Report of the
Executive Director, Church Extension
Daniel G. Ziegler
“My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too,am working.”(John 5:17)
“As long as it is day, I must work the works of him who sent me.” (John 9:4)
“. . .each with his assigned task.”(Mark 13:34)
“. . .and the Lord worked with them.” (Mark 16:20)
“Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”
(Acts 13:2)
“Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work.”
(Ecclesiastes 4:9)
” the work they had now completed.” (Acts 14:26)
“For we are God’s fellow workers . . . .” (I Corinthians 3:9)
“[God] has empowered [man] to . . . rejoice in his labor.” (Ecclesiastes 3:22)
God the Father is at work in the world today, choosing and calling people to Himself — to be His people, to become His Church. God the Son, Jesus Christ, after working redemption is at work in the world, building His Church. God the Holy Spirit is at work in the world convicting people, turning their hearts, imparting spiritual life to them and calling and gifting missionaries, evangelists and pastor-teachers to be His workers in planting churches and building disciples toward maturity.
We are privileged to be workers in the worldwide project of evangelism and church building. And it is hard work. The first century church planter, Paul, documents the difficulty and fatigue of this work in repeated statements: “To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy which so powerfully works in me” (Colossians 1:29). “Surely you remember, brothers, our toil and hardship…” (I Thessalonians 2:9). “… we worked night and day, laboring and toiling . . ” (II Thessalonians 3:8). “I have worked much harder” (II Corinthians 11:23). “I worked harder than all of them; yet not I but the grace of God that was with me” (I Corinthians 15:10).
Late twentieth century church planters, including those who serve on our behalf, likewise labor arduously to make disciples and establish churches. All too often, that effort is mixed with disappointment and discouragement, as people fail, plans and hopes die unfulfilled, hearts prove hard and commitments come up short. But the heroic, indefatigable and sometimes lonely laborers press on to “do the work of an evangelist”, (II Timothy 4:5). They do not lose sight of the goal — to make and baptize disciples (Matthew 28:19) and to “present everyone perfect in Christ”, (Colossians 1:28). They know that perfection or maturity can happen only in a body that is “joined and held together by every supporting ligament”, (Ephesians 4:16); their goal must include the establishment of the church. “Evangelism” without the church is incomplete, truncated, unbiblical and unthinkable.
By obedience, through faith, these men of God storm “the gates of Hades” (Matthew 16:18), bind and loose on earth (v. 19), “demolish strongholds” (II Corinthians 10:4), conquer kingdoms, gain what was promised (Hebrews 11:33) and plant the church where it did not exist before. And they are helped by fellow workers (Romans 16:21) who stand with them and toil beside them. Some “labor earnestly for them in their prayers” (Colossians 4:12). Many give generously, even sacrificially, of the remuneration of their daily work to provide support for the church planters. In these and other ways, we “have entered into their labor” (John 4:38).
By the gift of His grace and goodness, God, who “has empowered [man] to receive his reward and rejoice in his labor” (Ecclesiastes 5:19), allows His fellow workers to savor success. And this is such a time, when a previously unorganized congregation is chartered as a church and three churches who have fully supported themselves for three years are “graduated” from the Church Extension Department. These “bottom line” achievements of our goal are sweet occasions for rejoicing and thanksgiving.
The congregation at Walnutport first began with tent meetings in 1893. After rather recently suffering some tough blows and a season of decline, the believers at Walnutport in 1984 requested that the Board of Church Extension take the congregation under care as a mission and help it to reorganize as a church. David W. Chappell served first as organizing pastor. After his untimely death in 1988, Larry M. Smith accepted a call to Walnutport. Now, in its 97th year, the Walnutport congregation is “reborn” as a church. On September 12, three elders from among the membership were elected. This Conference is asked to recognize this church and receive it once again into Conference membership.
A number of brothers from outside Walnutport have assisted the congregation in its development. William H. Bartron and Laird F. Stengele have, together with the organizing pastor and Stanley H. Stahler from Walnutport and the Director, comprised the Board of Surrogate Elders. Clair A. Greenzweig, Randall A. Grossman, Philip E. Morrison have also served as “borrowed” elders in the past. The assessment committee for Walnutport has been Robert W. Smock, John W. Trauch, John C. Vandegriff, Jr., and Robert H. Zentz.
