About Us
Our Story, God's Story
HOW THE ALLIANCE CHURCH CAME TO SEBRING
There was no presence of an Alliance Church in Florida’s Highlands County until July 1982 when it began as a small Bible study in Lake Placid. Soon the group met for Sunday services, worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ.
God led in a decision made in September 1984 to transfer the Lake Placid minist
HOW THE ALLIANCE CHURCH CAME TO SEBRING
There was no presence of an Alliance Church in Florida’s Highlands County until July 1982 when it began as a small Bible study in Lake Placid. Soon the group met for Sunday services, worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ.
God led in a decision made in September 1984 to transfer the Lake Placid ministry to Sebring. Two years later the Alliance Church of Sebring was organized with 26 charter members to worship, learn, share and support the Alliance worldwide missionary outreach.
For several years the congregation met in various places, lastly the Stephenson-Nelson Funeral Home, until they moved into their new church building at 4451 Sparta Road in September 1990. Regular attendance soon approached seventy, and the building was fully paid for by 2003.
PASTORAL LEADERSHIP
Since its beginning, Alliance pastors have served the Church in full-time, bi-vocational and interim roles. By October 2004 attendance was down, and the Alliance Church of Sebringbecame a “developing church” under the direct administration of the Alliance Southeastern District. In late 2007 the Rev. Stephen Hagen accepted a call to serve as pastor. During his tenure of seventeen years the church continued to host Alliance missionaries, pray and provide financial support for their ministries. Pastor Hagen initiated a popular “Friends Zone” weekly ministry for school-aged children that ran for many years. In June 2025 he resigned to take up leadership of a nearby Christian retirement center.
In August 2025, the Rev. Kevin Gould, originally from Wales, UK, and with some twenty years of ministry in Alaska, joined us as Interim Pastor while a formal pastoral search is underway. Pastor Gould’s engaging teaching and preaching in both Sunday School and Morning Worship continues the Alliance standard as firmly based on the Scriptures. His wife Sheila generously shares her skills in audio-visual and website applications continuing to enhance our worship and outreach. Our trust is in God who will lead us through the future.
THE CHRISTIAN AND MISSIONARY ALLIANCE
The Alliance Church of Sebring is one of over 2000 Alliance churches in the USA and about 24,000 churches world-wide partnering in sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ. [https://cmalliance.org/] The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) was birthed in 1887 by Pastor A. B. Simpson who became heartbroken over the plight of overlooked people in New York City. His concern expanded to those unchurched around the world. The Missionary Training Institute he founded trained some 6,000 pastors and missionaries with the goal to take "The Whole Bible to the Whole World." Since the mid-1970s, the C&MA in the U.S. and Canada has become increasingly multicultural. The Alliance declares the Good News of Jesus Christ in His four roles as Savior, Sanctifier, Healer and Soon Coming King. The congregation of the Alliance Church of Sebring has joyfully supported missionary outreach around the world in keeping with its name, the "Christian and Missionary Alliance