YAKIMA — Songs of praise drifted from musicians and washed over the 100 or so members of the congregation as Restoration Church celebrated its first Sunday service at a new home.
The nine-year-old nondenominational congregation previously operated out of a downtown storefront office and held its Sunday celebrations at the Seasons Performance Hall.
It debuted at its new location on Sunday — the Centro de Fe Spanish Foursquare Church, 1705 W. Chestnut Ave.
A balloon drop and after-service social complete with Krispy Kreme doughnuts — both quite popular with the children attending — helped mark the special occasion.
Lead Pastor Kevin Deyette was all smiles after the 10 a.m. service at Centro de Fe, noting that his congregation is one of three to use the worship site. Centro de Fe meets at 1 p.m. each Sunday, and The Well Church meets there at 5 p.m. on Saturdays.
“We had been a portable church for almost nine years — we had everything in a trailer,” Deyette said. “We’ve been looking for a space to call our own, which would allow us to focus less on set up every week and more on people.”
According to the Restoration Church website, its roots start with West Side Church of Yakima, started by a small group of residents in 1953.
“Over the past 60 years, they have adopted a multiplication method of evangelism, where believers multiply believers, leaders multiply leaders, pastors multiply pastors, and churches multiply churches,” the website states.
In 2000, the elders at West Side began discussing different methods of reaching the Yakima Valley, which prompted the planting of Sun Valley Church at 2002 E. Mead Ave. in 2003; Harvest Community Church in Selah in 2009; and Restoration Church, which officially launched on May 5, 2013.
“We were planted with a vision of reflecting the diversity of our city. A place where your socioeconomic or ethnic background wouldn’t matter — we could all come and worship Jesus together,” Deyette said.
Deyette, who had served the previous seven years at the Madison House youth center in downtown Yakima, was part of the Harvest Community Church plant and has served as lead pastor of Restoration Church since its inception.
Leadership of Restoration Church is provided by its Board of Elders, and Deyette is assisted by Associate Pastor Jacob Hede.
The congregation has 125 to 130 members, with about 25 of them still participating remotely as the COVID-19 pandemic continues.
