With a congregation that's been growing steadily over the past 10 years, there aren't many empty spots among the two tiers of seating in the auditorium during Sunday worship at the West Highland Baptist Church.

In recognition of this growth, particularly among young families on the west Mountain and in Ancaster, officials at the church on Garth Street, just north of Rymal, are planning to build a new 2,500 seat auditorium in the next five to seven years.

"We're referring to this as Operation Rehoboth," said John Mahaffey, senior pastor at the church.

Rehoboth comes from the Book of Genesis in reference to the third of a series of wells dug by Isaac in the Philistines' territory.

The new building, expected to be in the area of 50,000 square feet, will be one of the largest church auditoriums in Hamilton with a price tag of between five and 10 million dollars.

"We would envision hopefully a congregation of 14 or 15 hundred people at some point in time," said Mr. Mahaffey, who noted they are planning to add a second Sunday service next spring.

Currently, Mr. Mahaffey said the church is averaging 800-850 people for its 11a.m. Sunday service and although the existing auditorium, built in 1987, has a capacity of about 1,000, it seats about 850 comfortably.

"The general idea is a brand new auditorium that we could attach to (the existing church building)," Mr. Mahaffey said.

Ken Hajas, a long-time church member, noted expansion plans began about four years ago through the church's community connection task force, a group mandated to come up with ways that the church could connect with the community through a variety of outreach programs.

Some preliminary drawings have already been done. The new auditorium will be built on the parking lot and beyond on the south and east side of the church. Of the more than four hectares (10 acres) of land on the church site, about 1.5 hectares (3.6 acres) was purchased in 2004 with expansion in mind.

Forward-looking

"The church was forward-looking to purchase that land," said Mr. Mahaffey, who noted much work needs to be done before the new auditorium is built.

That includes finishing about $75,000 worth of renovations to the church that began a couple of weeks ago.

The renovations, expected to be completed by Thanksgiving, will provide more space for Sunday School and other programs for the approximately 250 children that attend the church with their parents.

A capital campaign task force has been set up to raise money to pay for the renovations and for the new auditorium.

Thanks to the Linc and other area highway improvements, Mr. Mahaffey noted West Highland has become a regional church with some members coming in from Brantford and Burlington.

While some churches have seen their congregations shrink in recent years, Mr. Mahaffey said a strong adherence to Christian theology has kept the auditorium full at West Highland.

"Churches that have continued to maintain a fidelity to the Bible and preach it as God's word for us today are churches (that) generally continue to grow," Mr. Mahaffey said.

He added the 10-member church staff is also expected to grow. Ideally he would like to see a full-time minister for every 125 church members.

West Highland is currently looking for a student ministries pastor who will work with college and high school students.