Report of the
Executive Director of the
Church Extension Department
THE GREAT COMMISSION CHURCH
Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.
– John 20:21
This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.
– Luke 24:46-48
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
– Matthew 28:19,10
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
– Acts 1:8
Few, if any, in the Bible Fellowship Church would question that the Great Commission of Jesus Christ is directed to the Church in our time. It is the intention of the Lord Jesus Christ that His disciples obey and implement that commission right now and until He returns.
The Great Commission was stated by the risen Lord to the eleven surviving apostles in varying forms during the forty days between His resurrection and ascension. It is recorded in all four gospel accounts and in the Acts.
We would agree with John Stott, “In the last resort, we engage in evangelism today not because we want to or because we choose to or because we like to, but because we have been told to. The church is under orders…. Evangelistic inactivity is disobedience.” We say amen to Donald Mc Gavran, “This is God’s command. Doing that is essential Christian conduct. No one can be a good Christian who does not engage in this enterprise.”
Though the word “church” is not mentioned in any of the statements of the Commission, the church is essential in obeying it. In Matthew 28:19,20, the Lord directs His followers to three actions—make disciples, baptize them, teach them to observe all of His commands. Only the church does all these things. Only through participation in the church can any disciple reach his or her full potential (Ephesians 2:20-22; 4:11-16). Unless disciples are being churched and new congregations formed, the Commission is not being fully obeyed.
The scope of the Commission is all inclusive: all believers engaged in witness/evangelism directed to all people of all nations—in all venues in which the church does, will or should exist. A Great Commission church is one that obeys Christ’s orders in all of those locales. We may define the venues by the Commission as stated geographically in Acts 1:8—Jerusalem, all Judea and Samaria, and the ends of the earth. In order to apply the Commission to ourselves, our churches and our denomination, we are helped by contextualizing the Acts 1:8 statement. When we contextualize, we apply the Scriptures to our own cultural context without doing violence to the text in terms of it’s ancient cultural context.
Jerusalem
How do we understand Jerusalem when we apply Acts 1:8 to ourselves and our churches? Our “Jerusalem” is the community in which we live and serve the Lord. The Great Commission church will understand and clearly define its local target area and will make plans and take action steps to saturate that area with the Gospel. It will use many means to do this. It will challenge and train its people to reach out evangelistically to their respective circles of family, friends, neighbors, work and school associates, etc.
The Great Commission church will not ignore or neglect the people groups in its Jerusalem, but will share the Gospel with them, also. “All nations” (ethne—Greek) in Luke 24:45 and Matthew 28:19 does not refer to modern nation states, but to people of linguistic or tribal affinity, people who are culturally different and more distant from the person or group who is viewing them.
In the Great Commission church there should be an interplay of internal spiritual growth and numerical growth as new persons, from “our own” culture and other people groups become disciples of our Lord Jesus. It knows that its members do not become mature and strong except as they witness and seek to win the lost. If it is not seeing unbelievers being born again and added to the body, it is not satisfied for it yearns and prays for such growth. It longs to baptize and teach new believers and bring them to maturity in Christ, to the greater glory of God (II Corinthians 4:15).
The Ends of the Earth
“The ends of the earth” has had the same meaning all through the years, for every person or group located anywhere on earth, as it did in the mind of Jesus when He spoke that phrase on that first Ascension Day.
The Great Commission church gladly accepts its responsibility and gratefully takes its part in the worldwide proclamation of the Gospel and the formation of churches. It prays for world missions. It sends its members out to be missionaries. It gives liberally of its means to support the world mission.
With joy we celebrate the centenary of the Board of Missions of the Bible Fellowship Church. On November 3, 1864, the birthday of the Church Extension Department, the Semi- annual Conference drafted a constitution for that society which was called “The Home and Heathen Missionary Society of the Evangelical Mennonite Society.” Though it would be over 31 years until its first official foreign missionaries would go forth and a new board would be chosen to oversee that work, the worldwide scope was in view in principle. Citing the Great Commission as its basis, the Conference said, “We, as a small band of the Christian Church … feel it is also our duty to organize a Missionary Society to contribute our mite to the great work of our Lord.” That “mite” has become “mighty” as the Bible Fellowship Church is making a strong and exemplary commitment of its people, prayers and money to the concern of world missions, as a Great Commission denomination should do.
