LEWISTON — Like Internet romancers, leaders of the New Hope Baptist Church and the United Baptist Church first met online.

Pastor Bill Stevenson’s congregation, the United Baptist Church, had been looking for land to build a replacement for their grand-but-dilapidated stone building on Lewiston’s Main Street. They needed something smaller, newer and less rundown.

Then, on the way to visit a property, Stevenson passed New Hope’s modest white church. The College Road structure looked empty. So Stevenson checked the Web. 

“I found out they were still going and that they had very, very similar beliefs,” he said. “I figured, Smaller churches and same core beliefs. Why not merge?”

So he sent New Hope an introductory e-mail. Twenty-one months later, the two churches have become one family.

For more than a year, New Hope’s 20 or so members and United Baptist’s 60 people have been praying in the same services and under the same roof. In October, the two churches formally merged, passing a new statement of doctrine and joining their finances.

And on Jan. 1, newly elected elders will take office under the new church name: Unity Bible Church.

“It’s like what happens when two divorced people marry,” said Ernie Lacombe, an elder at New Hope, whose term expires on Dec. 31. “You bring kids into the relationship with you.”

But so far, the church families have blended well. In part, that’s due to a surprisingly well-matched pair of churches.

When Stevenson wrote his e-mail, he didn’t know that New Hope had been without a full-time pastor for several months. The little congregation had gotten by with Sunday services led by lay leaders. They were getting ready to find a new pastor.

“I can’t talk for other people, but I thought, ‘This is amazing,'” Lacombe said at reading the e-mail. “I was just blown away. I felt that God had opened a door.”

Elders from both churches agreed to meet and get to know each other.

They learned that New Hope had no parsonage, but United Baptist did. They figured that the combined congregations could easily meet in New Hope’s sanctuary, which can seat up to 200 or more people.

Most importantly, they seemed to believe the same things. Both churches affirmed their belief in the Bible as God’s perfect word and faith in Christ as God, Stevenson said.

“They were also the friendliest group of believers I have ever seen in my life,” he said.

Soon, Stevenson moved into the New Hope church’s front office and began preaching there every Sunday. It’s where he believes he and his congregation need to be.

It wouldn’t have been right to build a new church on a plot of land down the street, he insisted.

“This is not a business, and we’re not like the Rite Aid and the CVS that go head-to-head,” he said. “We didn’t want to compete.”

Following the Jan. 1 installation of new elders, the church is planning a celebration dinner on Jan. 10.

“Ultimately, God gets the credit,” Lacombe said.

Stevenson agreed. 

“The glue that holds us together is our faith in Christ,” he said. “Without it, this would never work.”

[email protected]