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教會歷史
Our History
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Counting
God’s blessing with A Brief History of the Chinese Baptist works in
Richmond
,
VA.
Tom
Tam
The Richmond Chinese Baptist work started over 100 years ago in 1881 in
Clay
Street
Baptist
Church
(Grace Street Baptist) with Rev. Samuel Clopton, a
son of a foreign missionary born in
Canton
,
China
. In 1951, The Richmond Baptist association
reenergized the Chinese work in
Grove
Ave.
Baptist
Church
, with Sunday school and a preaching service on every second Sunday of
each month. Our beloved Dr. Eugene Hill began his regular preaching in Cantonese
from 1956 to 1977. He also pastored the Cantonese speaking restaurant workers, small Chinese
business owners and their families in those days.
1977, The
Grove Ave.
Baptist Church sold their properties to VCU, our
director William Ligh passed away and Dr. Hill went to Hong Kong for a year of
teaching. During this transition time, God provided us with a place in the
Tabernacle Baptist Church at Grove Ave, and the first catalytic missionary from
Richmond Baptist Association, and several Cantonese speaking students to
continue this monthly worship service.
In 1979, the Chinese Cantonese Congregation adopted the name “The
Chinese Christian fellowship” and began to expand the Sunday worship service
from once a month to every Sunday in
both Cantonese and Mandarin.
In
Dec. 20, 1981
, The Chinese Christian Fellowship organized to form
the Chinese Baptist Church of Richmond.
With a partial support from the RBA, the Group called Pastor Samuel Kowk
as her first pastor. The
Tabernacle
Baptist
Church
extended their support further with their
fellowship hall; their youth department area and kitchen spaces as the
congregation began to grow. After pastor Kowk passed away, we were without a
pastor for three years.
In 1987, pastor Meng’s family came from
Taiwan
as our pastor. As the Tabernacle Baptist Church
began their building remodeling, we were thankful to our God and The Parkview
Baptist Church (now Paterson Baptist Church and so on) provided us with a
Beautiful chapel for worship.
One of the exciting comments made by our members was “we no longer
worshiping in the basement”. Within four year in
Parkview
Baptist
Church
,
our membership grew from 45 to about 100. In Nov.
1989, we purchased a 9 acres of land in 1800 Parkway lane and officially moved
into our first Church building in Oct. 1991. We thank the Lord that many members
gave sacrificially and the assistance from the VA Baptist General Board and
Richmond Baptist Association for their loans and grants to make this possible.
God commands his people be fruitful and multiple. As
our second generation grew from teens, to youth and young adulthood, they have
their own culture and need. In 1996, Daniel
Chu, a former member of the Church was called to be our English pastor after he
completed his seminary training. The English congregation meets at
9:30 am
for the worship service and the youth group on Friday evening at
7:30 PM
. Let us
remember that the
Chu
’s are now an IMB missionary in
Budapest
since end of 2004. We recently called the Farnen to
serve as our English congregation leader to continue God’s work.
About Five years ago, our membership began another
transformation. Most of our new members are from mainland
China
and most of them live near the westend. Pastor and
Mrs. Meng and several members of our Church began the westend worship service in
Gayton
Baptist
Church
(now in
River
Road
Baptist
Church
). Their membership grew to about 100. In Oct 2004, the west end worship
group organized into the Grace Chinese Baptist Church of Richmond, we need to
count our blessing and thank God for his wisdom and grace for establishing the
second
Chinese
Baptist
Church
in
Richmond
.
Oct 3, 2004
, the Chinese Baptist Church of Richmond has begun a
Cantonese group meeting in worship format on the first Sunday of each month from
2:00
to
3:30 pm
. We have about 30-40 people in our meeting. If God is willing, may this
Cantonese work be another growth cycle of the Baptist in
Richmond
.
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