The three churches which are graduating are: Mt. Pocono PA, Poughquag NY and Wappingers Falls, NY. It took the three an average of five years to become fully organized as churches and eight years to attain full self-support. All three were started by bi-vocational organizing pastors. The great advantage of beginning as a daughter church is demonstrated by Mt. Pocono, which was able to gain recognition as a church just two years after it began and to achieve full self-support one year later.
Two of our newer missions in New Jersey, at Edison and in Ocean County, having begun public worship through mass telemarketing campaigns, are making outstanding progress. Edison, which launched public worship in April, 1989, is averaging in the 80’s at morning worship. Recently Richard B. Ravis joined Pastor Dennis M. Cahill as associate pastor, fully supported by the Edison mission, which is known locally as Christ Community Church — a Bible Fellowship Church. Brother Ravis bears primary responsibility for outreach, discipleship and small group ministries. During the year, the Sunday school and the congregation’s three evening house-churches have blossomed and grown steadily, as has the mission’s financial base. J. Richard Vroman, who has found employment and moved his family to Edison, serves bi-vocationally as Director of Christian Education. In its first 16 months, the congregation has baptized 16 believers.
In northern Ocean County NJ, after the largest yet of our phone campaigns, public worship was begun at the beautiful Ocean County Boy Scout Council building on April 1, 1990, with over 140 present. Worship attendance is now averaging in the 60’s and there are already nine declared committed families on line. Dean A. Stortz is the organizing pastor. Many people from many places helped in the exciting phone campaign. Special participation by three churches should be noted. Community Church of Howell freely opened its facilities as a base for the 15-line phone room and provided hundreds of person-hours on those lines. Faith Church of York PA and Calvary Church, Sinking Spring PA, have adopted the Ocean County work as a daughter church. This has entailed not only prayer and financial support but also personal involvement. Examples of the latter occurred during the successful summer evening children’s Bible school. A crew from York came to help to distribute advance publicity materials and a group of youths from Sinking Spring helped to staff the school. This adoptive daughter church concept provides a fruitful model for abetting the development of new missions in the future.
A wonderful happening during the year has been the merger of Second Kent Baptist Church in New York State with our eight year old Holmes mission to form Faith Bible Fellowship Church. Pastor Robert S. Commerford’s willingness to help a struggling church without a pastor was a key to the merger. Our mission at Whaley Lake provided a young congregation of mostly rather new believers with lots of children, without an adequate meeting place. Second Kent brought a somewhat smaller group, mostly older people more mature in the faith, with a spacious building just four miles from Whaley Lake, in a strategic location right at an interchange off Interstate 84, with a larger and denser population. The newly merged group worshipped together for the first time on July 1 and publicly celebrated their union on September 9. Average attendance at worship has climbed from the 40’s at the Lake, to the 70’s now.
A rich and delightful aspect of this new congregation is that it continues the ministry of two faithful ancient Baptist Churches — First Pawling Baptist, begun in 1754 and Second Kent Baptist, 1844.
Also this year, the Pleasant Valley NY mission, which began as a daughter of Valley Church in Poughquag, has come into the Department, by transfer at the initiative of the Elders at Valley Church. It is located 20 miles north of the Faith BFC building in Holmes. This affiliation was formally acknowledged on January 7, the first Sunday of 1990, when David R. Way was installed as organizing pastor under a call from the Board of Church Extension. Brother Way serves bi-vocationally. Attendances at worship and Sunday school are running nearly double what they were a year ago.
More modest growth is occurring at Somers Point NJ, which appears to be a somewhat more difficult or resistant field. Several new families have begun to attend worship regularly since the springtime. A Bible study group meets weekly in nearby Brigantine, which could become the nucleus for another new mission in the future. Roger L. Reitz serves as pastor at Somers Point and leader of the Brigantine study.
