Hendersonville Highway near Asheville. Gus is deeply encouraged by the spiritual environment.
And if it tends to be messy, that’s more than OK with Gus. “The inherent messiness of a church plant actually sometimes helps. It allows a freedom of honesty and creates an environment that says you don’t have to have it all together. It helps us depend on God.”
Or, said in another way, to bask collectively in Grace.
A Q & A with Grace Biltmore Pastor Gus Schill
Where did your passion for ministry come from?
I grew up without really hearing the Gospel. I grew up in church, but it was very much based on a social gospel. I was never really challenged to investigate Christ, or to explore the reality that he died for our sins. Sports was really my God. It wasn’t until my junior year of high school, when my coach encouraged me to attend a Fellowship of Christian Athletes camp, that I became a believer. I came back to tell everyone about Jesus, and that really didn’t go so well. My brother called me a Jesus Freak, and my first efforts at evangelism were a miserable failure.
So a call to ministry didn’t happen right away?
I took coaching jobs at Northwest Missouri State [and later] with South Florida. While I was in Miami, I discovered James Kennedy’s church (Coral Ridge Presbyterian) and his preaching on the cross really was powerful. Four years later, I married my wife Kate and shortly after that I began to attend seminary at Reformed Theological Seminary in Mississippi. After seminary, we moved to Asheville and I was hired by Arden Presbyterian Church where I pastored for 11 years.
What started you thinking about a church plant?
I found myself falling into a maintenance mode at the church I was at. I just felt like I was ready for something different and God was leading me to other possibilities. I remember meeting Dave when he shared his vision about church planting. After that meeting, I called him up and said, ‘Would you consider me?’
What was your relationship with Dave at that time?
I really didn’t have one. I had known Dave from a distance. In fact, I had looked at his church plant over the years with a little bit of suspicion. It was a different style of church. I would hear things in our denomination like ‘Oh, Grace is Presbyterian Light’ in terms of worship style, and I really had some doubts about what was going on.
What changed that?
Dave and I started talking around 2000. Those talks really shook my foundations about passion for ministry, worship, and church. That’s when we first started talking about the possibility of a church plant. The more we talked, we could see how God was shaping our hearts together in this vision of how to plant a church. That was true for my wife and family also. Dave’s idea was for me to come on at Grace and spend some time on staff. We both really valued my relationship with the Arden church community, and didn’t want to create any unnecessary friction. I spent 11 years there with some very dear friends and we loved it.
How difficult was it for you to shift gears?
Grace has a very different style of worship. When I first came to worship at Grace, I looked around for the red flags. ‘Where’s the pulpit, where’s the cross, and what’s with the stage, what’s that about?’ The second time I went a few weeks later, I just sat there and bawled. I found myself worshipping God with this group of people in such a genuine way. My heart was just ripped apart.
Can you put a finger on the difference you experienced?
I’m never sure how to express it. I walked into Grace and I smelled Jesus -- like bread being baked up in the kitchen. It was wonderful. That’s as close as I can come to explaining the difference.
When did you come on staff at Grace to prepare for the church plant?
It was early 2004. I worked as an apprentice – a viable member of pastoral staff for a year.
What was the purpose of coming staff first?
The whole idea was not just training but also just to bask in grace. That’s the way Dave described his desire for my time here: ‘To bask in Grace.’ It was more than just studying and preparing to launch this first church plant. As it turned out, the year didn’t serve us really well in terms of actually starting Grace Biltmore. Because of delays on approval from Presbytery, we ended up starting it in the worst possible scenario – our start-up funds taxed to almost zero, starting the week after Easter with the summer months ahead of us. And the expectation was to be completely self-supporting right out of the gate. But, in a deeper more important way, the year at Grace was invaluable. It was a year for me to deal with huge heart issues. I discovered I had some forgiveness issues I was wrestling with in my own heart with other Christians. Grace helped me sort through some of these issues. During that time, I rediscovered the fact I was a big-time sinner. That’s huge – and it’s so easy to forget. You can go through years of very successful church ministry and preach that and teach it, but never really have the reality touch your heart. The year at Grace renewed with me how deeply forgiven I was, and how much, out of that, I should forgive others. I can’t tell you how core this reality is and how subtly it can get twisted and discarded. In fact, the more success you have in ministry, the more self-deceived you can be.
