Vancouver Gospel Home Church
– our LPD Church of the Week
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At our LPD Conference in March 2020, it was a joy to accept and welcome Vancouver Gospel Home Church into the LPD/EFCC Family. They began in 2014, and we are so glad that they have joined with us. Sadly, with COVID regulations coming immediately afterward, I have not been able to meet with them to officially welcome them to the family. I was able to visit them in February of 2020, to attend worship and to greet them in Christ, and I am so glad that I did.
This church ministers to Korean immigrants to our area, and meets in Maillardville, within the Municipality of Coquitlam. Maillardville, as the name might imply has French-Canadian roots. Maillardville is just up the hill from what was known as Fraser Mills, where the largest sawmill in the world was once located. My grandfather managed the general store that the mill operated for the sake of the once thriving community of mill workers. The mill drew many workers from Quebec, and they settled up the hill, forming the community of Maillardville.
My father, growing up in Fraser Mills enjoyed the community of Maillardville; so much so, that he became a French teacher in his early years of teaching, and did his Master’s Thesis on “French Canadian Settlement in British Columbia” (Just “Google” UBC Archives, John Ray Stewart).
Times have changed. The mill is gone and Fraser Mills is no more. Maillardville is now very multi-cultural and there is now a large Korean-Canadian Community in Coquitlam.
Please join us in praying for Lead Pastor Deaho (Daniel) Cho, Pastor H.W. Ma and Bible educator S.J. Lee, and the people of Vancouver Gospel Home Church, as they conduct three online services each Sunday, and seek to live by their theme of, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:10)
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Are We On the Offensive or Defensive Today?
Through this season of pandemic, Christians have debated about the virtue of closures, protocols and even vaccines. All of us have had to wade through opposing posts and information that have been liberally shared by governments the press and social media.
Some have felt that Churches have been treated unfairly; that closures have been unwarranted, and that Christians have been singled out unjustly. Others believe that closures are both justified and for our benefit.
With such debate, our attention and energies can be diverted from our Lord and our mission, and can put us in a defensive position. Rather than reaching out to our world, we can focus on simply trying to “hold on” to what we have.
The familiar phrase, “The best defense is a good offense” has been attributed to many people – from contemporary athletes (i.e. Michael Jordan) to various military leaders to Chairman Mao. In reality, it was taken from the words of George Washington, who in 1799 stated, “…make them believe, that offensive operations, often times, is the surest, if not the only (in some cases) means of defense.”
Is this familiar advice relevant for Christians today? Certainly, the church through the ages has faced all kinds of challenges and “threats,” yet has been resilient and has prevailed.
I was encouraged and reminded of our confidence in Christ in reading an article by John Mark, Vice President of Student Services and Professor of Church History at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and Spurgeon College. He asks, “What is the “Greatest Threat to the Gospel”?, and writes, “What this “greatest threat” trope ignores is the clear teaching of Jesus that He will build His church and not even the gates of hell will prevail against it (Matthew 16:17-19). The gospel is never threatened because it is the Savior who ensures His kingdom will advance.
Here is the link to the article: what-is-the-greatest-threat-to-the-gospel
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Stay Focused..
Here is a good reminder from Oswald Chambers, who writes, in My Utmost For His Highest, “The people who influence us the most are not those who detain us with their continual talk, but those who live their lives like the stars in the sky and “the lilies of the field”— simply and unaffectedly.”
Here is the link: https://utmost.org/living-simply yet-focused/
