Presbyterians like to do things "decently and in good order" and the start of this church would attest to that.  Grace Presbyterian and St. Andrew’s Presbyterian churches in Little Rock started to discuss the need to expand their churches’ reach into west Little Rock in the early 1980’s.  A professional consultant, hired by the Presbytery of Arkansas, recommended that a new church be built.  Second Presbyterian Church in 1984 pledged money towards the purchase of the church site, which at the time was on Rock Creek Parkway.  That street became Chenal Parkway and the initial church site was where Target now sits.  This area was so underdeveloped at the time that the sign indicating a new church would be built there soon was put on the wrong piece of property by mistake.

The Presbytery appointed a committee to help form the new church and the Rev. Ray Gearing and his wife Ruth were called from their church in Ada, Oklahoma to serve as the organizing pastor.  The first local meeting of interested parties was on May 21, 1985 at Parkway Village on Chenal Parkway (about a half mile west of the first church site).  Weekly meetings were then held at various places in Little Rock to continue planning, including Betty Lile’s home on Pleasant Valley Drive, and the Baptist Medical Center’s cafeteria in west Little Rock.  These meetings were usually on Tuesday nights.  The first official church service was held on July 14, 1985 at Presbyterian Village on Rodney Parham Road.  The name Trinity was selected on the first ballot on September 22^nd, garnering 11 of 21 votes cast.

The church met at Presbyterian Village for 18 Sundays and then moved to the bar at Econo Suites (which is now called Best Western Governor’s Suites) on Merrill Drive for 15 Sundays.  Ed Cohen and his wife Pitt came from Pulaski Heights Presbyterian Church to work with us for the first several years of our existence, and Ed arranged for us to meet in the Block Realty Building next.  He worked as a realtor for them and we were able to meet there until we moved into our first building in October 1989.  The Block Realty Building was immediately adjacent to Christ the King Catholic Church on Rodney Parham Road.  On October 18, 1987 a chartering ceremony was held during the worship service and all those wanting to covenant together to form Trinity signed their names, even the children.  This document is framed and hangs today in the church office.  We became an official congregation of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) at an organizational ceremony held at Grace Presbyterian Church on Rodney Parham Road on November 1, 1987 at 7:15 p.m.  We broke ground for our first building on July 10, 1988 and we moved into that building on October 8, 1989.  By the end of 1989 we had 77 members on the books.

In September 1991, Ray and his wife Ruth retired and we welcomed the Reverend David Judd in November 1991 as our interim minister for a year.  The Reverend Darrell Cluck then served as our pastor from 1992 until August 2001.  While he was with us we moved from the location on Chenal Parkway to the current location at the corner of Rahling Road and Hinson Road.  The first service in our current location was on May 2, 1999.  We moved because we did not have room at our prior location -- it was on a hill and expanding our property on those slopes would have been very costly.  So when Target tendered an offer to buy our property for far more than we had paid for it, we quickly accepted and left the first site to go to an interim location for two years until we could get the current site planned and built.  Target tore both our building and the steep hill down to build their current store.  Before the current site, we met at a former dance studio next to Way Out Willie’s Mexican Restaurant on Merrill Street, just a few hundred yards from the bar at Econo Suites where we met in our first year.

After Darrell left in August 2001, the Rev. Stan Larson, a Lutheran minister, was our interim for a year before our current minister, Rev. Jeff Price took over in September 2002.  Stan had just married a Presbyterian minister who was called from Houston to serve First Presbyterian Church in Morrilton; when he followed her to Arkansas he was looking for a job just as we were looking for an interim.  Jeff was an Associate Pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Pine Bluff before being called to lead us.

Rev. Price and his wife Julie, and children Tanner and Becca, are stories unto themselves and there is much more to tell.  Please visit with us and see if you are called to witness and be a part of the next chapter in God’s plan for us.  We want to hear your story too!