About Us
About Manna House
A small church with a deep table. We are glad you found us.
Our Story
There is a name in Scripture that carries more weight than it first appears. Manna - the bread God provided in the wilderness for a wandering people. Not in abundance. Not all at once. Just enough for today, arriving in a place no one expected, for people who had no other options. The name was not chosen casually. It is a theological claim - that God still meets his people in unexpected places with exactly what they need, and that the table he sets is open to anyone hungry enough to come.
Manna House is a church planted in the heart of Dilworth, Charlotte - a neighborhood of young professionals, longtime families, and neighbors who are, in their own ways, searching for something real. We are a community gathered around a conviction: that the gospel of Jesus Christ is not one topic among many. It is the center of everything. And when it is truly central, it produces something that cannot be manufactured - a community that is multicultural by conviction, not as a program. A table that is open not as a strategy but because the gospel demands it.
We are affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention and the Greater Charlotte Church Planting Network - part of a broader family of churches committed to the flourishing of Charlotte. We hold to Reformed theology - a high view of Scripture, the sovereignty of God, and the grace that saves not because of who we are but because of what Christ has done.
We exist not for ourselves but for our neighbors - in Dilworth, across Charlotte, and to the ends of the earth.
What holds us together
These are not just statements we affirm. They are the ground we stand on and the lens through which we read Scripture and engage the world.
1 Scripture Is Our Final Authority
The Bible is the inspired, inerrant, and authoritative Word of God. It is our final rule for faith and practice, not a document to be revised, but a living word to be received.
2 Timothy 3:16-17 2 The Gospel Is Christ's Completed Work
The gospel is not one topic among many. It is the center of everything. Jesus Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose again on the third day. This changes everything.
Ephesians 2:8-9 3 God Is Triune
There is one true God, the creator and sustainer of all things, who exists eternally in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The three persons of the Trinity are equal in substance, in power and in glory.
Matthew 28:19 4 Jesus Christ Is Lord
Jesus is fully God and fully man, the only mediator between God and humanity. His life, death, resurrection, and return are the hope of the world.
Colossians 1:15-20 5 The Spirit Gives Life
The Holy Spirit convicts, comforts, teaches, and empowers God's people. We depend on him for faith, holiness, wisdom, and mission.
John 14:26 6 Community Is Where Brokenness Meets Grace
We were never meant to follow Jesus alone. Community at Manna House is not a program or a Sunday morning courtesy - it is a covenant. The kind that bears burdens and celebrates milestones. The kind that walks through the hard seasons and shows up uninvited when it matters. We are building the kind of community where people are genuinely known - not by their job titles or their zip codes, but by their names and their stories.
Acts 2:42-47 7 The Church Is A Covenant Family
The church is not an event or a building. It is a people gathered by grace, committed to worship, discipleship, service, and mutual care.
1 Peter 2:9-10 8 Baptism And The Lord's Supper Point Us To Grace
We practice baptism and the Lord's Supper as visible signs of the gospel - reminders that Christ has acted for us and welcomes us to his table.
Romans 6:3-4 9 Mission Means Seeking the Peace of Our City
We are sent people. Our mission begins in Charlotte and extends to the ends of the earth. We serve our community not because it earns us favor, but because we have already received it.
Jeremiah 29:7 10 Sanctification
The Holy Spirit indwells God's people and gives them the strength and wisdom to trust Christ and follow Him. Good works do not and cannot make a person acceptable to God. However, authentic faith in Jesus Christ will always be accompanied by the fruit of being increasingly transformed in Christlikeness - loving and serving God and others. All aspects of our lives are to be lived to the glory of God under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
Romans 8:29 11 Eternity
Christ is presently seated at the right hand of the Father, ruling and reigning, until He returns bodily and visibly to judge and renew the whole world, receiving His people to Himself.
Acts 1:11 12 People
God created people male and female in his own image to know, love, and glorify Him. Because all people are created in the image of God, they are filled with dignity and worthy of honor and respect.
Genesis 1:27 13 Sin
Since the Fall, all people are born opposed to God, rejecting or ignoring him and rebelling against His rule and reign. Because of this rebellion, we justly deserve God's displeasure. Having been separated from Him, we are without hope unless He graciously rescues us from our broken condition.
Romans 3:23Meet the Pastor
Pastor Femi Oke
Pastor, Manna House Charlotte
I grew up in Nigeria, where the word "neighbor" carries a weight that English struggles to hold. It does not mean the person next door. It means the person you share your table with, show up for uninvited, and remain loyal to through the long seasons. That is the kind of community I grew up inside - and the kind I have never stopped believing is possible.
I came to Charlotte by way of a career in construction management and a 5,000-mile leap from everything familiar. For years I built structures - reading blueprints, managing timelines, making sure things held together under pressure. Then God interrupted that plan. Planting Manna House meant trading the security of a career and a country to become a student again - learning new streets, new rhythms, a new city, and a new way of trusting that what we need will be provided as we go.
When I walk through Dilworth I see a neighborhood with genuine beauty - the old homes, the oak canopy, the pride people take in where they live. But I also see something beneath the surface that the data and the demographics cannot fully name: people who are known by their job titles and their zip codes but not truly known by their neighbors. People who have proximity without belonging. People who are, in their own quiet ways, still looking for somewhere to call home.
That is why Manna House needs to exist here. Not as a large organization with programs for every need, but as a living room for this neighborhood - a place where people are genuinely known, where the table is long and the door is open, and where the searching and the settled and the skeptical can sit together and find that home was closer than they thought.
One thing to know before you meet me: I am a much better listener than I am a talker. I am not the pastor with a polished answer ready for every question. I am the person who will pull up a chair, ask you how you are actually doing, and mean it. You do not need your life together to belong here. You do not need to know what you believe yet. Just come as a neighbor. I am genuinely glad you are here.
Team
Tolu Aponinuola
Jennifer Tyav
Iyanu Titiloye
The table is open.
If something on this page stirred something in you - curiosity, recognition, a question you have been carrying - we would love to meet you. Come this Sunday. Or reach out first. Either way, the table is open.