Archives

by Melissa Lauber
UMConnection Staff

WHEN THEY FIRST started meeting at Zuali Malsawma's house a decade ago, the 10 people gathered hoped they might grow to be a fellowship of 25 people. “But God worked,” Malsawma said.

On June 22, exactly 179 people became members of the new Mizo United Methodist Church in Rockville.

“God is indeed good,” said the Rev. Joseph Daniels, superintendent of the Greater Washington District, as he handed the church’s charter to the Rev. Biak Chhunga. “We can’t wait to see the good things that continue to happen as this church continues to flourish in the name of Jesus.”

Many of the members, including Lal Dika, said they felt the chartering of the new congregation was like a rite of passage – that they were moving, in faith, from a kind of childhood to adulthood. Over the past decade they had grown up.

In a slide presentation, Chhunga shared the growth of the church with images of members meeting first in a house, then at Ager Road UMC in Hyattsville, and then at Faith UMC in Rockville, where they now gather for worship on Sunday afternoons.

Chhunga expressed pride in his members. He praised the prayer team of older adults who are always ready to pray for the church and its people. He thanked the lay people who provide leadership to the congregation and community, and he shared many stories of how the church is alive in mission, sending more than $12,000 a year to ministries in Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) and surrounding countries.

Much of that money goes to support other churches’ evangelism efforts and has resulted in many baptisms.

“We thank God for everything,” Chhunga said. “God uses us. God inspires us. Above all we depend on the grace of God.”

The congregation is united by language. Most speak Mizo or Mizo tawng. Many are immigrants from Burma and the Mizoram state of India. A large percentage of the congregation is made up of young adults. Preserving their culture is important to them. Mizo is spoken and sung during worship and the many children who attend Sunday School can also take Mizo language classes from the congregation.

During the chartering service, the Rev. Ed DeLong preached. DeLong was the conference staff person, who, following the inspiration and leadership of Bishop Felton May, consecrated the Mizo fellowship in 2004.

Standing in the pulpit, preaching on the theme “Always Room for One More,” DeLong remembered back years before, when he was also present at the start of Faith UMC in the 1960s.

Our Wesleyan heritage teaches us that every congregation is to start a new congregation, he said. “The church has gotten away from that.” But the Mizo fellowship, now Mizo UMC, deeply embraces the spirit of evangelism and has already started a satellite fellowship for Mizo people in Moorefield, W.Va.

“You inspire us to think globally about our annual conference,” DeLong said, “so that all of us can be richer in our understanding of God.”

Celebrating the newest church in the Baltimore-Washington Conference, Daniels praised the congregation for all they have done and all they will do.

“You believed God wanted to do something in your midst,” he said. “In recognizing you as a full-blown church, I pray that you will keep before you that there are still multitudes of souls who do not know Jesus Christ. They are waiting for us to share our story of Good News out of our context, our culture, our language and our very being. … You are a part of Christ’s holy church. Let us dedicate ourselves to this purpose.”