In the beginning…
Pastor Greg Rohlinger and his wife, Lori, started Palm Valley Church in July 2000 with 3 other couples – meeting in the Rohlinger’s living room.
The first public service…
On October 1, 2000 Pastor Greg stood out in front of the “church” at the Palm Valley Cinemas in Goodyear, Az and prayed that people would show up. One or two cars pulled up and then drove away, but soon enough people started arriving – 148 to be exact.
G-R-O-W-T-H
A second Sunday service was added after 14 months to accommodate the growing church family – approximately 400 people. Within another 14 months, Palm Valley had outgrown the theatres and moved to Desert Edge High School. We quickly grew to 900 people.
Flexibility
With attendance at 1,600 Greg was inspired to start a Saturday evening service to reach people who couldn’t attend on Sunday mornings. Many NFL fans thanked him.
Continued Growth
Over the past few years our continued growth has lead us to look beyond the facilities of a High School to continue to carry out the mission that God has called us to. Palm Valley Church owns 40 acres at I-10 and Verrado way. As the economy turned over the last few years, our building plans at this location had to be put on hold, but we knew that God had a greater opportunity for us. Having grown to more than 2500 in attendance it was obvious that Desert Edge High School would not hold us forever. During the winter of 2009/2010 we purchased the storefronts and began renovating what is now the home of Palm Valley Church. Our first service in this location was held in June of 2010. This building will be an incredible launch pad for ministry to the west valley. We know that a church is not a building, it is the people.
This isn’t what I expected
Palm Valley may be different, but it’s different for a reason. We want people to feel welcome no matter who they are, where they come from or what they’ve done. We’ve always said “Come as you are.” We want church to be relevant, inspiring and exciting and put a personal relationship with Christ ahead of “organized religion”. If you want to find out more about why we do what we do, come to our Membership Class.