The church at Mt. Pocono was awarded full and clear title to the Kirk-in-the-Woods during the year, by order of the Orphans’ Court in Philadelphia. The church also was able to purchase a contiguous lot of about an acre. These acquisitions were celebrated in an inspiring and well attended public service and fellowship luncheon on Sunday, May 6. This vibrant congregation continues its solid growth.
The church at Newark DE has kept on growing and solidifying, despite the out-migration of some key people from the area. William G. Schlonecker is the pastor. If all goes well, the church will “graduate” from the Department a year from now.
Our most distant mission, in Spencer MA, got off to a good start in its public worship last October 22, when over 50 persons assembled. Christopher J. Morrison and Dennis W. Spinney serve bi-vocationally and jointly as organizing pastors at Spencer. Each works a full-time secular job to support his family in a very high cost-of-living area. Brother Morrison was freed in the early weeks to devote his full-time to the work of the ministry, during which time good progress was occurring. When the financial support reserves dwindled and a job opportunity opened, he accepted.
While I do not claim a prophetic gift of foretelling, I think I may have some common sense insight about church planting. A year ago I wrote, “If additional giving is not forthcoming, Chris will need to return to the longer work schedule and have nothing more to give to raising up the baby church in Spencer. This could doom it to failure. The Morrison family urgently needs one or more churches that will adopt them as missionaries, build and maintain close personal communications with them and accept responsibility to help to support them.”
For the most part, this support did not develop, though two churches did make some financial commitments as they were able. The budget anticipated $12,000 for Morrison support; less than half of that was contributed ($5,737). Brother Morrison has had to take entry level employment, which requires him to put in 55-60 hours per week at work and commuting. The result is that he has very little discretionary time to put into the ministry — virtually none for outreach — and so the group has declined significantly. The dire results of which I spoke a year ago may be coming to pass.
Further,Pastor Morrison’s position is a temporary one,which could terminate at any time. Should that happen,it is quite likely that the Morrisons’ would have to leave Massachusetts,where cost are very high and adequate employment very hard to find.
From the start in Spencer, our plan was to free half of Brother Morrison’s time for the work of the ministry. For 1990-91, that will require at least $13,000 in designated giving. We believe that could provide for a turn-around. We ask the brotherhood to pray earnestly about and for Spencer — that the Lord and His people will provide for this need and/or that a better paying, permanent job closer to home will open up.
Should the Morrisons’ have to leave Spencer, it could very likely end the Spencer mission. With that, could perish our hopes for a second mission start in that central New England area and for an eventual cluster of a least three or four congregations in that tri-state region, as we now have in the Mid-Hudson Valley.
Our remaining two missions are in two of the three largest cities within present Bible Fellowship Church territory. In Newark NJ, there was disappointment when our proposal to purchase a larger building, which had been many months in the making, came apart at the hands of the seller.
By virtually every measure, the Newark congregation is stronger than it has ever been. It maintains and expands a vital and credible witness and impact in its needy city. Its members continue to look to the Lord for direction to, and provision of an adequate building suited to its growth.
Our most difficult and distanced cross-cultural church planting ministry ever has focused on Philadelphia and has targeted Southeast Asian peoples in that great metropolitan area. David H. C. Sng has labored diligently and intensively in this work. It has been far from easy. Several young adults from Buddhist backgrounds, who have professed faith in Jesus, have gone out of the city to school, three of them to Pinebrook Junior College. When that happened, their families did not sustain their involvement in the worshiping community, so Lord’s Day worship was discontinued. At present, the approach, direction and form of the mission to Southeast Asians are being reassessed.
My service on the Committee to Study Intercultural Ministry has intensified my interest in, and concern for, church planting evangelism among the many distinct people groups who are coming to live in the United States of America. We cannot decline to reach out with the Gospel to these peoples and remain credible disciples of Jesus Christ.
The Lord has been working, and so have we — at His behest and by His power. The Scriptures direct us to “always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord” (1 Cor.15:58),”bearing fruit in every good work”(Col. 1:10). As we do that in the field of church extension, we are able to say, as we rejoice in our labors, to our new believers and congregations, “Are not you the result of our work in the Lord?” (1 Cor. 9:1).
