Where We Worship
Good Shepherd Lutherans reach out to youth
By Zenaida Serrano Espanol
Advertiser Staff Writer
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| Pastor Don Baron delivers a sermon at the Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Liliha.
Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser |
• Name of church: Good Shepherd Lutheran Church
• Our denomination or affiliation: The Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod, based in St. Louis, Mo.
• Where we are: 638 N. Kuakini St., Liliha
• Our numbers: 250
• Our pastor: Don Baron, senior pastor
• What we believe (our mission statement): "By the grace of God, we the people of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church are committed to believe, live and tell Christ's Gospel and His perfect Word. In the power of the Holy Spirit, we will win people to living faith in Christ, nurture them within the life of His Church and equip them to do His Church's Great Commission in the world."
Baron said that the church proclaims the classic biblical Christian faith as summarized in the "ecumenical creeds": the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed and the Athanasian Creed. Lutherans place special emphasis on the Bible's teaching that was rediscovered by the 16th-century Reformation through the leadership of Martin Luther, which is "justification": People are made right with God through divine grace alone, through faith in Jesus Christ alone, and not by any merit of their own.
• Our history: Good Shepherd Lutheran Church began in the 1950s as a Sunday school extension of Our Redeemer Lutheran Church on University Avenue. Worship services were held in a storefront on School Street near Houghtailing until the chapel in Liliha was built in the late 1950s.
• What we're excited about: Church members are planning several major events, including the annual vacation Bible school next week, 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. This free event, open to all young people, is themed "Polar Expedition" because Baron said children will discover that "Jesus' love is cool."
There will be a July 1 celebration at the church to commission a team of three church members who will travel to Kyrgyzstan, a country that lies west of China.
The team will live for a month among the Dungan Chinese people, "serving them in the name of Christ through teaching English as a second language," Baron said.
There also will be a dedication of new facilities at the church, which Baron hopes will take place sometime in August. These facilities include a new Fellowship Lanai and a Weinberg Foundation-supported early childhood center.
• What's special about us: "We use a very different paradigm for church life called the 'cell church'," Baron said. "The cell is the basic Christian community at Good Shepherd Church."
Each cell group — units similar to those that other fellowships call "home churches" — comprises about 10 members. The church has about 14 cell groups. Apart from the congregation's Sunday worship gatherings, cell groups meet weekly in members' homes.
"Almost the entire life of the congregation happens out in the community in the cell groups: mutual caring, spiritual growth, leadership development, accountability and evangelism," Baron said.
The church offers other services and programs to the community, aside from the vacation Bible school.
It has sponsored a youth basketball team and held a basketball camp. It teaches Bible classes in the Mandarin dialect Sundays. Good Shepherd Lutheran Church is also the site of Good Shepherd Preschool, which opened in the 1970s and serves 60 children.
Baron also pointed to the church's newly launched S.A.Y. Yes program, an outgrowth of Save America's Youth that provides faith-based mentoring for community youth with special needs. Baron said the goal is to have one mentor for every five children and to have them work together until the children are 18 years old.
The mentors and children will meet together several afternoons each week; salaried tutors will teach skills such as computer skills and help with special academic needs.
"The goal is in-depth development of their emotional, spiritual, physical, intellectual and social life," Baron said.
The church is also heavily involved in world missions, such as its work with the Dungan Chinese of Kyrgyzstan. Church members also support missions involving the Malinke people of Guinea, West Africa, and the people of Mindanao, Philippines. They support of the Missouri Synod's missionaries on every continent.
• Contact: E-mail gslchi@cs.com or call 523-2927.
If you would like to recommend your church, temple or faith organization for a Where We Worship profile, e-mail faith@honoluluadvertiser.com, call 535-8174 or write: Where We Worship, Faith Page, The Honolulu Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802.
