Canadian Mennonite
Volume 10, No. 19
October 2, 2006
Assistant pastors to celebrate 100 years of active ministry
New Hamburg, Ont.
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This fall, the Nithview Community congregation will be celebrating with Victor Dorsch and Amsey Martin, who serve as assistant pastors, and are each celebrating 50 years of active ministry. That’s a total of 100 years!
Their paths first crossed in the summer of 1955. Victor Dorsch, his wife Viola, and their two children were living in a small apartment at Eastern Mennonite College (EMC) in Harrisonburg, Va., where Dorsch was completing his theological studies. Late that August, Martin and his new bride, Leona, moved into the apartment next door. These young men were preparing for a lifetime of Christian ministry and their spouses were prepared to support them and serve wherever they were called. They had many opportunities that year to “bump into” one another as the small adjoining apartments shared a bathroom.
The Dorschs had a dream to serve God in the mission field, so they applied to Eastern Mennonite Board of Missions in Lancaster, Pa., with an openness to serve wherever God would call them. On Oct. 23, 1956, the Dorschs and their young family set sail from New York for their first assignment in Somalia. They would serve as missionaries in Africa for the next 31 years.
In the meantime, Martin spent one year at EMC, choosing to complete his pastoral training part-time while serving as a pastor. His first call came in the fall of 1956, when he became the pastor of a small, emerging church in Glen Allan, Ont. To support his growing family he also worked at the Wallenstein feed mill. Then in 1963, Martin was invited to plant a church in Listowel, Ont. The new congregation began with only three families, but since that time Listowel Mennonite Church has outgrown its facilities three times and now has 225 members. Martin also served at Poole Mennonite (Milverton, Ont.) and at Bethel Mennonite (Elora, Ont.), before retiring from Living Water Mennonite Church in New Hamburg in 1996.
Despite being continents apart, their pathways still crossed. In 1973, the Dorschs’ daughter, Shirley, returned from Africa to take her final high school year. She lived with the Martin family in Milverton and became good friends with their daughter, Sharon.
When the Dorschs returned from Africa, he served for seven years as the pastor at Mapleview Mennonite Church near Wellesley, Ont.
“Viola and I always hoped that we could come to Nithview when there was a need,” Dorsch reflects. Some rental apartments became available in early 1994 and the Dorschs moved in during March of that year. “No sooner had I signed the papers than the Nithview chaplain, pastor Gerald Schwartentruber, approached me and asked if I would help him with the pastoral needs at Nithview,” Dorsch says with a laugh. “I have been serving as an assistant pastor at Nithview ever since!”
When Martin retired from full-time ministry in 1996, he and his wife were well settled in their New Hamburg home. He began looking for an opportunity to serve in the community and joined the pastoral team at Nithview in 1999.
Nancy Mann, current pastoral care coordinator at Nithview, acknowledges that it would be difficult to offer the wide range of pastoral services without the contribution of these faithful, experienced pastors.
“They really understand the needs of seniors because they are seniors,” she says. “We are so fortunate to have them serving as part of the pastoral team here at Nithview.”
Dorsch, who is in his 79th year, reflects, “I enjoy working with elderly people, and just walking with people in their times of need. I still have some good years left in me and I want to use them for the Lord’s service.”
Martin agrees that serving at Nithview brings satisfaction and purpose to his senior years. “It is a joy to share with the many residents and the great staff at Nithview,” he says. “I thank the Lord for the opportunity to serve him here.”
The Nithview Community congregation was to honour Victor and Viola Dorsch on Oct. 1. Amsey and Leona Martin will be acknowledged on Nov. 19.
At 25, Covenant prepares to meet new challenges
Winkler, Man.
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Potluck and fellowshipping around the table—a well-established tradition of Covenant Mennonite Church in Winkler—was central to celebrating the church’s 25th anniversary on Sept. 10.
In 1981, Covenant was created from Winkler Bergthaler Mennonite Church, to provide an alternative General Conference option in Winkler and to be an outreach to the community. A core group of 12 members grappled with such questions as “What does it mean to be the church today?” “How can the church speak to present-day issues?” and, “What kind of church does our community need?” Those same questions are still engaging this congregation, now a generation older and with its own traditions.
“When we were younger we wondered if we had wisdom,” congregational chair Doug Dyck told the congregation. “Now we’ve gained wisdom, but have no one to pass it on to.”
Covenant was a congregation that from the outset wanted to offer a less formal and more-participatory worship style with shared leadership. The small group of founding members carried a heavy load of responsibility in leading worship, teaching Sunday school, participating in weekly care groups and performing all the other tasks involved in the life of a church.
Slowly but steadily the membership of Covenant grew until 1988, when it reached a peak of 46, requiring the church to grapple with a variety of new issues.
Gary Bueckert, a founding member, recalled, “The diversity of theological thinking within the group was beginning to cause a strain on some relationships.”
In 1992, Barry Lesser was called to be Covenant’s first pastor, with the hope of easing the workload for members and developing a more unified vision. However, by 1997 membership had dropped to 28, its pastor was resigning and Winkler Bible Institute, where the congregation had worshipped for 16 years, was closing down.
Despite this divisive and difficult period, members recalled many fellowship events that helped to build good inter-generational relationships that continue to this day. Even when the congregation languished, it sponsored a refugee family from Guatemala and never ceased to be an active supporter of local and overseas mission projects.
Without a pastor and a building, members were faced with the necessity to reinvent Covenant. Within the year Covenant purchased the former Lutheran church and hired Kelvin Dyck for an interim one-year period, a position he holds to this day.
In his morning message Dyck reflected, “We are deeply mindful that why we are here is purely and simply because of, and through, God’s grace.”
A changing demographic profile is one of the issues now facing the congregation. Children have grown up and left the area, and adults are retiring—or nearing retirement—with plans to travel or serve in other locations. At the same time, the new building has provided a welcome for visitors to the church.
“For the long-term survival of this congregation we need to attract new people, more young families and singles,” noted Bueckert.