The Vine News

Just days after celebrating 40 years of serving the community, the congregation of Kettering Baptist Church had something else to shout about – the promise of a new worship center.

Pastor Bucas Sterling III broke ground on the 27-acre site off Route 301 in Upper Marlboro, MD in mid November, reaching a landmark in what has already been a three-year journey to build a new home for the Kettering, MD church.

The church’s current sanctuary seats about 250, which it fills for a 7 am service weekly. The later morning service, which draws about 600 people, is held at Eleanor Roosevelt High School auditorium at 10:15 am.

The new worship center will seat approximately 1500.

Sterling told congregants that he has seen the hand of the Lord in the process: keeping the price on the property steady at $1.2 million during a real estate run a few years ago while the church was conducting a 12-month study of the property for building feasibility, and more recently, providing a blessing few would have expected in the middle of the worst national recession in decades.

“By God’s amazing grace we were able to completely pay off this property this past Thursday,” he told the crowd of about at least 200, who later cheered and shouted as he plunged a golden shovel into the soggy turf to break the ground.

Sterling said it was solely through donations from members that the church has paid for all the preliminary studies, architectural drawings and purchased the property, which is approximately 10 miles from its current building at the corner of Central Ave. and Kettering Drive.

Building could begin as early as spring, Sterling said, and could take up to two years to complete.

The church plans on keeping its current building will be used to house other churches or community purposes, Sterling said.