A Forty-Five Year Mission in Orange City
Emmaus Lutheran Church sits along South Volusia Avenue in Orange City, the small West Volusia town that anchors the residential stretch between DeLand, DeBary, and Deltona. The congregation is best known in the area for two things: a Saturday-evening and Sunday-morning schedule that fits working and traveling neighbors, and a curbside food pantry that has been feeding families across West Volusia from the church parking lot since before the pandemic. Members describe Emmaus as a place where the welcome is wide, the liturgy is grounded in historic Lutheran teaching, and the church calendar deliberately steps beyond the building into the surrounding community.
The congregation is part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, one of the larger Lutheran bodies in the United States, and is linked through the Florida-Bahamas Synod. Within that wider family Emmaus carries its own flavor: a 1970s mission start, an Air Force Reserve chaplain as its current pastor, and a hands-on calendar of community-serving ministries that reaches beyond the church walls every other Tuesday morning.
Meet Pastor Carol Yeager
The pastor is Carol Yeager, an ELCA pastor with a background that sets her apart from many clergy in Central Florida. She served 28 years in the United States Air Force, first as an active-duty line officer and then as a Reserve chaplain, providing spiritual care in both dusty deployments and frigid northern bases. Before coming to Florida she pastored congregations in North Dakota, North Carolina, and Washington State. Her writing on the call to ministry is direct: "I grew up in the church and have always felt that God met me there," she says, adding that "there is no one that I meet whom Christ doesn't love."
Pastor Carol continues to carry a particular care for those who serve in the military and for their families, even after stepping back from the chaplaincy. Members of Emmaus describe a pastor who is comfortable trying new approaches - running Bible studies, hosting pub-theology nights, and walking with families through both the serious and joyful turns of life. She is also the regular author of the "Pastor's Corner" notes that appear on the home page.
Worship at Emmaus: Saturday Evening and Sunday Morning
Emmaus runs two weekend services so neighbors can pick the slot that fits. Worship on Saturday begins at 5:00 p.m.; worship on Sunday begins at 10:00 a.m. Both are Lutheran services with the historic liturgy - readings, sermon, prayers, sharing of the peace, and Holy Communion - set to a mix of traditional hymns and more contemporary songs that invite participation across generations.
The Communion table, by tradition and conviction, is open to all who wish to receive it. As Pastor Carol puts it, the church "celebrates Communion, and all are invited to participate, regardless of their background." Sharing of the peace - the moment in the service when worshippers turn to one another with a handshake, fist bump, or hug - is treated as more than a friendly intermission. Members make peace with each other before approaching the Lord's table together, just as the earliest Christians did.
Watch the Services from Anywhere
For those who travel, are homebound, or simply want to look in before visiting, Emmaus livestreams each weekend service on its YouTube channel and on Facebook Live. Recordings remain available afterward. The livestream is an extension of a long-running habit at Emmaus of making the service available to neighbors who cannot be in the sanctuary on a given weekend, and the church notes in its outreach that it "brings the church to you."
How It All Began in 1979
Emmaus is a mission-start congregation. On February 26, 1979, a small group of Christians gathered for the first time as a congregation in the DeBary Community Center, in what was then called the "Four Townes" area of Central Florida. About 170 people came to that first service. A planning committee went to work, and in September 1979 a Charter Roll was opened; 82 adults signed it, becoming the first members.
Three months later Dr. Yount, then president of the Florida Synod, formally organized the congregation. The members described the early days as a "great spiritual success" and voted unanimously to call Rev. Robert E. Kromer as Emmaus's first pastor. From there the story is one of gradual growth: a building committee formed in early 1982, and by October 1983 three buildings arranged around a courtyard were dedicated to the glory of God on the South Volusia Avenue site the church still occupies.
With the formation of the ELCA in 1988 - a merger of The American Lutheran Church, the Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches, and the Lutheran Church in America - Emmaus became a charter member of the new denomination. By 2024 the congregation marked its 45th anniversary with a publication celebrating its history, a milestone the church treats as both a memory and a launching point.
The Food Pantry: Two Tuesdays a Month
The ministry that puts Emmaus on the map in West Volusia is the Food Pantry, which operates from the church parking lot on the first and third Tuesday of every month between 9:30 and 11:00 a.m. Drivers pull up to the curb, and volunteers load up to two bags of non-perishable groceries into each vehicle. There is no paperwork or means test - anyone who comes in need is served.
Each month the two weekend services compete in a friendly in-kind donation contest; one recent tally was 159 cans of tuna and 76 cans of Vienna sausage, with the Saturday service edging out the Sunday service that month. Cold cereal and oatmeal have been chosen as the following month's items. In a single recent distribution the pantry served 101 households, and the numbers have only grown since.
Volunteers say that distributing food often opens the door to something else: prayer. Anyone in need of prayer can ask a volunteer to pray with them on the spot, or can ask for an appointment with Pastor Carol for a longer conversation. The food pantry is run entirely by church members and donors, and the modest scale keeps it personal.