The Middle
Please refer to your New International Version of the Bible to check whether I am accurately quoting Acts 1:8. “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and to the ends of the earth.”
The Excluded Middle
Someone who has compared my quote with the Bible says, “You jumped from Jerusalem right to the ends of the earth and you skipped the middle.”
Following through in our contextualization of Acts 1:8, what is our “Judea and Samaria”? For the eleven apostles, Judea was home territory, where the people were Palestinian Jews, just as they were. The Samaritans were mostly Gentile and culturally different from the Apostles. We may understand our Judea as the English speaking people on the North America continent. Our Samaria is the culturally diverse people groups who live among us—different in language, custom, color, cuisine and other factors which give them group identity different from the predominant culture. Our “Judea and Samaria” is one of the greatest, neediest mission fields on earth. Yet for many among us, our world—missionally speaking—consists of “Jerusalem” and the ends of the earth; the middle is outside of our vision, overlooked, uncared for, excluded.
The Diminished Middle
Check my quotation again against the Bible. “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.”
“No! You quoted it wrong.”
“How?”
“You made the middle smaller.”
How have we diminished the middle? After about a century of giving 5% to 6% of total offerings for extending our Church through church planting evangelism, we began in about 1970 to decrease our proportion of support for this ministry until it is now less than 2%. And last year and this we have not been able to budget anything for new church starts. In 1994 Bible Fellowship Churches gave $3.00 for “other missions” (other than BFC missions) for each $1.00 they gave for church planting evangelism in our “Judea and Samaria.” In recent years our churches have been giving declining numbers of their sons and daughters to be church planting missionaries in North American or even to be pastors of existing Bible Fellowship Churches.
A Great Commission Church ought not to diminish the middle ground of her Lord’s Commission.
The Decreased Middle
Let’s try it again, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” “No! It’s still not right!”
“Now what’s wrong?”
“You missed a word.”
“What word?”
“All!”
“Ah, but it’s such a small word!”
Jesus said, “in all Judea and Samaria.” That “all” covers a lot of ground and millions of people. These questions have been put to me over the last 15 years: “Why should we have Bible Fellowship Churches in Hudson Valley, New York?” “Why would you want to go all the way to Massachusetts to start a new church?” “How can I relate to a new church that’s more than two hour’s drive from my town?” When I’ve talked of planting new congregations in Columbus, Ohio or in Indianapolis, Indiana, or in the Sun Belt states such as Florida or Texas, people look at me as if they are stunned or uncomprehending.
Can we look at our Savior and say honestly, “Lord, we’ve done our best to obey your Commission,” when our most distant churches are 100 miles west, 130 miles south, 80 miles north and 300 miles east of our point of origin? Is that adequate penetration of our Judea in 138 years?
A couple recently became part of one of our churches. They love their church and are positive about their new denomination. Recently they had occasion to travel to Utah. Approaching the Lord’s Day, expecting to participate in worship, our brother and sister opened the Yellow Pages to locate the nearest Bible Fellowship Church. Of course, they found none!
What about “Samaria?” After speaking at one of our churches about the needs and opportunities for ethnic church plants in the US, I greeted a brother at the door. “Let them learn English if they want to live here,” he said; and in my mind I added “or let them go to hell without hearing and understanding the Gospel!” That brother and I had an interesting conversation.
There’s another, more hopeful and positive picture regarding the decreased middle. Throughout the years, many have suggested or asked whether we could plant churches in Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas, various sites in Florida, the Buffalo and Long Island areas of New York, western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire and Ontario, Canada. One of the real groundswells in the BFC is the interest and commitment to the formation of new ethnic churches in our “Samaria.”
