History

Jubilee Mennonite Church officially came into being on January 1, 1995.  It was the result of the amalgamation of two congregations:  Northdale Mennonite Fellowship, a General Conference Mennonite church, and Valley Gardens Community Church, a Mennonite Brethren congregation. Both congregations had been undergoing re-evaluation, and seemed ready for a new venture.  Membership of the merged congregation was near eighty persons.

The building we are currently in had been built by the Northdale congregation in 1975-76.  Before that, the congregation had been meeting in the theatre of River East Collegiate since Oct. 1972.  Valley Gardens Community Church had been meeting in the Valley Gardens Jr. High School for about ten years.

One of the important dynamics of the merger was the excitement we felt about bridging two Mennonite conferences.  There had been much pain, suspicion and misunderstanding between the two conferences since the split in Russia in 1860.  We spent time studying each other’s history, and felt that moving together was a positive step of reconciliation, and a witness to the larger Mennonite community.

Initially two interim pastors, Lora Braun and John Epp, served on a part-time basis. Sieg Wall ministered from 1995 to 2001. Allan Labun served as interim pastor from 2001 to 2002. Terry Goertzen was hired part-time as associate pastor in 1996 and from 2002 until 2008 as full-time leading pastor. Richard Bage was youth pastor from 2003 to 2007. Martin Blumrich began as part-time youth pastor in 2007. Dan Nighswander began as leading pastor in 2009.