Adult Bible Study on Mondays
Bible study for adults meets every Monday at 1:00 p.m. in the Emmaus Room at the church. Pastor Carol leads the group through the scripture lesson that will appear in the weekend services, so those who attend on Monday come to Saturday or Sunday already steeped in the text. The group is small enough for real conversation and is described by the church as "a warm and caring group setting" - a place where newcomers can get to know the pastor and a handful of regulars without pressure.
Members describe the Monday hour as both a class and a fellowship, where questions are welcomed and the upcoming sermon is discussed in advance. It is the church's main ongoing adult education offering and serves as a feeder for people who want to go deeper before stepping into a ministry role.
Sharing Space: AA, Scouts, and Partner Ministries
Emmaus has long made its buildings available to community groups. From Monday through Friday, the church hosts Alcoholics Anonymous meetings in the "Four Townes Noon Group" between noon and 1:00 p.m., a service that has run for years and that the church treats as part of its healing ministry to the wider community.
Local scouting also finds a home at Emmaus. The church sponsors a Cub Scout Pack (Pack 560) that meets on the grounds, and a Girl Scout troop operates under the church's umbrella. The scouting program is one of the more visible ways the congregation reaches families with children in Orange City. A small lending library at the church offers members and visitors a selection of books to borrow.
Beyond the building, Emmaus partners with several outside organizations. The congregation supports Family Renew, an Orlando-area nonprofit that works with homeless families, and teams with a neighboring church to provide school supplies to children in need each fall. Once a month, volunteers from Emmaus cook and serve a meal at "The Bridge" in DeLand, an interfaith kitchen that feeds neighbors experiencing homelessness or food insecurity in West Volusia.
"God in a Glass" and "God in the Woods"
Two of Emmaus's more distinctive ministries meet neighbors where they are. "God in a Glass" is a monthly pub-theology gathering held on the third Thursday of each month (except on holidays) at 6:00 p.m. at a local pub or restaurant - locations rotate and are announced in the church newsletter and on social media. Pastor Carol leads a relaxed, conversational exploration of questions about God and faith, drawing on the spirit of Martin Luther's Table Talks. No beer is required; the point is conversation in a public setting, done "as a testament to our faith and as an invitation for others to join us."
"God in the Woods" is the congregation's outdoor gathering at Blue Spring State Park. The day includes a cookout, lawn games, and fellowship, capped by an evening hymn sing at 5:00 p.m. back at the church and a worship service at the park at 6:00 p.m. It is part campout, part parish reunion, and part proclamation - a chance for members and their friends to take church outside the four walls of the building.
Women's Monthly Luncheon
On the first Saturday of every month at noon, the women of the congregation gather for a monthly luncheon - a long-running fellowship tradition that gives women a regular touchpoint outside of worship. The event is hosted at rotating locations and is open to anyone who would like to come, whether a long-time member, a newcomer, or a guest from one of the area's other Lutheran congregations.
What Emmaus Believes
Emmaus teaches from the historic Lutheran foundations: the Bible, the ecumenical Creeds (Apostles', Nicene, and Athanasian), and the Lutheran confessional writings in the Book of Concord. The congregation confesses the Triune God - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - and proclaims Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Salvation, in this teaching, is a gift from God received through faith.
The church frames itself in the language of Martin Luther's Small Catechism: the Holy Spirit "calls, gathers, enlightens and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth and preserves it in union with Jesus Christ in the one true faith." Members understand worship as the place where, through Word, water, bread, and prayer, the faithful are nurtured and then sent back out into daily life. Tithing - the practice of giving 10 percent of one's income to God's work - is named by the church as a way members support youth, the elderly, those in crisis, and local evangelism.
An Open Door for Everyone
"Strangers are just friends you haven't met yet," Pastor Carol likes to say, and the congregation makes that line of welcome concrete. The church's own list of the kinds of people it has heard from includes those new to the area, those married, divorced, or single, those of any sexual orientation, race, or political persuasion, those skeptical of organized religion, and those recovering from hurts done in the name of church. All are invited to bring their whole selves to the table.
The church is also candid about the wider ELCA's commitments in this area: the ordination of LGBTQ+ clergy, the celebration of same-sex marriages in the denomination, and an explicit commitment to confronting injustice in church and society. At Emmaus the position is that "God's love and grace are limitless and for everyone," and that working out that welcome is ongoing - done locally as well as nationally.
The Building and the Neighborhood
Three buildings - clustered around a courtyard - form the campus that has been Emmaus's home since the 1983 dedication. The layout was designed to keep worship, fellowship, and education spaces close enough to walk between, and the courtyard remains a natural gathering point between services. The campus also hosts a small preschool, the kind of weekday activity that keeps the parking lot busy and brings families onto the grounds well before the Sunday crowd arrives.
From this West Volusia base, Emmaus reaches outward: food for the hungry, space for recovering neighbors, scouting for kids, school supplies for students in need, and a monthly meal at The Bridge in DeLand. It is, in short, a small Lutheran parish that tries to be a real part of the daily life of Orange City - welcoming on Saturday evening, again on Sunday morning, and visible in the parking lot every other Tuesday morning of the year.