On Monday, April 28 at BFC Conference, Christ Alone Fellowship, city of Lancaster, PA was received as a Particular Church. Praise the Lord!
Church Planting Beginnings
Seven years ago, Juan Carlos (Los) and Lynette Morales humbly believed God was calling them to plant a Bible Fellowship Church in the city of Lancaster, their hometown, although this is not the first church plant Los and Lynette had been a part of. In 2011, they had planted a church, but at the time they were entrenched in Word of Faith and the prosperity gospel. However, as they came across the teaching and writings of John Piper and R.C. Sproul and others, they began to look deeper into Scripture and how the prosperity gospel did not match up with what scripture says. “My faith was renovated and we knew we needed to leave our church,” said Los. “We left and overnight literally hundreds of people stopped talking to us. It was very painful.”
Joining Church Extension Ministries
In 2018, Los and Lynette found out about Church Extension Ministries who had already begun a small store front ministry in the city of Lancaster called The Center. Los and Lynette took the reins of that along with Romeero Melendez. Lynette and Rome created The CypherSpot which is a breakdancing/catechism ministry for children. Many of the children had no church or Bible background before attending. There was also a woman’s bible study that met at The Center as well as other outreach events.
The Center was a good start but was too small for Sunday Services. So the core group of 17 looked for a different meeting place. In 2019, they found one that was narrow on the second floor of a building, but it made do.
Growing in Discipleship
Los and one of his core group members, Wayne Cooley, also started the Basement, a video podcast to address some of the concerning doctrines they were hearing from their community online. Their goal was to target the people they were working with, but they also ended up with a global audience. But the Basement was structured as an interactive podcast with people listening in to submit questions and comments on the episode’s topic. It was a key teaching tool early on in the church plant’s ministry.
Expositional preaching was also purposefully chosen as a hallmark of Christ Alone Fellowship and makes them stand out among churches in the city. It helps the church stay on track in preaching the word when others have suggested to Los to preach on a particular topic that was in the news. He can easily say no that they are preaching through a particular book of the Bible and they would only work through that book.
In 2020, COVID shut down was a challenge for Christ Alone Fellowship, but they continued to meet and then even went to the Dominican Republic for a missions trip, something Christ Alone has done every year since.
Caroline Street Building
They outgrew the narrow building they were renting and in 2021 God provided a building for purchase on Caroline Street. By God’s grace, He provided for the purchase of the building and to remodel the parking lot, the bathrooms, the stairs, and the downstairs classroom space. When they moved into the building, David Gundrum said they would fill it quickly and sure enough, they did. Now they are at two services and still full and are thinking about planting a daughter church.
The threshold for graduation is 20 committed participants, at least two lay elders, and financially self-supporting. Christ Alone has about 100 committed participants with a Sunday morning attendance of over 250, four lay elders, and is financially self-supporting with Los as a full-time pastor and several part-time supporting staff.
Graduation at BFC Conference
At the presentation at BFC Conference, Los noted his appreciation for David Gundrum who has met with Los monthly to coach him through the church planting process. “David is a father figure to me. I appreciate people who can tell it to me straight, and David can tell it to me straight.”
Los also expressed his appreciation to his wife, Lynette. “I am the introvert and she is the extrovert and comes up with lots of ideas of how to get people together and unique ways to reach out to our community. She is a vibrant woman of God.”
A large contingent of people from Christ Alone were able to join in the celebration at BFC Conference after the church plant’s reception. Their worship team also led us in musical worship – Christ Alone style – which was joyous and uplifting.
On May 4, 2025, Christ Alone Fellowship held their chartering service which recognized their reception into Conference. The committed participants, who were interviewed by the assessment team of Church Extension Ministries in the fall of 2024, signed the charter which formed the first official membership roll of the church. The Bible Fellowship Church is so grateful for the way the Lord has worked to build His church in the city of Lancaster, PA.