While we are associated, each church is independent in leadership, purpose and structure.
Communion Chapel began with five families in the Woodlawn area of San Antonio in 1989. We currently have over 150 in attendance on Sunday morning worship, including children.
We are currently located at 5719 Mobud St. at the NE quadrant of Loop 410 and Bandera Rd. behind a Jim’s restaurant. Our facilities are not only home to our worship services but also our many ministries, such as Sunday School classes for both children and adults, our AWANA program (4 yrs. – 8th grade), our Men and Women’s ministries and some of our C.A.R.E. (small fellowship) groups.
Our heart is to minister to those God may bring our way and to whom God leads us. While not a Hispanic church, we are currently about 65% Hispanic and 30% Anglo, which is close to the population breakdown of San Antonio. We feel we are poised in the perfect city to reach this multi-cultural population for Christ.
People who have visited the church have told us that it is very friendly. We love being together and the growth we have enjoyed in the last few years speaks volumes about our love and warmth. We invite you to come and be part of our fellowship.
We launched a Spanish speaking service in 2009, in an effort to reach more people from different ethnic backgrounds.
Communion Chapel began as a home fellowship group of eleven people on May 5, 1989. That summer the founding pastor, Alex Mandes and his wife Julie, led the Bible study on Wednesday nights in a community center near Woodlawn Lake, which is an Hispanic urban area near downtown San Antonio. The outreach church would be geared toward the predominantly Hispanic community of the area. Later in 1989, the church was incorporated as Woodlawn Bible Church and became a member of the Evangelical Free Church of America (EFCA), and the first service was held on Easter Sunday 1990.
The initial facility was located in the Northwest Shopping Center on Fredericksburg Rd. and served as our home until the winter of 1994. We had grown to about 70 members and at that time we also changed our name to Communion Chapel EFCA. By this time it was apparent that the Lord was forming a multi-cultural church that was not only unique to San Antonio but was unique within the EFCA denomination itself.
In the year 2000, we once again experienced the need to move. We purchased our current facility at 5719 Mobud St. and had a growing congregation of approximately 160 members on any given Sunday. We continue to strive to minister to the people that the Lord brings to us, as well as outreach to the community around us. We have a strong commitment to missions both locally and internationally. This commitment is realized through financial support of various missionaries, Communion Chapel missions programs to the inner city and international outreaches, and numerous individual members serving on a short term mission trips around the world.
In October 2006, Pastor Alex accepted a position with the EFCA national team to direct Hispanic ministries. On April 22, 2007, Communion Chapel voted Michael Pratt to become their second senior pastor. Currently the church is enjoying growth in several areas of ministry.
There are weekly ministries also for fellowship groups, youth, college and careers, AWANA, Women’s Bible study, side walk evangelism, and a bilingual puppet ministry.
On Sept 6, 2009, we began a Spanish speaking worship service in our desire to reach other ethnic groups with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
