Contact: Ron Keener, Church Executive, 800-541-2670 ext 204

MEDIA ADVISORY, July 6 /Christian Newswire/ -- When grandson Tullian Tchividijian confronted dissidents in the congregation after he became pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, "Daddy Bill" (as Billy Graham is known within the family) wanted to come to Fort Lauderdale, FL and "set things straight."

Tchividijian spent months dealing with the challenges of a few people in the church who objected to him taking the pulpit of the famed, but now deceased, D. James Kennedy. When the elder Graham learned of the merger of Tchividijian's New City Church with Coral Ridge, "he was against it. He knew that, while Coral Ridge had been used by God in some very mighty ways, it was now struggling," Tchividijian says in an interview in the July issue of Church Executive magazine.

Graham was concerned for his grandson that the struggle would "consume me and get me off track." "He was concerned that I'd become so busy trying to keep the church from dying that I would not have time to focus on my primary calling which is to preach," the new pastor says.

Later, Graham saw the progress being made and "recognized the invisible hand of God's providence at work and began praying very hard for my protection and the church's success." Eventually, the dissidents lost a congregational vote and left to form a different church.

In a wide ranging interview, Tchividijian says the church is at work "expanding our media ministry, planting churches, developing satellite campuses, and in other ways extending God's great redemptive work that he's accomplishing here at Coral Ridge."

Tchividijian, 38, says the congregation has 2,400 members and 1,800 to 1,900 in worship in two services on Sunday mornings. Since the merger of the two churches the church has grown by nearly 700 people, and that was with 500 unhappy people leaving to start a different church. Some of those have even returned to Coral Ridge, nevertheless.

Tchividijian recently published a book on the lessons and life of Jonah, "Surprised by Grace: God's Relentless Pursuit of Rebels" (Crossway), and found support in the Scripture for his own travails in the church dispute. "I learned that God's capacity to clean things up is infinitely greater than our human capacity to mess things up," he says. "I learned about the 'stubbornness' of God to accomplish his will, regardless of how hard we may try and thwart it."

Article at: http://churchexecutive.com/archives/%e2%80%98high-noon%e2%80%99-at-coral-ridge-dissidents-challenge-the-leadership-of-a-new-pastor