Our church, like every church, was founded by a church plant.

In May 1946 Rev. Harold Lee arrived in Whitehorse with his wife, Lydia. They had a passion for the Gospel and a heart for those who were marginalized. In September of that year, they planted the Whitehorse Gospel Chapel, the first evangelical church in our city.

This would become Whitehorse Baptist Church, which would eventually become Mountainview Church.

Understanding and highlighting the individual history of each and every church can be a driving force for New Growth. Sometimes churches forget that we were all planted, once upon a time. In your community, someone like Rev. Lee decided it was worth a Gospel investment. So they dug in and the Lord blessed it.

This is still happening.

The challenge is that New Growth often sprouts out of unique circumstances. It doesn’t often line up with the plan that we would envision. Sometimes, if the Lord thinks we need it, He just drops it in our lap.

Not part of our long-term plan, but there it is. We might as well dig in, so the Lord can bless it.

In early 2017, a couple showed up on our doorstep from the other Baptist Church in town. They had a desire to plant a church. The timing wasn’t the best. We were 2 years into revitalization, with a name change and building project on the horizon. Realistically, we didn’t have the time or resources to be taking on this endeavor.

Moreover, their focus would be on reaching and discipling Northern Indigenous Peoples. An incredible vision and aspiration, but it wasn’t anything we had thought of or planned for. What would this look like?

Why our church? Why now?

There were dozens of questions and unknowns! The Elders and I sought the Lord’s guidance. We contemplated what this would mean for the future of Whitehorse Baptist Church, soon to be Mountainview Church.

That’s when the Lord reminded me about our founder, Rev. Lee. It is well known and well documented that he was burdened to reach Northern Indigenous Peoples as well. This was a vital component of he and his wife’s ministry. Was God bringing New Growth from a founding passion?

Would the crescendo of our revitalization come full circle to point back to where we started?

Excitement started to fill my heart.

Partnering with Harrison and Kaitlyn Kwok, to plant The Northern Collective Church brings excitement on a few fronts.

Ultimately, I get excited about people meeting the person and power of Jesus Christ. And the more churches we have in Whitehorse, the more opportunities we have for our community to see and hear the Gospel. The Northern Collective Church has a laser focus on reaching a component of Whitehorse that tends to be overlooked.

In addition, planting new growth aids in the fulfillment of our church vision, “To be an authentic, vibrant church, serving and reaching our city.“

Lastly, all metrics gathered by Barna, LifeWay and other research groups, show that planting churches increases the spiritual and numeric growth of the planting church as well as the sending church. I firmly believe that Mountainview Church will be more connected to Christ and more willing to connect with their neighbours because of this new growth.

Truth be told, there are still many questions.

There are dozens of processes and policies that Mountainview and Northern Collective will have to work through and check on each and every week. How will we track finances? How will societies and church membership play out? How will leadership structure and accountability be developed? And the list goes on!

That being said, it must be worth it! I can only imagine the amount of questions and unknowns, processes and policies that Rev. Lee had to work through back in ’46!