Covenant News

New Church Making Inroads into Laotian Community

BROOKLYN CENTER, MN (March 29, 2005) - Pastor Soudinh Penkhay was simply looking for a place where his Laotian congregation could meet. He never expected the congregation he led would join a denomination he had barely heard of and then become an official church plant.

Today, the Laotian Covenant Church averages 110 attendees on a given Sunday, many in their twenties who have converted from Buddhism. The church is averaging eight to 10 baptisms a year, Penkhay says.

The congregation initially met in a facility of another denomination, but had outgrown that space and needed to be able to meet on additional days other than Sundays, Penkhay says. Penkhay and the congregation learned of the Evangelical Covenant Church and discussions began in 1998 to allow the Laotians to use Brookdale Covenant Church.

"The Covenant accepts us," Penkhay says. "Everyone comes to welcome us." The warm reception thrilled Penkhay's congregation, which knew it had found a home. In 2001, the congregation was launched as a Covenant church plant and officially joined the denomination during the 2004 Annual Meeting in Minneapolis.

Many of the conversions are the result of people seeing the change in family members' lives, Penkhay says. Illegal and other immoral lifestyles once marked those family members' lives until converting to Christianity, he adds. "They throw away their old lives," Penkhay says.

Penkhay's life is a model of one that has been turned around. "I did a lot of bad things," he says. He converted to Christianity while in a refugee camp in Thailand. A man who once was a noted teacher of Buddhism had been converted and shared his faith with Penkhay. He came to the United States from the refugee camps in 1984 and eventually found his way to the Minneapolis suburb.

Brookdale has not only welcomed the congregation, but has restored the church's parsonage so that it can be used by Penkhay, says Tim Johnson, the church's pastor. Many volunteer hours and $8,000 were invested to complete the project.

The churches hold joint worship services once a quarter. People from Brookdale often attend the baptisms of converts in Penkhay's church. "They have a wonderful, festive atmosphere whenever they have an adult baptism," Johnson says. "It's a big family gathering and they always sing "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus."

Penkhay also ministers to Laotians meeting at Hope Covenant Church in St. Cloud, Minnesota, about an hour away. Each morning he travels to St. Cloud to preach and then drives back to Brookdale to conduct the service in the afternoon.

To learn more about the Laotian congregation and its ministries, call the Brookdale church at 763-535-6305 and leave a message for Penkhay. To read a story originally published August 8, 2002, when the church was started, please see New Church.

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