Was that a painful discovery?
Grace really helped me in providing a balanced environment of honesty, confrontation, the Gospel, hope, and acceptance at the same time. It provided a place where I could live and flourish and at the same time face those dark issues. Those values that you guys print in the church bulletin and most people just glance at, they are so radical – biblical, grateful, interdependent, honest, dependent, hopeful, and creative. In the light of the church culture that surrounds us – the Bible belt – those are realities you really have to immerse yourself in and try to flush out in the process of ministry. People start to find healing in that. I did. It was huge, life transforming.
How can a pastor wander so far from this truth?
Subtly – and I would have never admitted this – I had come to believe that the Gospel was something for unbelievers. In my year at Grace, I learned afresh that the Gospel is for us as believers as an ongoing salvation, a source of renewal, and a necessity for a deep sense of dependence. That was huge. Really huge. I breathed life again and felt life again. And Grace was the place that provided that for me, and I will always be grateful.
How did Dave mentor you?
Not as much as people might imagine. Dave was busy. We did not have this real close one-on-one relationship. But I did bask in Dave’s preaching. And other people on staff like Dean (Cortese) and Colin (Thornley) really did a lot more of the mentoring. I remember one time Colin looking me in the face and saying, ‘You really don’t believe the Gospel do you?’ It really [upset] me. But then I realized it was true. It was a pivotal point for me.
How was your experience at Grace different than what you expected?
When I first started thinking about planting a church, I had a much different picture of what it might look like. I was leaving a church where I had been a pastor for 11 years and I had just gotten my doctorate. I was expecting I’d go start First Church, wear a tie and robe, lead my people to success, and work on my Scottish accent from my bully pulpit with my big salary. And here I was starting at Grace as a church planting apprentice. It was a good humiliation in terms of a necessary humbling. It was a period of heart deconstruction. I learned to confront my own prejudices, arrogance, and superiority.
How have those lessons and realizations served you in the process of planting a church?
The whole thing about church planting is it’s all about finding strength through humility, strength through weakness. In a church plant you are being forced to face the reality that every day you are walking the line between success and failure. In a big church you can throw money and resources at something and it works – at least for a season. At Grace Biltmore, some Sundays our offering is $300. And it’s literally are you going to get paid this week – or are the people who work for you going to get paid – or are you going to be able to pay rent? Often, my overriding concern is – will the locks be changed in the door for us next Sunday. That’s the reality of where we are at. And that really isn’t a bad reality – it teaches you absolute dependence on God.
Overall, where would you say Grace Biltmore is at right now?
We’re getting by every week. We often wonder how we are going to pay the mortgage on Thursday, and then something unexpected happens on Wednesday. A lot of people assume we are helped with funds from Grace as the mother church. That’s not the reality. We are totally self-supporting and have been since we started. We are connected to Grace mostly in what we share in terms of value and mission. We are creating a ministry that Grace has been able to create over the years – a place where hurting people can come, people in need of renewal and life, people who are in process or questioning. We are seeing those same kind of people come to Grace Biltmore. It’s not the typical power church, victorious mode, you can’t out-give God message. A lot of people can’t afford to give. And some people who do give, we almost feel like we should give it back. I never understood the power of the widow’s mites before.
But I don’t get the feeling you are overly concerned.
The financial realities can be troubling, but that’s not the core of what really defines a church. At Grace Biltmore, the spiritual climate is good and that is what we are most encouraged about. The thing that I smelled when I came to Grace, I smell it at Grace Biltmore too. Those are things you can’t mass-produce and market and figure out different forms to make it happen. I think people are finding a place to heal and grow in a climate of grace. I look out every Sunday and see people who are going through some big-time sin issues that feel comfortable worshipping. Those are people who might be shunned in other churches. I think people are being moved by and toward God.
