At Empowerment of Grace, our mission is to transform lives through the word of God by faith through grace. Empowerment of Grace started Sunday September 29th in 2013 under the leadership of then Pastor Larita Rice. The ministry met for a few months in the living room of Pastor Larita’s Swansea home. The ministry was thriving and growing rapidly in leaps and bound and quickly outgrew the space. November of 2013 on Thanksgiving night, the Lord summons Pastor Larita into prayer time. During this time, he began to show her a vision of their next location. The spirit spoke to her and said get up and go to 59th street in East Saint Louis, Illinois. She obeyed. After getting to the area, she began to drive around praying for clarity of the specific place the Lord had in mind. There were only two buildings that was there that might have been a fit. One was a daycare, where she had formally worked at years before and the other was a former school. She rode around the daycare but wasn’t settled in her spirit. She then headed to the school being only a block or so away. When approaching the school, she parked on a lot across the street, still praying for clarity. The school building was boarded up and appeared abandoned. The Marquee had a website listed on it. She looked up the website and it too looked abandoned. It hadn’t been updated in some years. However, the spirit of the Lord instructed her to ride to the back of the building. Unbeknownst to her, the parking lot in the back was jammed packed. She exited the car and went inside. After entering in, she was greeted by a worker but also noticed that the gym was packed with youth and young adults.The place was bustling. She was told by the worker that the owner wasn’t there, but he shared the time that he would be there and told here to come back then. She followed instructions. Later she went back and met with the owner, Sylvester Sunshine Lee. She shared the vision on how the Lord had her to get up and drive down there. She shared the vision of the church and how it had outgrown the space at her home. Sunshine listened and then shared that her ministry vision was in alignment with his vision for the center. He later told her when to come back. He gave her keys to the building, alarm codes and keys to the gates to enter. The rest is history. Empowerment of Grace stayed at the Sunshine Cultural Arts Center for about two years. The ministry outgrew that space and then moved to Belleville, Illinois, The same happened, the ministry outgrew the space and then later transitioned to Saint Louis, Missouri. The building that EOG acquired was abandoned and almost condemned. EOG members and friends worked diligently to restore the property back to life and did so. The area of Baden is where the ministry called home for about two years. Due to unexpected need to move. EOG shifted to North Park church for a brief period of time and later to Bellefontaine UMC church from around summer of 2018 to November of 2019. The ministry went into a time of deliberation and discernment. The Lord spoke to the leaders, and all came to an agreement that the Lord was saying to go outside of the four walls. It was also a time to dive deeper into learning and rest. During this time, we began discussions with another ministry about a possible merger but that didn’t materialize. The leaders of the church agreed to go on sabbatical. In March of 2020, the world experienced a global pandemic, the COVID shutdown that had its massive effects on public gatherings and church services up until about Summer of 2023 is when the world started trying to open back up to what it once known as normalcy. Empowerment of Grace leaders and members were still on sabbatical. In November 2024 former members and leaders came together and begin to meet for a once a month worship service on the first Sunday of the month. The story is still being written and the journey continues.