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Pastor Hears Calling To Lead

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By GEOFF FOX

gfox@tampatrib.com

Published: February 8, 2009

WESLEY CHAPEL - When God speaks, James Dodzweit listens - even when he is suggesting that Dodzweit abandon a comfortable job at a megachurch to start a new one in a school cafeteria.

A longtime youth pastor at Grace Family Church in Lutz, where he led a wildly popular youth ministry that attracted hundreds of teenagers on Friday nights, Dodzweit is preparing to open the nondenominational Grow Life Church at Veterans Elementary School in Wesley Chapel.

The school is at 26940 Progress Parkway, off Wesley Chapel Boulevard-County Road 54, just west of Interstate 75. The new church is scheduled to open March 1.

"About a year ago, I sensed in my heart that God was calling me to start another church," Dodzweit said. "I fought it for a while. I had the cushy youth pastor church job, man. You don't just go out and start a new church because you had a bad salad the night before. You don't do it without knowing it's God telling you."

At Grace Family Church, which boasts about 5,000 members, Dodzweit was instrumental in establishing the Oneighty youth ministry, which regularly attracts hundreds of teens.

Craig Altman, pastor at Grace Family, said he is confident that Dodzweit's "dynamic" personality and "passion for our world" will help make the new church a success.

"He's going to make a big difference in that community," Altman said. "His personality is a big draw. He's easy to understand and has a creative way of keeping people's attention. His passion is evident. To be able to get 700 kids out to Grace Family on a Friday night, you have to be doing something right.

"We'll have people leaving to go with him and we encourage that. Too many people need God. There's plenty of room out there."

One of the people going with Dodzweit is Travis McClelland, former director of connections at Grace Family.
McClelland said recently that God "placed it in me" that Dodzweit would someday open a church, and that he would help him run it. But he said that was well before it was announced that Dodzweit was leaving Grace Family.

"I just kept it to myself," McClelland said. "Then, last June or July, they announced that he was starting a new church in 2009. He came down into my office the next day. He was hemming and hawing around and didn't know how to approach it, but he wanted me to go with him.

"He eventually just said it. I got real uncomfortable for a minute, then told him the whole story about how God spoke to me. He was surprised I never said anything about it."

Besides McClelland, Dodzweit said a "launch team" of about 50 adults, many of whom were members at Grace Family, will help establish the church, which will have a seating capacity of about 300.

Dodzweit and his team have raised $30,000 toward start-up costs, and the Association of Related Churches, a national organization that helps develop new churches, has matched the money with a loan.

Although Dodzweit is now following God's words, it wasn't always that way. That's surprising, considering that he was born in Nairobi, Kenya, the son of missionaries.

As a child, he said his family spent years at a time in Africa. When he was about 14, his family moved to upstate New York.

He said that coping with the resulting culture shock led him to try alcohol and marijuana. He was soon a regular user of both, and the accompanying rebellious attitude worried his parents.

"You wouldn't have wanted your teenage kid around me," Dodzweit said. "I was pretty arrogant. I partied from 1989 through most of 1994. It was pretty bad.

"One time my mom came to me and said, 'Don't you fear God?' And I said, 'No, Mom, I don't.'

"

In his second year in Bible school, Dodzweit said he finally "met Jesus and really found out who he was."

At Bible school, he also found his wife, Kelly, who he described as a "behind-the-scenes powerhouse." They have been married 12 years and have three children: Ethan, 11, Chloe, 8 and Aidan, 5.

Dodzweit is confident that the new church will be successful in the rapidly growing area.

"We'll probably be at Veterans as long as possible," he said. "We're not in a hurry to buy land or a building. I have a hard time taking a church and putting it in debt. Before we ever change locations, we'll be doing two or three services a weekend."

NEW CHURCH IN WESLEY CHAPEL
For information about Grow Life Church, go to www.growlifechurch.com.

Reporter Geoff Fox can be reached at (813) 779-4613.

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