Palm Sunday 2004 was filled with loud "Hosannas!" at St. Thomas Lutheran Ministries in Phoenix. The celebration began with 78 voices singing praises to God in English at 9:00 a.m. at the Phoenix campus. At 10:30 a.m., 150 people raised their "Hosannas!" in Spanish to the Palm Sunday King.

Meanwhile, our first worship took place at the Goodyear Campus (west of Phoenix) at 11:00 a.m. In a remodeled garage with limited seating for 80 people, over 110 voices sang praise to our Palm Sunday King. People were scattered in the nave, narthex, fellowship room, and outside the building. The day ended with eighteen more people joining in worship on the Phoenix campus at an evening service, designed for those Spanish-speaking members whose jobs do not allow for morning worship. What a day of blessings for God's people!

(From left) William Meier and Timothy Otto, pastors at St. Thomas Lutheran Ministries, Phoenix/Goodyear, Ariz., preside over the cornerstone laying service for their new worship center.

Early in the 1990s, St. Thomas, Phoenix, Ariz., found itself shrinking in numbers as dramatic changes occurred in the neighborhood. Since then, the Hispanic population has grown from about 40 percent to 85 percent in the four miles surrounding our Phoenix campus. In consultation with the Arizona District Mission Board, we offered our facility and services for Hispanic outreach, provided our fellow believers in WELS would allow us to call a Spanish-speaking missionary for this outreach.

In 1997 God answered our prayers by providing Pastor Timothy Otto and his wife, Jenny, to take on this effort. God's blessings continued to multiply under their faithful labors. But what were we, the shrinking and aging Anglo part of the congregation, to do in an area with no potential growth for Anglo-ministry? In consultation with the Arizona District Mission Board, we were authorized to begin exploration in the southwest part of the Valley of the Sun in 1998.

We began to target the community of Goodyear, 14 miles west of our Phoenix campus. At present, Goodyear has 45,000 residents (one-third Hispanic) and is projected to grow by almost 250,000 in the next ten years.

Members talk outside their new worship center after the first service held there.

God gave us the opportunity to purchase a ten-acre parcel less than a mile south of I-10 in Goodyear. This property includes a 3,600 square-foot home that will be used as a directed care home, and a 2,200 square-foot garage/apartment that will be remodeled into a worship center.

Currently, we are in the process of completing a four-classroom facility, which will serve as our Early Childhood Education Center and be used for outreach to the families of our community. A pre-school/daycare and kindergarten/third-grade program will be started here. 

None of this would have been possible without the partnership of the Board for Home Missions, WELS Church Extension Fund, and the synod's North American Outreach emphasis. With growing Anglo and Hispanic ministries at two locations, with the prospect of a new Christian school, with the plan in place to open a directed care home in the near future, our congregation gives thanks for the privilege of being involved in so many opportunities to reach the lost with the gospel message.

William Meier is pastor at St. Thomas Lutheran Ministries, Phoenix/Goodyear, Arizona.