Our MISSION AMERICA plan presents a vision along with specific strategies and tactics for an aggressive program to overcome the excluded middle, the diminished middle and the decreased middle, to push out the borders of the BFC in anglo America, while responding to needy target sites for new churches in the midst of our present congregations. At the same time we may see the formation of several new churches among the diverse people groups among us, which will bring great cultural and spiritual enrichment to our Church. Through a united, deliberate commitment to intensify our involvement in widespread evangelism and new church formation in America, we can, by God’s grace and with His help, be in truth and in deed a Great Commission Church.
Growth Subsidiary
Since 1972 the Church Extension Department has proved to be the growth subsidiary of the denomination. An interesting table shows that our nineteen newest congregations (all started since 1962), with an average age of 12 1/2 years and just 14% of the BFC members, produced 45% of the membership growth 1972 through 1993. In twelve of those 22 years, the number of net membership additions of the 19 youngest exceeded those of their 38 elder sister churches.
| ESTABLISHEDCHURCHESExpansionGrowth | NEWCHURCHESExtensionGrowth | |
| 38 | number of congregations | 19 |
| 67% | percentage of total congregations | 33% |
| 154 | average membership | 52 |
| 90.4 years | average age of churches | 12.5 years |
| 86% | percentage of total BFC members | 14% |
| 1217 | number of members added | 990 |
| 55% | percentage of denomination growth | 45% |
In 1994, all of the net membership growth—in fact 109% of it—was produced through those 32-year-old and younger congregations.
OUR DEPARTMENT CHURCHES
Starting in 1984, the 102nd through 112th Annual Conferences recognized eleven missions as fully organized particular churches and received them into Conference membership—an average of one per year. This is a strong and striking fruit of our collective labors—a very satisfying “bottom line.”
Christ Community Church in Edison, NJ, led by the pastoral team of Dennis M. Cahill and Richard B. Ravis, continues to grow strongly and steadily. On a recent Lord’s Day, eight believers confessed Christ in baptism. On February 25, worship attendance topped 200 without special promotion. The church, which meets in the township’s Washington Elementary Public School, is considering going to two morning services in the future. Budgeted appropriations for Edison ceased on January 1, 1996.
Community Church of Red Hill, PA, continues under the founding pastoral team of Ronald K. Denlinger and D. Thomas Phillips. The growth of the church is ongoing. Its Sunday morning schedule was recently modified to incorporate a unique split worship service which makes room for about 50% more worshipers than could be accommodated under the earlier schedule. This past January 1 marked the end of Pastor Denlinger’s support from RHMA and the successful completion of our working agreement with that fine partner organization. Community Church has now begun its three years of full self-support which will lead to its graduation from the Department, Lord willing, shortly after its seventh anniversary.
Self-Supporting
A church must demonstrate its ability fully to support itself for three consecutive years before it is graduated from the Department. One of them has achieved a year of self support, three others have become self-supporting as of January 1, 1996.
The church in Pleasant Valley, NY was received as a Conference member one year ago and has fully supported itself since then. A local chartering service was held on October 1, 1995. James A. Wickstead, pastor of Valley Church in Poughquag, the new church’s mother, preached the sermon; James A. Beil, Conference Chairman, presented the charter.
Good growth continues at Pleasant Valley. Sunday school attendance is up about 50%. While the church is technically self-supporting, a major portion of the pastoral support package is provided through a pension from pastor David R. Way’s former employer. The church is considering its financial picture in view of its future need to provide a full pastoral salary and its need soon to relocate to a larger meeting place.
Faith Church, Holmes NY has now begun full self-support. Robert S. Commerford is the pastor. Five persons were baptized on February 10. Worship attendance averages somewhat more than 100.
Still Receiving Appropriations
The church in Ocean County, NJ, where founding pastor Dean A. Stortz continues to serve, is a responsible, stable body of believers. Financial assistance from the Department treasury is being decreased each year, with this year’s decline being somewhat heavier than both the church and the Board of Church Extension would prefer. The decrease was necessitated by decreasing receipts for the department budget against increasing costs.
