Our Story

In the 1990s, Murfreesboro began seeing significant population growth to the point that it became one of the fastest growing cities in the United States. Our original ONE CHURCH Calvary campus was founded by Dr. Mark Gregory as a result of a call to reach this growing population with the good news of Jesus Christ.

Beginning on March 1, 2000, this newly formed congregation met on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University and subsequently at several different locations until the church was able to purchase 40 acres of land in north Murfreesboro. On July 11, 2004, upon the completion of our first worship facility we began worshipping at 431 Dejarnette Lane.

From our very inception, Dr. Mark emphasized an adherence to the Word of God and taught it faithfully for 19 years. When Dr. Gregory received the call to teach as a Bible college professor in 2019, the church searched for a pastor who would continue to faithfully teach the Word and lead us to becoming a church that looks more and more like Murfreesboro. After a nationwide search for seven months, Calvary called Pastor Steve Willis to be its second pastor.

Steve began his ministry in the first weeks of the COVID-19 crisis which required his first Sundays at Calvary to be preached outdoors. Remarkably, during those challenging months, our church became one of the 2% of American churches that grew during the pandemic, growing from an average attendance in the mid 200s to over 700 by 2022.

Our church family continues to grow stronger and deeper! As from the beginning, at the heart of Calvary’s ministry philosophy is a commitment to becoming more and more of a congregation that not only looks like the demographics of Murfreesboro, but behaviorally looks as much like the 1st-century apostolic church as possible. To this end we seek to worship God in spirit and truth, to faithfully teach the Bible as has been once for all given to the saints, to fellowship with one another in good times and bad, and to express our faith through prayer, evangelism, and service. Nearly all of our members WORSHIP ONE, SERVE ONE, & CONNECT ONE, that is, we participate weekly in a worship service, serve the church body in some capacity, and meet in smaller fellowship groups to encourage one another in our daily walks with Christ.

Because of this philosophy, we do not run a lot of programs, we focus on relationships, and we do not expect members to participate in countless ministries. We want our members to be involved in community activities as a witness for Christ and we do not want to detract from the primary ministry that most of us have in our homes. Consequently, we simply ask our members to joyfully participate in one weekly worship service, humbly serve in one weekly ministry for an hour or two, and relationally connect for an hour-long prayer and fellowship time with their small group on a weekly basis. This way everyone worships, everyone serves, and everyone connects in a way that provides balance, growth, and still have time to focus on our families and other community relationships.

This simple church philosophy, we believe, has led to our growth within our community. And, due to our ministry values and rapid growth, we have decided to plant more congregations around Murfreesboro instead of becoming a “mega” one campus church. These additional campuses will look like the early church in that they did not compete with one another, but instead viewed themselves as one, unified church that met in several cooperating congregations throughout the city (Acts 15:3-4; 1 Cor. 1:2; Rev. 2:1; et al). It is our hope to launch a new congregation that will be a part of the ONE CHURCH network by the end of 2023. At that time we will send out some of our members to another section of town, probably on the south/west side of Interstate 24, and that new congregation, along with our Calvary congregation, will function as ONE CHURCH under the leadership of one group of elders/pastors led by our Senior Pastor Steve Willis.

If this vision sounds exciting to you, we would love it if you would contact us at info@onechurch.org. We always looking for people who want to love and serve Jesus with us and reach our community for Christ. To this point in our journey, the Lord has provided, directed, and blessed this work. We are so thankful for the manner in which He has led us to develop and expand the work of His Church. We are confident that the best is yet to come!