How central is the message of grace to your church?
There a lot of wounded people. It’s hard to say that without sounding like ‘Hey we’re just a bunch of misfit toys.’ But we are a bunch of misfit toys. A lot of people have been wounded by the church, or the church’s expectations, or have been around the church for most of their lives where they no longer wrestle with their spirituality. What we see at Grace Biltmore is a lot of people who are beginning to wrestle with grace. A lot of them are just like me – they have understood what Grace is for a long time and misunderstood what grace is for a long time. It’s neat to see people understand and be grabbed by grace differently in the life of a church plant. It’s really quite exciting. I had a preacher’s kid come up to me recently. He told me, ‘I’m discovering that I’m afraid of God, and I’ve been afraid of him all my life. And I’m just starting to notice that I’m coming out of church and I feel good, I feel loved. I don’t feel guilty.’ And that’s just one story. Those are huge things.
Have you given up on your idea of robe and tie, bully pulpit, and big salary?
[Laughing] A church plant environment provides permission for people to be a mess. If Grace Biltmore was an established church, a lot of the people who are coming might not be coming. They would just move from church to church where the subtle message is – go get your act together and then you can come and be a part of us. There is an inherent messiness to church planting that allows a freedom of honesty or an environment that says you don’t have to have it together. We can stay loose and roll with the punches.
From a pastor’s perspective what are your current concerns?
It’s been hard to help people gel relationally. In a church plant, the pressure is for the pastor to be everyone’s best friend. The pastor is kind of like the hub in the wheel for other relationships. I will be more encouraged when people start bypassing me and start crossing over to build relationships with each other. But a core of loving people is starting to come together and that has been good.
What have you learned as a pastor?
Pastoring a church plant like Grace Biltmore has been a much different experience than my previous ministry. We have a lot of people who are coming who I had never been exposed to before. I have been accustomed to working with people who were college educated, well groomed, who send their children to private schools, who drive the right cars, and are, for the most part, good looking. At Grace Biltmore, you are sometimes afraid to peel back the first layer because you are afraid of what you might be exposed to. God is teaching me to love people, who I first look at and wonder, ‘Do I want to really invest the emotional and relational drain this person might put on my life?’ God is convicting me of my lack of love. He is delivering me of so much of my superiority. From a pastoral perspective, I feel Grace Biltmore is having a lot more of an impact on me than I am having on them. I see pastoring a lot more as a two-way street than I ever did before.
OK, I’ve got to ask the question. What are your numbers?
We meet in a gymnasium with anywhere between 100 and 130 people on a Sunday.
What is your vision for Grace Biltmore’s future?
Let’s see, this Sunday I’m preaching at Grace. That’s about it. [Laughs]. I want Grace Biltmore to be part of a church-planting process for our area. I still want us to be part of Grace although there always hasn’t been much of a connection. We still see ourselves as an extension of Grace’s ministry. So any talk that Grace has about church planting, we are still very much excited about. We think we should be a part of that. I don’t know what that looks like, but we feel we can have a role. It’s still all fresh for us so we can be flexible. I would also like to see us expand our staff. I would also like to better reflect a lot of creativity that Grace reflects.
What has been the relationship between Grace and Grace Biltmore?
I think it can be better on both ends. We are two churches. Everyone gets busy. I think both churches regret that there has been some sense of disconnect between us. I believe we can do better. We very much want to stay connected with what Grace is doing.
Grace Biltmore meets 10 a.m. each Sunday at the Foster Community Center located behind Foster Seventh Day Adventist Church, just south of I-40, exit 50A across from the Huddle House on Highway 25. For more information, contact Gus at 329-5766 or visit the church’s website, http://gracebiltmore.org/index.htm.
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