Calvary Church, Walnutport, PA, has been without a stated pastor for over two years. During this time there has been some erosion of the congregation’s strength and number. The church is actively seeking to call a pastor.
OUR MISSIONS
We use the term “mission” to identify a congregation that has not yet been able to elect and install local elders from among its members. A work without a membership roll is an unorganized mission. A congregation becomes an organized mission when it has received its first charter members. All missions are governed by boards of surrogate elders.
Organized Missions
Three of the organized missions are located in cities. Calvary Church in Scranton, PA, is served by pastor Roger L. Reitz. During the year the mission has grown significantly in membership, worship attendance, the Sunday School, prayer meeting and offerings. Morning worship attendance is averaging over 50; Sunday evening and prayer meetings are attended by 20-25 persons. This “church on the hill” is on the move.
The mission in Staten Island, NY, is struggling. The out migration of a key family to Florida and the withdrawal of a deeply involved member have hurt the small flock. Pastor Ralph E. Ritter serves faithfully with expectancy and hope for a turn-around. An Awana program has provided openings into homes of the 90 children who have attended at least once during the year. Attendance has averaged 35 children weekly. Men’s and women’s seminars in May and October, respectively, are highlights of the year and well attended. The Newark, NJ congregation provided the staff for the Staten Island VBS during the summer.
In November, founding pastor Delbert R. Baker celebrated 20 years of ministry in Newark, NJ. This mission is strong and vital in its urban setting. More than 25 persons are regularly teaching the Scriptures in a varied program for all age groups. The congregation has a very strong ministry to needy people, regularly feeding families in need and going to Penn Station to feed and clothe the homeless there. The mission receives help in this benevolent work through cash and in-kind offerings by churches and individuals. Special recognition should be made of the church in Ephrata, PA, which has for several years brought a truckload of foodstuffs to Newark during the Christmas seasons, a value of many hundreds of dollars, to help the needy.
The Newark congregation has acquired a lot at the heart of its block for a possible future building site. An additional lot will need to be obtained to make-up the requisite square feet needed for a worship center and parking and to provide needed access to the site from the streets.
Our organized mission in Thompson, CT, meets in a rural setting in its own building on a busy road. Dennis W. Spinney has served the congregation from its beginning. The body has great strength of koinonia. It maintains an active program. Its steady growth has been accelerated since Pastor Spinney has been able to give his full time to pastoral service. The congregation has two Sunday morning services and is moving rapidly toward the time when it will move to the lower level of the building, which can accommodate a larger number of worshipers.
A New Mission?
The church at Wappingers Falls, NY, has requested that the Board of Church Extension receive it as an organized mission for the purpose of relocating to nearby Beacon, NY. The latter community, a city of some 13,000, needs an evangelical church and has been targeted by the Board for a number of years. The church has been without a pastor for about a year. An active search for an organizing pastor is underway. The church joins the Board of Church Extension in requesting that the Conference approve this charge of status for the congregation.
Unorganized Missions
The mission at Somers Point, NJ, has received Richard A. Moyer as organizing pastor and has relocated to Egg Harbor Township, where it now meets at the Wonder Years Day Care Center, not very far from its 6 1/2 acre building site. Russell and Eleanor Ruch continue to commute weekly from Hatfield, PA, to assist with the work.
The congregation is reaching out evangelistically to over 400 homes in the township with an offer to give each family, who will accept and view it, a copy of the “Jesus video.” It is the hope and prayer of the congregation that, coupled with much prayer and careful follow-up, this work will result in many professions of faith and additions to the congregation. People and churches outside of the area have provided significant help in financial contributions for the purchase of the videos and in visiting the homes.
Pastor Moyer is serving bivocationally. He doubles as the chaplain at the over 1000 inmate Atlantic County correctional facility at Mays Landing. He hopes that his evangelistic and discipling work inside the prison will lead to continuing ministry with inmates who leave the facility, many in the context of the young church.
