Editor's note: When a discontinued congregation vacates its campus because of declining membership, it may seem like a death knell. But some hear a clarion call to keep God's work in the house. Today we kick off a series of stories about church campuses retooled to continue ministry in the afterlife of a departed congregation. Look for more examples in the weeks to come.

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Jim McClelland looks over the former Wesley Memorial UMC gym he helped put together in his youth and admires how far Parker Street Ministries has come in helping young people. Photos by Susan Green.

LAKELAND – When Jim McClelland steps into the gym at Parker Street Ministries, the memories come back in torrents.

“I was here when this gym was built,” says McClelland, who in the 1950s was president of the Methodist Youth Fellowship at Wesley Memorial UMC.

“I was part of the group that hung the first basketball goals in this gym.”

McClelland’s ties to the former Wesley Memorial, which closed in 2009, go back three generations. His mother grew up in the church, and his grandfather, pastor of the former Myrtle Street UMC, started the building fund that led to construction of Wesley Memorial’s sanctuary in 1918.

He remembers the Sunday night youth meetings, when he played the piano or organ for worship. He can point across the street to a house where his mother lived in her later years, allowing her to walk to church meetings when her children no longer lived close enough to drive her.

When Wesley Memorial closed, McClelland had long since moved away. In 1961, he took up studies at Georgia Technical Institute and went on to settle in Indiana, where he has been president and CEO of Indianapolis-based Goodwill Industries since 1974.

But he kept up with news of the church through family and friends. He remembers reports of the final months, when about 50 or so worshipers trickled in on Sundays.

Parker Street Ministries staff maintains the look of a church as it operates in the former Wesley Memorial UMC. Executive director Tim Mitchell says he even installed a church bell to chime the hours.

“They were just trying to keep the doors open,” McClelland recalls. “We were all kind of hoping it would stay open.”

The congregation at Wesley ceased to be, but the building never really closed. A budding young ministry aimed at giving disadvantaged kids a leg up through education and neighborhood revitalization had already taken root in a small part of the church campus.

“We were involved with this church even when it was the church,” reflects Tim Mitchell, executive director of the Christian nonprofit Parker Street Ministries. From the time the ministry started after-school tutoring there in 2006, church members would peek their heads in from time to time and ask if anything was needed.

“It was a neat thing,” Mitchell says. When the sad day of the final Methodist worship service came, Parker Street staff mourned right along with congregants.

“Almost our whole staff went to the last church service. It was kind of symbolic – the torch was passed to us to keep on doing God’s work here.”

A school bus stop at Parker Street Ministries makes it possible for working parents to send their children there for after-school tutoring. Below, children make their way to the ministry, where they can use computers and get help with homework.