I've driven past the corner of 69th and Western dozens of times — usually on the way to somewhere else, usually in a hurry — and I'd always clocked the building as another suburban church, the kind that blends quietly into Sioux Falls' sprawl. Then I met someone at Josiah's who mentioned they'd been going to First Evangelical Free for three years, and the way they talked about it made me curious enough to actually pay attention.
The church sits back from the road, and the name itself — First Evangelical Free — has that old-school earnestness that either pulls you in or leaves you cold. I think what strikes me most is how many people I've run into who describe it less like a weekly obligation and more like a place they actually want to be. There's a lack of performance to it, if that makes sense. No fog machines, no attempts to look like anything other than what it is.
I talked to a couple who'd moved here from Dell Rapids and said they tried four or five churches before landing here — they wanted somewhere that felt less like a social club and more like people working through the hard questions together. The Sunday I visited, the sermon wasn't polished in that TED Talk way, but it also didn't dodge complexity. There was a moment during the closing prayer when someone's kid started crying and no one flinched — just that easy acceptance that life happens in real time.
The parking lot isn't huge, and on busy Sundays you might end up on the grass. The building itself won't win architecture awards. But the 26 reviews with a perfect rating aren't from people dazzled by aesthetics — they're from people who found what they were looking for, which in Sioux Falls' crowded church landscape, means something.
— Grace
The Sunday I visited, the sermon wasn't polished in that TED Talk way, but it also didn't dodge complexity.