The Bayshore Mission in Aberdeen, NJ, is just 16 months into its public life in eastern Monmouth County. The philosophy of ministry of this mission, under the leadership of John C. Vandegriff, is seeker targeted, designed to reach and win those who have never been part of churches or have “given up” on the traditional church.
Bayshore has used a number of evangelistic strategies, culminating in a mass mailing to 14,000 homes in the fall. Many people visited following the mailing; attendance and new committed families rose significantly.
A committed family assessment was held October 7, and at the November 20 meeting of the Board of Church Extension, the congregation received approval to begin to form its membership roll. Membership interviews are currently in process.
Worship attendance in January/February 1996 averaged 66, which is more than 50% higher than it was before the mailing.
On January 14, at a congregational meeting after morning worship, Pastor Vandegriff challenged his people to consider greater financial commitment to the work of Bayshore Church, and Dennis Cahill shared the story of growth of giving at Edison at a similar point in that church’s history. In the five weeks following that meeting, weekly offerings about doubled, to $776.00 per week. These markers of spiritual, numerical and financial growth are very encouraging.
Another mailing to 15,000 new homes last month preceded a Celebration Sunday on March 24. The congregation meets at the beautiful Lloyd Road Elementary School in Aberdeen.
A committed family assessment was held November 18 at the mission in Brodheadsville, PA, a daughter congregation of Berean Church, Stroudsburg. The results were positive, indicating the presence of 12-14 potentially committed families. The mission, known as Heritage Church, under the direction of the elders of Berean Church, has interviewed and received its first members. Donald R. Hibbs is the organizing pastor.
We continue to recognize a dormant mission in the Upper Pocono area, along the Interstate 84 corridor. We believe the area is spiritually needy and a viable target area for a church plant. We await the Lord’s call of a church planter to revive this mission.
The mission at Gilbertsville, PA, is “on hold” in its relationship to the denomination and the Church Extension Department, as it works through some issues that may bear on whether or not it will ultimately be part of the denomination. The congregation continues to function, but is has not received an organizing pastor through a call under the BFC system of pulpit supply.
A New Ethnic Mission
The Department is working with Bethany Church in Hatfield for the formation of a new mission among Haitian people in Philadelphia, PA. Known as Beraca Bible Fellowship Church, this mission is developing as a daughter congregation of Bethany Church, with primary oversight by that church’s Board of Elders.
Since September the Haitian congregation has been meeting at the former Emmanuel Church building in Southwest Philadelphia in a rental arrangement with the Board of Directors of the Bible Fellowship Church.
Beraca Mission is being served on an interim basis by Ebrane’ Cadet, who is a Haitian national. He is seeking ministerial credentials through the Ministerial Candidate Committee. Brother Cadet and his family are residing in the former Emmanuel parsonage.
Some financial assistance has been provided to Beraca Mission by the churches through the Joint Committee on Ethnic Ministry, which is comprised of representatives of the Board of Missions and the Board of Church Extension.
It is anticipated that when the Board of Church Extension shall be able to call an organizing pastor according to the pulpit supply system, Bethany Church will hand off primary oversight to the Board of Church Extension.
Since the last Annual Conference, demographic survey work has been done in Luzerne County, PA to update an earlier survey of that area.
I am grateful to God for the Board with whom I serve, for Carol Snyder and Rachel Kistler, my faithful staff, for the able and godly pastoral leaders who serve our churches and missions, for the saints who comprise the congregations of the Department, for the members who serve as elders, deacons, teachers and other servants of the congregations, for the men who sacrificially serve the missions as surrogate elders, for the volunteers who have served in work and ministry teams on many of our fields during the last year and for the hundreds of individuals and many churches who pray, give and care that their good work, now known as MISSION AMERICA, may progress and prosper.
There is much about which we can be encouraged. It yet remains to be seen what we shall do if we have the faith, vision and determination to do it boldly! What is possible if we unitedly commit ourselves all out to being a Great Commission Church? We have probably not yet begun to ask for or think about that!
Daniel G. Ziegler