We always wanted to be open to whatever God wanted. I believe He loved that. – Doug & Janie Harriman

"One word, I think, that described New Heights from the very foundation was, open. We always wanted to be open to whatever God wanted. I believe He loved that. I think a lot of things happened because we just didn't get in the way of Him doing them. 

We didn't have a great master plan of how things were going to play out. We just wanted to have a prayer driven church, small groups, a presence in the community, be grace based, and preach Jesus. Our vision was pretty small, but we were open. And, oh man, the vision just went way beyond what we thought it could ever be. For example, I wouldn’t say we were all so invested in missions before, but now, you see what happened there. 

One thing we prayed for from the beginning, was to make a difference in our community. It's been such a blessing to see those prayers directly answered through the Potter's House ministry, Fayetteville Prayer Room, Joshua Center, and Celebrate Recovery. Those are the things that are on the ground level of our community and touch so many people outside just the church itself. Eventually, then, even the fact that we built on to the Boys and Girls Club and we don’t own the building. Only God could have orchestrated that story. Being able to make a difference and have a good influence on our community has been such a passion of ours. God has blessed that over and over again.

Another thing that kind of shaped New Heights in the very beginning, was when Becky Garrett was healed of breast cancer. That just changed our whole paradigm. We believe in the power of prayer and God's power to heal and do way beyond what we could ask. It was a foundational testimony that really changed our perspective. We felt like it was affirming that God blessed her and blessed us to. It really cemented the power of prayer as just being part of our church personality. 

If you think, okay I'm going to go out and start a church - it’s almost hysterical, we never thought that until we were in the middle of it.  It was such a joy while we were on the journey. That was the joy, just being on the journey of it all. We would never have imagined or expected anything like this. It’s just been unbelievable. 

New Heights has always been open to anybody that wanted to come. I think that's continued over the years. I love that people can come as they are - spiritually, economically, and physically. They can just come as they are. I have felt like from the start that there was just one spirit, the Holy Spirit, that simply came. And people felt it. 

I think the fact that from the beginning we were so dependent on the lord. I think prayer got a really strong foothold and thats continued over the years."