Assemblee Chretienne de La Baie, QC
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Contents
History
Assemblée Chrétienne de La Baie, Saguenay, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, Central Quebec, Canada is a French open brethren assembly that was founded in 1999 by Denis Simard who remains as the present contact.
La Baie is a port town on the headwaters of the Saguenay River. Early efforts to bring the gospel to this area met with significant opposition. On three occasions the town was blanketed with Christian literature. Roy Buttery did a good deal of colportage work here, once being jeered and stoned with pebbles and chased out by a group of women and children. In 1961, Allan Hoffman, while distributing tracts together with a group of students from Emmaus Bible School, was arrested and jailed. He was released when Roy and others threatened to legally pursue the municipal authorities. Despite such opposition, a few were saved and added to the assembly at nearby Chicoutimi.
Today’s assembly at La Baie began in the hearts of Denis Simard and his wife Donna who, following their original commendation in 1984, moved here to live four years later. It would be a full decade however before their vision would be realized. In their own words they tell of its early beginnings.
When we came here to live in 1988, there was no Christian assembly, though a small home-based Pentecostal church existed which closed two years later. In the past, many efforts of evangelization were made at La Baie and though souls had been saved, a new work had never been established. We believe that the special mind-set of the population, many being elderly Roman Catholics, and their strong feelings of belonging, are responsible in part for this "hard soil". People of this city would hardly open to you if you were not "one of them".
Our 1989 commendation to the Lord's work here had as one of its goals the planting of a permanent testimony at Ville La Baie. Ten years went by before we were to see the realization of this objective. During these years, various efforts involved outdoor evangelism in parks, literature distributions to homes, home Bible studies, follow-up of contacts, besides selling Christian literature and sharing the gospel through a book table set up regularly at the shopping mall. Throughout this period, we were also praying for other couples to share the responsibility of the work, but the Lord directed otherwise. After working five years with the assembly at Jonquière, the brethren gave us the right hand of fellowship to start an assembly at La Baie. It was with the approval and collaboration of the elders of that assembly that we celebrated the first Lord's Supper at La Baie in September 1999.
The assembly has carried on since then, the Simards continuing to provide the leadership. The current facilities provide for a meeting room as well as space for a well-stocked Christian bookstore.
Location
- Atelier Des Arts, 1652 St. Marc 1999-2018
- 991, boulevard de la Grande Baie sud
Correspondent
- c/o Denis Simard 1999-2020+
Alumni
Sources
- Walterick Publishing Assembly Address Books: 1999-2000, 2003-2004, 2006-2008
- ECS Ministries (Emmaus International) Assembly Address Books: 2009-2010, 2013-2014, 2016, 2018, 2020
- News of Quebec
