Building Eternal Relationships on Triana Boulevard
West Huntsville Baptist Church sits on the corner of Triana Boulevard and 8th Avenue in Huntsville, Alabama, in a neighborhood shaped for decades by the nearby presence of Redstone Arsenal. The congregation's story began in 1899, when a small group of believers organized a church with J.A. Eaves as their first pastor and B.L. Tipps as sexton. More than 125 years later, the same address still anchors a multi-generational body that describes itself simply as "a community of believers focused on Jesus Christ and intentionally committed to loving our neighbors." The phrase that appears across the church's materials is "Building Eternal Relationships," and the people there have taken that phrase and built a ministry around it.
A Sunday at WHBC
Sundays at West Huntsville revolve around three gatherings. The day opens at 9:00 AM with the GROW Hour, a Bible study time when every age group meets in its own space. Adults gather in the Heritage Room to study why and how West Huntsville serves others and trains leaders. Children meet in the WESTKids area on the second floor of the North Wing, and WHBC Youth gather in the Dwelling Place downstairs. The main Worship Service begins at 10:15 AM in the Worship Center and combines song, prayer, and teaching from God's Word. That service is streamed live online each week so that members who are traveling or homebound can worship alongside the room.
Sunday evenings are for smaller groups. At 5:00 PM, AWANA meets upstairs in the WESTKids area for kids age two through fifth grade. Downstairs in the Dwelling Place, WHBC Youth gathers for worship, games, and conversation with students in sixth through twelfth grade. Adult Groups also meet throughout the week on the WHBC campus, in homes around the city, and online.
First-time guests are told to come as they are. Jeans and a t-shirt fit in alongside a suit or dress. Multiple screens inside the Worship Center make it easy to find a comfortable seat without missing anything. Children six weeks to two years are welcome in Childcare Corner on the ground floor of the North Wing, and a family with kids of almost any age can be checked into the right room before the service even begins.
WESTKids, AWANA, and the Next Generation
Children's ministry at WHBC is structured to follow a child from infancy through fifth grade, then hand them off to a youth ministry that continues into high school. Childcare Corner, directed by Kathy Park, serves the youngest children during the Sunday morning services. WESTKids, led by Cherry Eade, meets during the 9:00 AM GROW Hour for children from age three through fifth grade with the goal of helping each child "KNOW Christ personally, GROW in HIM, and GO tell others about HIM." AWANA picks up where Sunday morning ends, gathering children age two through fifth grade at 5:00 PM on Sunday evenings for a program built around Scripture memory, games, and large-group time.
WHBC Youth, directed by David Gossett, is built around Psalm 63:1 ("O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly..."). Students in sixth through twelfth grade meet at 5:00 PM on Sunday evenings in the Dwelling Place for worship, teaching, fellowship, and fun. The youth ministry exists to give teenagers a steady place to belong during the years when belonging matters most.
The Next Step Path: Following Jesus, Baptism, Membership
Three next steps shape how newcomers move into the life of the church. The first is following Jesus, described as a personal decision to trust Him and begin reading the Bible, praying, and gathering with other believers. The second is baptism, which the church teaches as an outward statement of obedience to Christ and identification with His death, burial, and resurrection. The third is membership, which the church describes as the outward way of saying, "I am committed to walking with this body of believers." Those who wish to become members attend a Membership Seminar and then present themselves before the congregation during a worship service. Membership comes either by profession of faith and baptism at WHBC, by transfer from another similarly believing church, or by statement of prior baptism.
Groups for Every Season
Groups are the connective tissue at WHBC. They meet throughout the week in homes, on the WHBC campus, and online, and they exist to give every person a place to belong, be encouraged, and grow. Fall kickoff for the next season of groups begins in mid-August. Hosts are trained and supported, and a current Groups List helps visitors find a group that fits their stage of life. The Groups ministry pairs naturally with the church's small-group Bible studies and provides the everyday rhythm of discipleship outside the Sunday gathering.
WeGo Missions: Going Because He Said So
Mission work is described at WHBC as the heart of everything else. The WeGo program is the church's way of naming that conviction. The short answer to why they go is woven into the name itself: WeGo because Jesus' words were not a request but a command, and because true faith cares for the broken and orphaned.
Trips in the WeGo rotation include Eutaw, Alabama (a domestic trip focused on the Blessing Eutaw ministry, construction, and relationship building); Honduras (orphan ministry, food distribution, and encouragement of FCM staff); Slovakia (English training, sports, and local church encouragement); and Brazil (missionary encouragement, video and photographic support, counseling, team building, leading worship, and children and youth ministry). A WeGo Fund, supported through the church's online giving page, helps every WHBC participant cover a percentage of trip cost so that more of the congregation can take part.
