The Long Road Home

For nearly two years, Epoch Church had been homeless. After selling their downtown building in 2022, they became nomads, meeting on Sunday nights at First Baptist and then at Grace United before returning to First Baptist. 

One week, Grant Harrison didn’t know where they’d meet for the upcoming Sunday.

He and Nathan James, Epoch’s co-pastors, looked all over Little Rock, but nothing was working out. Sunday was coming, and they didn’t have a place to meet. Grant knew he had to tell the congregation.

“We don’t know yet,” he told them. He braced for the reaction. He’d understand if people were frustrated. They hadn’t met in one place consistently for a long time. He was ready to hear complaints or questions about whether leadership knew what they were doing.

Instead, he heard: “Just tell us where we’re meeting. Whatever you find is fine. We’ll be there.”

That moment has stuck with Grant. “There was never ‘You’re not meeting our expectations.’ It was always ‘We’re a church family. We’re in this together. We’ll figure it out.’” 

Epoch Church has been on the move for 20 years. And while their location might have changed, one thing hasn’t: their belief that church isn’t a place. It’s a people.

California Dreamin’

Grant and Nathan have been lifelong friends. They met in elementary school, but didn’t become close until college. While studying at Ouachita Baptist University, they served together in a college ministry called Refuge. Grant led worship, and Nathan preached. It was a good pairing.

They both served at First Baptist Arkadelphia under Pastor Clay Cunningham. Their time at First Baptist Arkadelphia gave them a glimpse of what church could be. “We started seeing that church is not ‘Youth do this, older people do that.’ It’s a family. This is what it means to be a part of the family of God,” Grant says. 

During their last year at Ouachita, Grant and Nathan were thinking about life after graduation. Friends from California invited them to visit and check out Cal Baptist University. Grant and Nathan were more than intrigued. After graduation, they packed up everything and headed west. “We were done with Arkansas. We were never coming back.” 

California was sunshine and beaches. And there were plenty of work and ministry opportunities. “We loved it. We still have great friends there.” Occasionally, they’d talk to friends and family in Arkansas. Both of them heard something in those conversations. Many of their friends from Ouachita didn’t have any real connection to a church community. “They would go to a different church every week because that was just something to do.” 

Grant and Nathan felt the Lord stirring. “Maybe the Lord wants us to go back to Arkansas.” But they weren’t sure. However, the more they talked to people back home, the clearer it became—God was calling them back. To do what? That part still wasn’t clear.

In 2005, they moved back to Arkansas with no plan. “We were just going to see what happens. We never thought about starting a church.” Grant and Nathan saw the people around them. They were hungry for something different. When the idea of planting a church came up, friends told them, “We want to do that.” 

“You have to remember this was 2005,” Grant says. “There wasn’t a ton of church planting going on. We didn’t have a mother church. Nobody was sending us. So, it was really simple. Let’s get together.”

On July 31, 2005, twelve people met at the Capitol Bistro in downtown Little Rock for an evening worship service. Despite having no plan or strategy, Grant and Nathan were now pastors of a church plant. 

Aging Out

For nearly 17 years, downtown was home to Epoch. After starting at Capitol Bistro, they moved to the Legacy Hotel. From there, they met at the Junior League on 4th and Scott. Eventually, they landed at a space on South Main for eight years before purchasing their own building across the interstate on 9th and Main. They stayed there for about a decade.

In the beginning, the church grew through relationships. Congregants invited their friends, neighbors, and co-workers. But downtown residents were less open. “Most of the people had an experience with church that was not great,” Grant says. “These were younger people working in coffee shops and delis. They were a lot more liberal in their thinking and living. They didn’t want anything to do with churches. For the first time in my life, I was hesitant to tell someone I was a pastor.”

Building relationships with their neighbors was slow. “It took about 10 years before we really started seeing fruit downtown,” Grant says. Sometimes, however, their best efforts had unintended consequences.

