“The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. For He hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.” - Psalm 24:1-2
Pastor Don Brown, whose vision 35 years ago brought Bethel Church from downtown Chehalis to its current home along the Newaukum River, has chosen those verses for remarks he plans to offer tomorrow evening at a ceremony to celebrate his congregation’s success in paying off the mortgage for that building three decades later.
“God had a plan for this valuable piece of real estate before creation, and reserved it for us on his own time schedule,” Brown says about the 23-acre property that he helped find and purchase when he and other parishioners in the 1970s were looking for a new church site with greater visibility, accessibility and room to grow.
I met with Brown this week at his home in Stillwaters Estates, in the company of Glenda, his beloved wife of 58 years, and the man who now leads Bethel Church, Pastor Kyle Rasmussen.
Brown, now 83, has advanced Parkinson’s disease. His hands tremble and walking is a challenge. At times his words were difficult to hear, but his spirit of thankfulness and love for those with whom he has served our community were easy to understand.
Looking back, he compares the construction of the church building along I-5 to the work of Joshua, who helped bring the Israelites to their new home after Moses died.
“I think of all the people in the church who have taken a step of faith like the Israelites,” Brown said. The Bethel church building he helped create is not a place to stop that work, he said.
“It keeps expanding and getting bigger and bigger,” he said, “like putting your foot out there to extend the kingdom of God.”
Indeed. Over the few years that my family has attended Bethel, we have seen that growth. New missions include outreach and service projects to feed, house and love the needy in Chehalis, Centralia, Portland, Honduras and beyond. Expansion includes the partnership with the former Destiny Christian Center in downtown Centralia, which is now known as the Bethel Church - Downtown Centralia campus.
That merger, in fact, was actually a remarkable reunion.
The new downtown Centralia Bethel campus meets in the building that housed the Centralia Assembly of God congregation that originally planted the future Bethel church in Chehalis a lifetime ago.
In other words, Bethel has adopted the church that gave birth to it 75 years ago.
I learned this week that my congregation got its start in the early 1940s as a Bible study/tent meeting.
This new Chehalis group met in the Moose hall, the Boy Scout lodge, and finally in a building they constructed along Main Street in Centralia.
That church building, now home to Cascade Mental Health, became a hinderance when street parking was removed on both sides of the nearby road. Three nearby churches needed parking. Even buying a full city block, leveling the houses and turning them into a parking lot wouldn’t have solved the problem.
Bethel, under Rev. Brown, looked for a new home.
They found plenty of sites, but none that had everything they were looking for. Brown’s family had spend part of his childhood living in a rental house on Newaukum valley property owned by the Hamilton family, and he inquired with Frank Hamilton if he had property for sale. He didn’t.
One day the Browns were dining at the Longhorn Restaurant in Rochester and they saw Frank Hamilton there. Don went over to say hello. It happened that Frank’s brother, Fred, was up visiting from his home in Santa Maria, California, and Fred said he just might have some land for sale.
Brown and members of the church went out to look at the property, a cornfield where the Hamiltons had also raised turkeys and cows.
It was just what Bethel was looking for. The family gave the church a deal, selling them 23 acres for $86,000. Brown and another church member flew down to California immediately to seal the deal. Brown carried the down payment check in his pocket.
“They wouldn’t have sold to anyone else, but a church, they were OK with it,” Glenda said.
Along with stories of the banker who turned them down for a mortgage (“come back when the church is bigger”), Brown talks of the many families who gave to a bond campaign that helped finance construction of the church with the theme “not equal gifts, but equal sacrifice.”
He mentions the Johnson brothers, Ken and Wayne, who donated the rock that became the foundation of the new Bethel Church.
The mortgage that helped pay for the rest of the construction is now, finally, paid off. Money that went to the bank in interest can now go into the community in service, said Pastor Rasmussen, who has led the church for the past 11 years.
Bethel, in Genesis, was the blessed spot where Jacob had his vision of “stairway to heaven.” In awe and wonder, he named the place Beth-El. The name literally means “House of God.”
Looking back, Brown’s quiet voice grows emotional as he lists the former pastors and people of Chehalis’s “House of God” who sacrificed for God’s kingdom.
They would, he said, quoting the 23rd chapter of the book of Numbers, “rejoice to see what God hath wrought.”
I asked Brown about his best memories from his lifetime of ministry.
“Besides God’s blessing?” he said. “The people.”
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Brian Mittge writes a community column each Saturday, and on Sundays teaches music to the preschool class at Bethel Church.
This week’s song will be “The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock.” Drop him a line at brianmittge@hotmail.com.
