QUESTION: Are teachers at Grace Christian Academy, a private Christian school in Haw River established in 2018 by the nondenominational church, The Lamb’s Chapel, being fired or forced to resign because they attend a church service other than Lamb’s Chapel?
Are they being fired for attending a new church being led by the former head of school at Grace Christian Academy, Brian Biggers, who is now leading a new church in Burlington, Grace Chapel, and is also planning to open a new private Christian School?
ANSWER: “Not true,” Bobby Fisher, executive pastor of The Lamb’s Chapel, said in a curt phone interview with The Alamance News Wednesday afternoon. “No teacher has ever been terminated from Grace Christian Academy for not being a member of The Lamb’s Chapel.”
Asked to elaborate, Fisher said, “I choose not to wallow in the mud.”
Founded by The Lamb’s Chapel in 2018, Grace Christian Academy is a private K-12 Christian school at 415 Roxboro Street in Haw River. The Lamb’s Chapel, a nondenominational church, had been based at that address but has since expanded to a new location near the Burlington-Alamance airport.
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Meanwhile, a job description for teachers posted on the website for Grace Christian Academy lists the following qualifications: “A mature Christian who meets the biblical qualifications for leadership; agrees wholeheartedly with GCA’s Statement of Faith”; endorse and support the constitution and by-laws of The Lamb’s Chapel; and be an active member of a local church that is alignment with The Lamb’s Chapel Statement of Faith.”
The church’s statement of faith outlines traditional Christian beliefs about such things as adhering to biblical laws, striving to live a Christian life, as well as biblical views concerning marriage, gender, and sexuality.
According to a job description posted on the GCA website for a vacant position as head of school, Grace Christian Academy does explicitly state that the chief school administrator is required to be an active member at The Lamb’s Chapel.
In a June 7 email to Grace Christian Academy families (explaining the departure of then-principal Kevin Bowman), Lamb’s Chapel pastor Scott Grimm wrote, “It is true that we’ve enacted a policy of requiring upper leadership only to have .”
Grimm noted in his email that Bowman had been “a member in good standing right up until he resigned.” Grimm’s email gave no details concerning the circumstances of Bowman’s departure as principal of Grace Christian Academy, a role he’d served in since it opened, according to the private school.
Meanwhile, Bowman is now currently listed as the head of school for a new private Christian school planning to open at 2401 Eric Lane in Burlington (near J&R Liquidations, formerly the JR cigar outlet). [See separate story here: https://alamancenews.com/new-private-christian-school-in-burlington-planning-to-open-for-2024-25-school-year/]
Grimm, the pastor at Lamb’s Chapel, stated in his June 7 email that Bowman was offered the opportunity to resign “as a courtesy option.” A photo of Bowman, taken outside Grace Christian Academy and posted on its Facebook page, indicates that he had been employed there at least until May 23, which marked the last day of the 2023-24 school year for GCA students.
A subsequent petition, urging the reinstatement of Bowman as principal, posted June 6, 2024 on change.org (an online petition site) had garnered 971 signatures last month. The petition, which has since “closed,” was directed to the Grace Christian Academy school boards; the names of its members are not publicly available.
