January 2008
Ken
Van Vliet
Have you ever asked, which church is the
largest in Turlock? A few come to mind. I can almost
guarantee that Monte Vista Chapel would be mentioned
in that conversation. So how does someone lead a congregation
that large? We had the privilege of interviewing Pastor
Ken van Vliet. He is the Senior Pastor of one of the
largest churches in Turlock; Monte Vista Chapel. He
has been married for fifteen years to his wife, Michelle.
They have two children, Benjamin (11 years old) and
Rebekah (8 years old). Pastor Ken has a heart for people,
preaching God’s word, and challenging the congregation
to become more like Jesus. We talked about the many
ministries available to their congregation including
the “Now is The Time” building campaign.
After our conversation, we come to the conclusion that
saying “they have a lot going on” would
be an understatement. We hope you enjoy reading about
Monte Vista Chapel and their Senior Pastor. If you would
like further information, click on their link below.
Us- How long have you been serving
here at Monte Vista Chapel and did you start off as
their Senior Pastor?
KV- I started volunteering in High
School Ministries, then went on to college ministries.
They hired me as a college pastor. It kind of seemed
like every so often, over the next four years, there
was an opportunity for a different ministry. Finally
about seven years ago, the senior pastor that hired
me, Roy Price, planned on retiring and so he gave kind
of a year notice. He said it was going to be a year
out and so the church went through a succession process
to see whether they wanted to go outside to hire somebody
or stay inside to hire someone. Through that process
they kind of decided to stay internally and offered
me the job. So I’ve been here since.
Monte
vista Chapel Website
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US- Why do you think small groups are
so important for your church?
KV- We really believe that you’re
created for a community; a community with God and a community
with others. There’s something inside of us that
longs to know others, be known, to be understood and to
understand others. I think small groups provide an environment
for that to really happen for us, to be able to love others,
for others to love us, for us to be able to speak into
someone else’s life, to have them speak in to ours
lives and to be challenged. You come into the sanctuary
and if there’s a 1100 people who show up on a Sunday
morning, you can kind of sneak in and sneak back out and
nobody even knows you. So this is a way for us to get
to be known. I think that’s the way for us as members
of the body of Christ to actually be Jesus to each other,
to be His hand and feet. If I have done something where
I need forgiveness, obviously I go to God and ask for
that forgiveness and God grants that forgiveness, but
there’s something about going to a brother or sister
in Christ and confessing that to them and then having
them extend that forgiveness where you see it in the flesh
and bones and it’s a real person and so I think
it’s what takes a lot of what the church is supposed
to be about and allows us to live it out. That’s
a big portion of what small groups is all about.
US- Do you offer any type of support
groups?
KV- We offer a significant amount of
small groups. Drug and alcohol addiction, grief recovery,
divorce recovery, parents who want to adopt, sexual abuse,
sexual addiction and many more.
US- You’re remodeling your Worship
Center. How do you think the Now Is The Time campaign
has impacted the people of the church who are participating?
KV- It has actually been a good process,
we are almost to our goal that we had set. We expect to
be there by the end of the year. For the most part, the
congregation is very excited about what’s going
to be available. On one hand it is a maintenance issue.
The building is 25 years old and it needs to be taken
care of. It has all original paint, carpet and pews. So
it needs to be updated. Part of it is a deferred maintenance
and the other part is that it gives us the opportunity
to do ministry with a little bit of quality. They are
fixing the acoustics in the room so it will allow us to
do some contemporary and classical Christian concerts
as well as community activities.
US- Where do you see Monte Vista Chapel
in ten years?
KV- That’s a great question. One
of the things we want to do is maximize our facility.
Not that bigger is better, we just want to maximize it
to its full potential. Then I think we can concentrate
on the outlining areas like Delhi, Waterford and Patterson
for some possible church plants or maybe help out some
churches that are under resourced. We don’t only
want to be effective in Turlock. We want to be effective
in the Central Valley. Finally, Monte Vista is a missions
church. Twenty percent of all our resources go towards
missions. I would love to see us have a million dollar
mission budget. We want to impact the world and advance
the gospel in places where people
dont' have the opportunity to hear it.
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