Ladies Ministry
The Ladies Ministry exists to glorify God through prayerfully planned opportunities for women in the church and community. Its work is organized into four overlapping teams. The Hospitality Team prepares church-wide bridal and baby showers for first-time moms and marriages and is coordinated by Debbie Poland. Take Them A Meal provides food in times of surgeries, births, and extended illness, coordinated by Renee Lindsey through an online meal calendar. Ladies Caring Groups, led by Sandra Gossett, divide the adult women of the church into eight rotating groups that respond to deaths and extended hospital stays within the body. Precept Bible Study, led by Dawne Douthit, meets on Wednesday mornings each fall and spring. Together these ministries turn the Ladies Ministry into a network of practical care for the women of WHBC.
The WEST Center and Other Ministries
The WEST Center is the church's counseling ministry, directed by Dwayne Woodworth. Its presence on the campus of WHBC reflects the church's wider conviction that making disciples means caring for the whole person, and counseling services sit alongside the church's other weekly ministries. The WEST strategy itself - "Worship, Equipping, Sending, Training," as the church's own language suggests - is the template the pastors and ministry leaders use to plan and execute everything that happens at WHBC.
Worship Through Song
The Worship Ministry, directed by Melanie Gossett, leads the music of the 10:15 AM service. The team includes a band, a choir, vocalists, instrumentalists, and audio and technical support. Anyone who loves music and worshiping the Lord is invited to get in touch with the Worship Director to find a place to serve. The stated goals of the team are simple and direct: glorify God, encourage the church body, and build relationships with other team members.
A History Spanning More Than a Century
The 1899 origin of the church is the seed from which everything else has grown. In 1906, during C.L. Culpepper's ministry, the property at the corner of 8th Avenue and Triana Boulevard was purchased and a new wooden building was erected. The wooden structure burned in 1936, but under the leadership of J. Vernon Rich the congregation rebuilt a stone sanctuary in just four months. A new worship center was dedicated in 1961 during Cecil O'Rear's pastorate, replacing the stone building for Sunday morning services. The North Educational Building was added in 1963 under Sam Wolfe, and the South Educational Building followed in 1980 under Max Barton.
Scott Gossett became pastor in 1988 and has continued to shepherd the congregation. Four years into his tenure, in 1992, the church paid off the last of its $125,000 in building debt, and the pastors since have described the years that followed as a season of unusual blessing. Because of its proximity to Redstone Arsenal, the WHBC family has ministered to people from all over the world and has sent missionaries and members to many parts of the globe. The current generation of leaders continues to upgrade the buildings and intensify the church's efforts to make disciples in Huntsville and around the world.
What WHBC Believes
West Huntsville Baptist Church holds to a set of doctrinal convictions that flow directly from its Baptist identity. The church confesses one God, infinitely perfect and eternally existing in three persons - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - and teaches that the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the inspired, inerrant Word of God and the final authority for the believer's faith and life. The Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, is confessed as having become man without ceasing to be God, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary, who died on the cross for our sins, was buried, and bodily rose from the dead.
The church teaches that salvation is the gift of God made available solely by grace through the shed blood and resurrection of Jesus Christ, received personally through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ alone. All the saved are kept by God's power and secure in Christ forever. Water baptism and the Lord's Supper are observed as ordinances, not as means of salvation. The true church is composed of all those who through saving faith in Jesus Christ have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit and united in the body of Christ, of which He is the Head. The church looks for the personal, premillennial, and imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ and affirms the bodily resurrection of the dead - of the believer to everlasting blessedness and joy with the Lord, and of the unbeliever to judgment and everlasting conscious punishment.
Staff and Leadership
Scott Gossett serves as Pastor. Don Eade is Executive Pastor and Michael Cranston is Assistant Pastor. Cherry Eade directs WESTKids, David Gossett directs Youth, and Melanie Gossett directs Worship. Sarah Hubbard is Ministry Coordinator, Kathy Park directs Childcare Corner, Micah St John directs Communications, and Dwayne Woodworth directs the WEST Center. Together this staff team oversees the ministries, counseling, communications, and Sunday programming of the church.
Get Connected
Visitors can send a message through the I'm New form, sign up for a Membership Seminar, request prayer, or look over the upcoming calendar of events. Giving is available online through the church's giving portal, and weekly audio and video of the worship service is available through the messages library. West Huntsville Baptist Church meets at 2211 Triana Boulevard in Huntsville, and the doors are open to anyone who wants to build eternal relationships alongside a congregation that has been doing it for more than 125 years.