EVERETT — South Everett has a secret.
It’s huge. A small sign, barely visible from the street, is the only clue that lets passersby know it’s there.
Behind an oblong commercial building off Airport Road there’s a new 10,000-square-foot youth center.
It’s Sonrise Chapel’s expanded youth wing. It opened in June.
From the outside, the building looks like just another bland office structure.
Until you step inside.
From a second-floor recording studio — where young people will soon be able to mix and record their own worship CDs — you can look through a window down to a sanctuary large enough to seat 300. There’s a 30-foot stage boasting electric guitars, a keyboard, drums and a piano where the worship team can sing and dance. Downstairs, there’s a coffee shop and espresso bar.
And Russ and Kim Babcock are a part of it.
For two decades — half their lives — the Babcocks have been youth pastors at Sonrise Chapel.
They’ve been married for 24 years, have four kids of their own, and have attended Sonrise since its launch in 1986. That’s the year Dan Hammer, lead pastor, started the church as an offshoot of Westgate Chapel.
“This is really unheard of, for a youth pastor to stay so long,” said Rick Michels, a father of six who has attended the church for nine years. “Youth leaders have a tendency to burn out, or to look for a senior pastor’s position far before they come close to 20 years in the same church and same role. Really it’s amazing.”
What’s amazing, too, is a mid-sized church with a 10,000-square-foot youth wing in addition to its main sanctuary.
Roughly 800 people, including 100 young adults, attend Sonrise each Sunday. In today’s era of mega-churches, that’s not huge.
Yet, like the name of their youth ministry — 10X, a name inspired by a passage of scripture from the book of Daniel — things here are 10 times bigger than you’d expect.
The new youth wing is big for a reason.
“Our heart is really to see young people in ministry, to equip, to train and to send them,” Russ Babcock said. “So if a seventh-grader, for example, says, ‘I’d like to be on that worship team,’ we can find a place for him.”
With the new youth wing, Sonrise can offer more ways for young people with different interests and talents to serve, Russ Babcock said.
Young people can work in the coffee shop or in the bookstore, which is expected to be added soon, Kim Babcock said.
The new wing also offers more capacity for conferences and workshops. Men’s and women’s showers have been installed for visitors, something Russ Babcock said he’d wanted to do for 20 years.
Kim Babcock, who leads worship for the church, hopes to expand the music program and to create a music school, she said.
She studied music at Shoreline Community College and has taught piano lessons for 30 years.
“Kids and music are a huge thing,” Kim Babcock said. “And that’s my bent.”
In 20 years of ministry, the Babcocks have worked with hundreds of young people who have gone on to colleges, churches and jobs around the world.
“Russ Babcock is an amazing fellow. He has been an inspiration to hundreds of young people who have grown up in this area,” Michels said.
Two of those young people are Ryan Danley, 23, and Karen Martin, 22.
Danley said he’d been to three different churches before settling at Sonrise. He’s stayed for two years.
“It’s great here because everyone wants to be involved. I want to be in things that are happening, things that are alive, that people want to have, whether that’s music or a relationship with God,” Danley said.
Danley plays electric guitar and sings in a four-member Christian worship band called Sight Versus Sound.
Martin, who is Kim Babcock’s assistant, leads a dance ministry for the church that includes ballet, modern dance and tambourine.
“It’s all part of the worship,” Martin said.
“We want to use the arts in worship so people who draw or paint or who have other gifts can participate,” Russ Babcock said.
With its expanded youth wing, young people at Sonrise have a place big enough to accommodate myriad talents and big enough for their dreams.
Reporter Leita Hermanson Crossfield: 425-339-3449 or Lcrossfield@heraldnet.com.
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