When the church met on South Main, they wanted to be involved in the community. But things got complicated. “They thought we wanted to push our beliefs on them. We were part of the leadership for community events. When people found out we held to traditional beliefs, they quit talking to us.”

The church realized it had to take a different approach. “We said, ‘We don’t want to lead anything. We just want to be a part of the community and serve.’” So, they served without expecting anything in return. For example, they helped The Root Cafe build a garden and fence for their restaurant.

By 2019, a pattern had emerged. The church attracted young adults—singles, young couples starting their careers—who liked living downtown. They would come and be an active part of the community. But they’d get married and have kids. Many would leave downtown for the suburbs and churches that could better serve families.

As Epoch’s leadership watched people “age out” and move away, they faced a decision. “Being a young church, we had always wanted older people in our community, but we were young pastors. Most older people probably aren’t going to listen to a 28-year-old pastor. I’m not saying that’s bad. They’ve lived a lot more life than I have.” 

Grant and Nathan wanted Epoch to be multi-generational, but knew they couldn’t force anything. The truth is, becoming multi-generational wasn’t happening downtown. So, that year, the church put its building up for sale, unsure where the next chapter would take them. 

When Community Isn’t Enough

For years, Grant and Nathan had emphasized the importance of community. Deep relationships, having home groups, and being involved in each other’s lives. But then came a season that tested everything. “It was the hardest time I’ve ever been through in ministry,” Grant says. As Grant and Nathan walked alongside their people through that challenging season, “some people just didn’t have legs to stand on.”

Both of them had to face a hard truth. “We were so focused on community that I wonder if we minimized Christ.” The experience forced the two pastors to think about the church’s priorities. “We wanted to make sure that our foundation is not a community. Our foundation is Christ, because community’s going to hurt sometimes,” Grant says.

“If community is your foundation, it’s not going to last. I don’t care how great your relationships are. Everyone’s going to let you down at some point. Your foundation has to be on something solid. We didn’t understand that until after the fact.”

The church came through that season stronger. But when their building finally sold in 2022—three years after putting it on the market—Epoch found themselves homeless.

Rolling with the Changes

In 2025, after bouncing from church to church for two years, Epoch moved into a new home in Breckenridge Village. Their first service in the renovated space was this past Easter.

Through all the changes and hardships, Epoch’s people have learned to be flexible. They understand that things don’t often happen quickly in their community. It wasn’t a quick process getting into their new space. “Our people have been 100% about this whole move of the last few years,” Grant says. “They’ve just been amazing.”

They’ve opened their space to other organizations, such as Young Life and Likewise Worship. “We know what it’s like not to have a building. We said that we don’t want a place unless we’re using it—not just for us, but for anybody.” They’ve also started a NextGen group for youth, something they couldn’t do before because they didn’t have youth. Now that they do, they’re involved in different parts of ministry, whether it’s prayer before the service or serving communion. “They’re not separate. To be intergenerational, you’ve got to be it in all aspects.”

Grant knows change is part of church life. “We’re going to have an open house for all the businesses here. That might change how we do things in the community. How’s that going to look? That could change a year from now, but that’s okay. We don’t have to have it figured out. It might sound cheesy, but we’re like clay. Every year, there’s a different shape to us. Sometimes, you’ve got to crush it and start over. If the Lord’s doing it, it’s going to be fine.”

Despite all the changes, one thing has remained constant. “We’re a community that loves the Lord, loves each other, and wants to be the Church wherever the Lord has us. Right now, it’s Breckenridge Village. Who we are as a church is still to reach the lost for Jesus. It may look different than it did downtown, but our goal is still the same. We want to be a church that is a light in Breckenridge Village. We may not be a big church, but it doesn’t take a big church to do some big things for the kingdom.”

We are grateful for the exceptional work of Epoch Church and other churches in our cities that are shining Christ’s light where they are. They are helping the whole Church grow.

Speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him, the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

Ephesians 4:15-16