By Mennonite Weekly Review staff

With help from volunteers and an Anabaptist reciprocal insurance company, Lakota Gospel Church now has a new home.
The Mennonite Brethren congregation with fewer than 50 members is on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southern South Dakota. Second in size only to the Navajo Nation reservation in Arizona, Pine Ridge is located in the nation’s poorest county.
Pine Ridge has the highest poverty- and alcohol-related death statistics on the continent. The average life span is 52 years.

After the June 21 fire that destroyed the church building and its contents, members and church leaders questioned whether the congregation could continue.

Then came an offer of help from MutualAid eXchange. In addition to its insurance programs for Anabaptists, MAX has ministries that lend support for the emotional and spiritual needs of individuals and churches.

Church and conference leaders credit the MAX offer with jump-starting not only a building program for the Lakota church but a new sense of spiritual vitality for its people.

“It’s one thing to rebuild a church building,” said Glenn Welborn, who develops and coordinates MAX’s U.S. mutual aid programs. “To see the movement of a congregation from real discouragement to renewal, a spirit of hope, excitement and enthusiasm — that’s the most important part of our work.”

While an adjuster dealt with the insurance aspects of the damage, Allen Schroeder, a MAX responder from Minnesota, helped assess other ministry needs in the congregation.

Processing what had happened surfaced as an immediate need. Schroeder met with Lakota Pastor Howard Whiteface and congregation members for a prayer meeting and discussions regarding their future.

Once church leaders decided to rebuild, MAX funds covered 60 to 70 percent of the rebuilding materials. But additional finances and labor to complete the project were still needed.

Curtis Hoyt, a member of Bible Fellowship MB Church in Rapid City, agreed to serve as the on-site general contractor.
Hoyt is executive director of Hands of Faith Ministry Inc., a rehabilitation program for Native Americans. Men from the reservation who were learning new skills and trades through Hands of Faith helped rebuild the church. Hands of Faith volunteers from around the country also helped with the project.

“For me to see the spiritual renewal and to provide an opportunity for Native American men to not only learn a vocation and to help rebuild the church, but also to participate in some of the meetings held by those working together was an awesome experience,” Welborn said.

Additional labor came from Bible Fellowship MB Church and two teams of MAX employees who traveled to South Dakota to help with drywall, electrical work and other tasks.

The Lakota congregation requested $7,000 from MAX for the rebuilding project and looked to other sources for additional financial assistance.

Other MB Central District congregations contributed funds, to which MAX added through its Network Ministry, in which Anabaptists across North America are notified of special needs within the Anabaptist community.

After this, “funds were given far beyond the $7,000 initially requested,” said MAX marketing coordinator Denise Dietz.

Through the network, MAX gathered donations to pay for the removal of debris and to add Sunday school rooms to the Lakota church, which the congregation had not had previously.

While the new Lakota building is not yet complete, it is close. Christmas services were held in the new church, only six months after the fire.

Hoyt and Hands of Faith volunteers will finish the remaining work on the church and Whiteface said the congregation will host a dedication service.

Whiteface, who began attending the church’s Sunday school ministry as a small child, said the congregation has been encouraged in several ways.

The bigger building enables them to host larger groups of people, particularly for special occasions such as Christmas.

Whiteface, who also has a radio broadcast in several states, said donations to the church have increased along with the number of visitors attending services.

“God does much more than bless the rebuilding of the building,” Welborn said. “There is an emotional and spiritual renewal. It is an awesome experience to see God at work in people’s lives.”