By Leanne Friesen, Executive Minister of CBOQ
At the end of April, one week following Easter Sunday celebrations, our CBOQ Board Executive and Executive Minister piled into a van and went on a road trip for a visit to the Quebec Association. This was part of a special initiative to strengthen our relationships with our Associations that are a greater distance away from many of their sister CBOQ churches. For a number of years, the CBOQ Board would hold their spring meeting the day before one of our Association meetings and collectively travel to that region. Recognizing the significant cost of bringing sixteen Board members to Quebec, we reached out to the Quebec Association and asked if they would prefer if we sent a smaller contingent, and used travel funds to instead help Quebec churches attend Assembly. The resounding answer was yes!
With the help of Regional Associate, Karen Wong, the Board Executive – Eleanor Emmott, Evelin Wharram, George Mah and Dale Rose – and Executive Minister were delighted to join with invited leaders from Association Churches at New Canadian Baptist Church on Saturday morning. We were absolutely blown away by the incredible worship team that led worship for us at this church. New Canadian Baptist Church is a Russian speaking congregation with a thriving worship team made of young adults. They graciously led us in English! We had an amazing turnout with most churches in driving distance able to join us. After a testimony from Eleanor Emmott and sharing about CBOQ from Leanne, we broke in small groups to learn about ministry in Quebec. We were very struck by the common themes that arose: the challenges of secularization being the biggest theme. In Quebec, local laws prohibit, for example, faith groups from renting public buildings. The evangelical church is very small in Quebec and the Quebec association relies on one another for support. The care for each other was obvious and encouraging!
That afternoon, Karen took the team on a tour of our Montreal churches. Our Montreal churches are diverse and represent many different cultures. We have churches that worship in Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, Cantonese, French and English. They are located in strategic locations throughout Montreal and it was exciting to get a glimpse of God’s working throughout the city.
The next day our team split up and visited and shared at five of our sister churches: George spoke at Imani Full Gospel Church and was excited by the energy and passion of this church which worships in the oldest black church in Montreal! Leanne visited Montreal Chinese and brought greetings to their Cantonese, English and Mandarin services, before leading the English Sunday School class. Evelin spoke at Val Royal Baptist Church, where she felt a warm welcome and was encouraged by the faithfulness of its longterm members. Eleanor spoke at Westmount, which has seen many new people join the church who are new to Canada in recent years. This is also the home of the interdenominational worship nights we shared about at Assembly that year. Eleanor also went early to attend the service of one of our French Union churches, which rents in the same space. Dale really had an interesting visit however. He returned to a church he pastored, Lakeside Heights, which is currently without a pastor. When they heard he was coming, they asked if he would perform the baptism of a new convert who was eager to be baptised! What a great opportunity!
Each of us were humbled and blessed by our time in Montreal. We have much to learn from our Quebec churches and the ways that they have learned to minister in situations where there has been increasing pushback against faith organizations. We are truly excited to see leaders that God is raising up in our Montreal churches who are being innovative and serving with hope for the future.
We look forward to an increased number of our Montreal churches attending assembly this year with the financial help we were able to offer. We will be having a special time to feature them on Saturday morning – we know you will enjoy learning about ministry in Quebec as much as we did.
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