About Cole Mill
Sunday AM service times// 9:15 & 11:00
1417 Cole Mill Road Durham, NC 27705
A long history… The Summit began life as a church in the early sixties under the name “Homestead Heights Baptist Church.” Some of our current members have been a part of the church from the beginning and could tell stories of the blessings they’ve seen and the challenges we’ve been through as a church.
A fresh vision… In 1998, Homestead Heights was without a senior pastor and they called Dr. Keith Eitel, head of the Missions Department at Southeastern Baptist Seminary to be “Interim Pastor.” Dr. Eitel taught us about the world outside of Durham and the USA—a world that needed to be reached.At the same time, Dr. Eitel led the church to reassess what it meant to be led by God—that it wasn’t about having a church that catered to our own personal preferences. It was about being a church that worshiped God and reached out to the world. A new unity and purpose was born in the church.
In December 2001 the church voted to call J.D. Greear as our new lead pastor. J.D. had been serving as the college pastor.
J.D. immediately cast a vision for the church to engage the RDU area with the Gospel. Homestead Heights was “re-launched” as “the Summit Church.” With a new identity, it was time for a new beginning. Worship attendance at the time was about 400, but a goal was set to have 1,000 in worship that Easter. The members came together in a show of unified energy and focus unlike anything anyone remembered seeing before. On Easter Sunday, more than 1,100 people experienced worship at the Summit.
WHERE WE ARE GOING
Within the next two years, it became clear that God had even bigger plans. We had outgrown our facility and began to look for new land. The church sold the property it had owned since the early sixties and began meeting at Riverside High School. Attendance grew to more than 2000 per week.
A Regional Church… As the Summit grew, we saw people coming from all over the Triangle. Our search for land became more focused on areas that would allow us to continue to reach people from all over the triangle area. Late in 2006, the church purchased 37 acres on T.W. Alexander Road, near Brier Creek, one of the fastest growing points in the area and a place that puts the Summit in a better position to reach the entire Triangle.
Multiple Campuses… Having outgrown Riverside High, it became necessary to develop a facility plan that wouldn’t take as long as it would to develop our 37 acres. In August of 2007, the Cole Mill Campus was launched, enabling the Summit to continue to reach as many people in North and West Durham as possible with the Gospel.