At this Annual Conference, we have had a wonderful opportunity to rejoice in our labor and to reflect on the results of our work in the Lord. In the next year or two, we may expect similar times of refreshment as the eight missions in the Department and one daughter mission (Pocono, West End) grow and develop. But then, the rejoicing may diminish and the results decrease. This is probable because in the last three years, the Church Extension Department has been able to open only two new missions; and a mere two daughter missions have been started.
We need to recall our WIDER HORIZONS goals that were overwhelmingly adopted in 1983. Have we forgotten them? Are we praying and planning and providing for their accomplishment?
The churches asked the Church Extension Department to start 39 new congregations between the end of 1985 and the end of 2000. With 34 yet to go, we’ll need to open over three per year on average. Three of the goal of 16 daughter churches have been begun, leaving 13 more remaining within the next decade.
With these goals before us and a number of our pulpits presently vacant, we can see our need to “ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field” (Matt. 9:38).
To provide for the start of new missions, the Conference agreed on a goal “to double the churches’ offerings for church extension as soon as possible” (1983 Yearbook, p. 21). Surely we did not mean then that it take eight years or more to achieve that goal!
During the 1989-90 fiscal year, our churches gave $21,675 more for extending the church than they did in the previous year. This 16% increase is very encouraging; we are truly grateful.
The $158,311 that the churches gave this year was still $40,567, or over 40%, short of that 1983 goal of doubling our offerings. In our first “current” budget, income fell short of maintenance costs by $22,974 — a deficit that will have to repaid with interest from future operating budgets.
Last year our organizing pastors received salary increases of merely $240.00 each — way below our Annual Conference recommendation. This year they must receive 7% increments, and some need more because they have been so far below the recommended minimum salary package.
We have earnestly asked the churches to consider increasing their church extension contributions at least 10% this year to help to meet these raises. Many of the churches have indicated that they intend to do so.
Meeting these support needs, as part of the cost of maintaining our present ministries, will involve several designated lines in our 1990-91 budget, which are marked with an asterisk. In addition to the need for the Morrison family, noted earlier, these include needs for the Spinney, Stortz and Smith families. Further, the financial report shows that designated support for the Cahill, Commerford and Reitz families fell considerably short of expenses last year. We ask the churches to bear these needs in their minds, hearts and prayers as we work through the coming year.
Then our New Missions Start-Up budgets for this year and next indicate added need for $56,000 to $59,000 to start-up to three new missions each year. And those new congregations, if started this year, will need at least $34,000 to sustain them in their second year.
To help to tell the story of what our Lord and our church planters are doing and to help in developing more support, we have engaged Carol Z. Snyder as our director of development and communication. In addition to these portfolios, her office will also relieve me of some of the routine business such as mailing, bookkeeping, etc., which will allow me more time for personnel matters (recruitment, staff development, etc.) and strategy and survey work. I believe these will stimulate new church formation and present congregations’ growth.
Mrs. Snyder has served for many years at Pinebrook Junior College, most recently as director of admissions. She is presently serving half-time with the development office of the college and will devote her full-time to our Department after Jan. 1, 1991. Her experience at P.J.C. will prove invaluable to her work with us.
Carol is not only my sister in the Lord, but also in our earthly family. Of all living persons, she is my longest standing friend. I look forward to working with her; I know she will make a tremendous impact for good on our work.
Peter F. Drucker has written that efficiency is doing things right and effectiveness is doing the right things. Over the past few years, the Board of Church Extension, particularly in its use of committees, has become more efficient. We are presently involved in an in-depth strategic planning process, which we hope to conclude within 1990 that should make us more effective.
We continue to believe that there are great things for us to do in extending Christ’s Church in North America. We have been made aware, for example, of a city of over 40,000 in northern New Jersey that is, as far as we can discern, without a credible evangelical church. And we think that may be more typical than exceptional in the metropolitan area.
We still anticipate planting a church in Beacon, NY and we have many other potential targets in view. Within the past year we have done survey work in Orange and Rensselaer Counties NY, Waterbury CT and Berkshire County MA.
“Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed” (Prov. 16:3). “May the favor of the Lord our God rest upon us; establish the work of our hands for us -yes, establish the work of our hands”, (Psalm 90:17). Amen!