Mental Health, Recovery, & Addiction
Foster & Adoptive Care
Social Justice & Racial Reconciliation
Poverty, Food Insecurity, & Income Inequality
Church Planting & Global Missions
One of the most important questions we ask each other at Grace Hills is, What breaks your heart? How you answer that questions says a lot about how God has wired you to serve him and impact his world.
The Bible tells us in Acts 17 that “While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was deeply distressed to see that the city was full of idols.” (Acts 17:16)
In other words, Paul was stirred and agitated by the spiritual brokenness of one of the world’s foremost centers of art and intellect. And his heartbreak didn’t simply turn into resentment. His heartbreak drove him to act. A few verses later, he is sharing the good news about Jesus with the Athenians.
There are five signature issues we have identified as a church that break our hearts and move us to action. We want to do something about the problems we identify in the world around us, applying the truth and grace of the gospel to the situations that hurt people and keep them trapped in spiritual blindness.
1. Mental Health, Recovery, and Addiction
When we started Grace Hills, we wanted to create an atmosphere in every worship service that would make people feel welcome to bring their hurts, habits, and hangups with them. We would fight against faking it and strive for real authenticity so that we are genuine when we say that we’ve ALL been broken and we can ALL find healing together in Jesus.
We want to address mental health issues regularly, challenging the stigma around depression, anxiety, and many other mental illnesses. And we want to help people find the right tools and resources, especially the resource of community through Grace Groups where everyone is welcome.
2. Foster Care and Adoption
At any given time in Arkansas, there are hundreds of children awaiting placements in caring homes for foster care or adoption. We want to work closely with organizations and agencies to help identify potential families that can meet the need and then we want to support and minister to those families who embrace the challenge.
3. Social Justice and Racial Reconciliation
Social justice refers to the work we do to make sure everyone is treated fairly and equally in this world – that things that are wrong and unfair are made right. We pursue social justice when we speak up and advocate for the poor, the marginalized, and the disenfranchised. When we fight against human trafficking, volunteer at a crisis pregnancy center, or get involved in local policy issues.
Racial reconciliation refers to the ongoing work of uprooting the sin of racism on both an individual and a systemic level. We affirm the existence of systemic racism and believe it stems from the fallen nature of sinful humanity. So we engage in hard conversations with a listening ear and seek to break down the walls of injustice that threaten our peace so that we can truly come together.
This is God’s eternal vision for the church – a body of people from every tribe, nation, and language worshipping as one.
4. Poverty, Food Insecurity, and Income Inequality
Jesus saw the throngs of hungry people in his day and was moved with compassion to feed them. Today, we continue to engage in the work of feeding the hungry, helping those who are food insecure, and addressing inequalities and disparities in our local community.
And we want to do far more than simply giving away food and resources. We want to address poverty from spiritual, educational, and political angles to offer people a hand up to a more secure life. This is why we’ve formed a strong partnership with a local elementary school with a high percentage of students coming from food-insecure families.
5. Church Planting and Global Missions
We are a church plant. In 2011, Saddleback Church in southern California blessed and sent our founding pastors to Northwest Arkansas to plant Grace Hills. Since then, we’ve directly planted three daughter churches and have partnered with other planters. We want to multiply the work of sharing the good news by establishing worshipping communities of Jesus followers.
We also believe that the good news about Jesus is the best message anyone can hear, especially for those who have never heard the good news before. So we send missionaries to other parts of the world like Lebanon and Papua New Guinea to groups of people who haven’t heard about Jesus yet to introduce them to the love of God.
Organizations With Whom We Work
We don’t believe it is necessary to pioneer every work or re-invent the wheel when it comes to fixing these issues, so we partner on a financial, promotional, and volunteer level with various organizations, including…
For the Love NWA – A food truck located in downtown Bentonville that feeds neighbors every Thursday night.
Grace F. Hill Elementary School – A local elementary school with many kids coming from food-insecure families.
The CALL in NWA – Equipping foster and adoptive parents to help children experience the love of Christ.
Compassion International – Feeding hungry children and releasing children from poverty.
International Justice Mission (IJM) – A global organization that protects the poor from violence throughout the developing world.
Loving Choices – Pregnancy resource center in Northwest Arkansas serving all women with FREE and CONFIDENTIAL services.
Micah’s House – A transitional home for young men.
Soul’s Harbor – A transitional home for men in recovery.
Havenwood – Serving single mothers and their children.
Saving Grace – A transitional home for young women.
Help One Now – A global ministry that helps families in developing countries.
Northwest Arkansas Food Bank – serving Northwest Arkansas for 26 years, nourishing NWA communities by feeding hungry people.
Salvation Army NWA Shelter – A faith-driven, non-profit organization embracing the hungry and hurting of Northwest Arkansas to find Hope and experience life change.
Samaritan Community Center – A local non-profit providing affordable resources and services to address poverty.