Rich Past, Exciting Future

The story, mission, beliefs, and leadership of West End

West End is a place for you.

Our history begins in 1996 with lots of prayer. Pastor Carter Crenshaw led a group from Christ Community Church (PCA) in Franklin, TN, to pray about the possibility of planting a new church in the Nations neighborhood of Nashville. In 1997, the group began meeting at W.A. Bass Middle School.

The church grew in size and service to our community. By 2001, West End was able to purchase 44 acres on White Bridge Road to build a permanent campus. It was completed in 2005.

After 25 years of faithful leadership from Carter, John Bourgeois stepped into leadership as Lead Pastor.

Since 1996, our church and its ministries have grown, but our members have remained steady on this mission: to help people know, love, and follow Jesus.

Senior pastor John Bourgeois laughs at last year's fall party

Members connecting at the West End Community Church Picnic

At West End, we’re all on a journey.

“On our hardest days, I would ask…”

When Dominique partnered with UpRise, West End’s career training ministry, she found support and a new future.

“I want people to know they’re loved.”

Post-church lunch is an open-door policy at Dylan and Mamie’s house. No agenda. Just come and be.

“We’re not meant to do this alone.”

When Lucy experienced devastation, God used the presence of another West End member to bring hope.

Inside our walls, you’ll find the curious, the committed, the skeptical, the hurting, and the hopeful. We’re seeking to know, love, and follow Jesus.

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Our Mission:

Helping people know, love, and follow Jesus Christ into a life of love to the glory of God.

God created us to flourish in relationship with him, with one another, with ourselves, and with creation. He extends the invitation to know him through his son, Jesus Christ. The more we get to know Jesus, the greater our understanding is of his character and love for us - and the more we will love him in response. He empowers us by his Holy Spirit to follow him into his life of other-centered self-giving love, bringing glory to God, reflecting his beauty, goodness, and truth together.

Things aren’t the way they’re supposed to be. On our own, we attempt to create identities for ourselves without reference to God. This ruptures our relationships. Self-repair, however earnest, is never enough; we need help. The Bible tells us the story of a God who sees the pain and suffering we created for ourselves and provides the solution. The gospel - which means “good news” - is not about what we must do for God, but rather what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. The good news is the message that: “God made (Christ), who had no sin, to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21).
We believe true life is found in relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Together we seek to grow in our knowledge of, love for, and obedience to the one who laid down his life for our sake. Our love is always a response to his great love for us. The more we get to know Jesus, the greater this love becomes. This work being done in our hearts is not a result of our own efforts. Accepting by faith what God has done in Christ to save us enables us to begin saying NO to ourselves in order to say YES to God.
As we surrender to the love of Christ, his love permeates our whole hearts. We choose obedience to Christ and love as he loved us. The overflow of his love leads us to follow him into redemptive relationships with the lost, least, lonely, and left out. We grow together to foster a community that embodies and extends Christ's love where we live, work, and play.

Our Beliefs

We are grateful for the gift of the Bible, which we humbly receive and affirm to be God’s Word. Within its pages, God reveals his truth, goodness, and beauty to us. Written in the shape of a story—the Bible is the account of God’s relentless pursuit of his people that unfolds as a fourfold plotline of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration. As the story develops, we discover the abundance of Jesus as he leads us on our journey.

Imagine a world in which people, places, and things exist in perfect relationship and harmony. Everything is beautiful, nothing is broken, and there is no hint of wrong. The Bible calls this state of perfection “shalom”—a Hebrew word meaning completeness, wholeness, and well-being before God. This is the world of Genesis 1-2. God created the world, and everything in it, as an expression of his glory and grace—with mankind as the centerpiece and his masterpiece. Made in his image, God created us to know, worship, and enjoy him, and to serve his purposes in the world. God looked at all he had made and said, “This is very good.”
Deception and tragedy entered the story, and the wholeness of creation was breached and broken. Like all of God’s good gifts, the freedoms and privileges of creation were to be stewarded with humility and gratitude. Tragically, God’s first worshipers became his first rebels—putting themselves in the place of God. This is the essence of what the Bible calls sin. Everything in creation, every sphere of life, and every aspect of our being suffered the devastating impact of sin and death. Nothing is the way God designed it to be. Everything is broken.
But because of his great love, everything, everywhere is also the target of God’s redemption. In full view of his creatures sin and helplessness, God set in motion a plan so big and generous, he chose stars, sand, and dust to express the size of his future family (Genesis 12-17). And he promised, one Day, to fill the entire earth with his glory.
God’s promises are so big only he can keep them. The greatest expression of his generosity is seen in the gift of his son, Jesus Christ. Jesus is the “Yes” to every promise God has made. He came to do for us what we could never do for ourselves. This is the Gospel.
As our substitute in life, Jesus fulfilled God’s law for us; and by his death on the cross, he took the judgment we deserve. By trusting in Jesus’ finished work, we are fully forgiven and are robed in his righteousness. As our risen Savior, Jesus intercedes for us, and reigns over all things until his return.
After his resurrection, Jesus declared, “I am making all things new!” Notice he did not say he is making all new things. God’s story is a story of restoration, not replacement. In fact, the completion of the story is even grander than the beginning. Jesus isn’t taking us back to the Garden of Eden, but into the new heaven and new earth. By his death and resurrection, Jesus placed an expiration date on all sin, evil, sickness, and brokenness. There will be no more racism, injustice, or war in the new heaven and new earth. There will be no more pain, suffering, or disaster. There will be no more death, in any form. This is the hope of the Good News of Jesus Christ. This is God’s story. We believe this story to be true, good, and beautiful, just like our God. It compels us to worship God, it fuels our hope, and frees us to love our neighbors.
If you're interested in learning more about the story that shapes our faith, there are a few resources we recommend:
The New City Catechism summarizes the main points of this story and their implications in 52 very short question-and-answer articles.
West End Community Church is a congregation of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), a group of churches whose theological beliefs are summarized in the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Westminster Shorter and Larger Catechisms. To learn more about the PCA, visit our denominational magazine, By Faith.
Please feel free to contact one of our pastors or elders if you have any questions about what we believe the Bible teaches.