History of Northlands Church

“And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.”

Philippians 1:6

A Shift of Continents

 
In 1996, when Gregory and Michelle Haswell were the senior pastors of Highway Christian Community Church in Durban, South Africa, they felt the clear call of the Lord to “Shift Continents”. At that time, their rapidly growing church with a congregation of 1,500 was having a tremendous impact in the city. The church’s expanding ministries included “Highway Radio”, one of the largest Christian radio stations in the country.

 
After ensuring the stability of those ministries by raising up leaders to take them further, they were led to plant a new church in Atlanta, Georgia. With the sincere and substantial support of the Highway Christian Community, they arrived in Atlanta in November 1999 to plant Northlands Church.

 
The church met for the first month in the home of their long-time friends, Dionne and Bridget van Zyl. In early 2000, the church moved to the ‘W’ Hotel in Dunwoody, and after a year and a half the church moved to the Hilton Hotel on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard in Peachtree Corners, where they met for another two years before purchasing the present facility in Norcross, GA.

God’s Leading to Expand

 
The story behind the purchase of the church’s building is an interesting one. In 2004, Pastor Greg called the church to three days of prayer and fasting to ask the Lord for His direction about Northlands owning its own church building.

 
Here is Pastor Greg recalling the sequence of events: “We felt it was time for us to have a permanent home – we had extracted all the joy out of meeting in hotels! We ended that time of fasting and prayer on a Wednesday night for an exciting prayer meeting. The Lord gave us an exact description of the building. He said it would be bigger than we thought we needed and described some of the physical features.”

 
“The next morning, one of the leaders in the church had a breakfast meeting with a friend who happened to be a commercial real estate broker. In passing, he described a building that matched the one we had heard about from God at the prayer meeting the night before! A meeting with the building’s owner was arranged that same day.”

 
“As I drove up to the property, I was amazed how well it had been described in our prayer meeting. We agreed to terms, and that Sunday were able to report to the church that we had found ‘the building’. It was a very exciting time for us. The finances came in at almost three times the pledged amount, and as a result we were able to convert the structure right away into precisely the church building we needed.”
 

Impacting Nations

 
In its ten-year history, Northlands has continued to grow in influence and expand in its ministry reach. Hardly a week passes by without sending a team to some destination around the world. In addition to assisting other churches in the USA, Northlands is also focused on Russia, Peru, Germany, Canada, Hong Kong and South Africa.