By Steve Rodgers
Collaboration Project Story Team

Bethany Evangelical Free Church has had its roots on Madison’s near east side since it started as a Norwegian-speaking church in 1906 (when the church’s name was “Betania”). Now it has become home to four small communities of Christ-followers—many of whom are first-generation immigrants speaking four different languages.

Bethany has been quietly shaping the church landscape in the Madison community for over a century. Its influence has been significant and far-reaching. In the 1960s, Bethany planted two churches—one on the west side of Madison and one on the east side. Those churches are alive and well today. The west side church is Blackhawk Church and the east side church is Door Creek Church.

Over the past 20 years, its red-brick building at 301 Riverside Drive on the banks of the Yahara River has continued to evolve. The building is now called the Bethany Ministry Center that’s shared by these four groups.

The gradual evolution of the Bethany building into the Bethany Ministry Center dates back to 1997 when a Lao couple started making inquiries at Bethany about the possibility of forming a Lao ministry. This couple, Sida and Limmon Khounphaysane, worked with Bethany Pastor David Carlson to lay the groundwork for a Lao ministry.

By 1999, Bethany started holding weekly Lao services with help from the staff at Lao Evangelical Free Church in Rockford, Ill. This community, now known as “Bethany Lao,” is currently holding weekly services at the ministry center. On the first Sunday of each month, Bethany Evangelical Free Church and Bethany Lao hold joint English/Lao services.

A few years later, in 2002, the pastors of Bethany and Sun Prairie Community Church started talking about planting a Latino church. The two churches formed a steering committee and, with help from the Evangelical Free Church’s Forest Lakes District office, established the Nueva Vida (New Life) Church. The fledgling church had a few different homes before settling into its current location at the ministry center in 2013.

Not long after Nueva Vida was started, a Chinese couple (Wingkai and Joni Cheung) approached Pastor Carlson about the possibility of starting a Chinese ministry. Given Bethany’s rapidly growing experience with forming steering committees, it didn’t take long to form another one for the prospective Chinese ministry. And by 2007, the Greater Madison Chinese Evangelical Free Church was started and began meeting at the ministry center. In 2018, Hao Wang was named its pastor.

With multiple churches speaking multiple languages together under one roof, the need for some type or umbrella organization soon became evident. The Ministry Center Board was created in 2014 to coordinate budgets and all of the activities taking place within the building.

“Scheduling of worship services can be a challenge, but the four groups make it work remarkably well,” says Pastor Carlson, who was named Bethany Evangelical Free Church’s pastor in 1994. On a ‘typical’ Sunday, the Chinese community meets at 8:45am, both the Lao and English communities meet at 10:30am (in different rooms), and then Nueva Vida meets at 2pm for worship in Spanish.

Many of the people who started these churches were first-generation immigrants who didn’t speak much English. The children of these church founders are second-generation immigrants who are fluent in English and more Westernized than their parents.

With more English-speaking children, these four churches can work together more closely on youth ministry. And in 2019, the ministry center received a grant from Blackhawk Church so that Daniel Aguilar (who’s also Nueva Vida’s pastor) could develop and coordinate youth ministry for the four churches. This ministry, called 2nd Generation, meets on the first and third Wednesdays of each month at 6:30pm. The 2nd Generation ministry is designed primarily for young adults and juniors and seniors in high school.

If the past is any indication of the future, the Bethany Ministry Center will continue to profoundly influence its community, just as Bethany Evangelical Free Church has done for over a century.

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Four Churches & Four Languages Under One Roof

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