On Wednesday April 22nd it will be exactly sixty five years since the formation of Moortown Baptist Church. Sixty five years that have seen six ministers come and go: Winsor Bond, Ralph Drake, Michael Caddick, Stephen Ibbotson, Gordon Hindmarch and Glenda Chadwick (who was our Youth Minister until 2012 when she moved back to her native Devon) and two – Graham and Shona who are with us now.
At that first ever Service, which due to overrunning building work actually took place at South Parade Baptist Church in Headingley, forty nine people became Moortown Baptist Church.
Since 1955 MBC has added extensions on to extensions, it’s had a grand pipe organ, hundreds and hundreds of new chairs, hymn books and bibles, at least two new kitchens, a cricket club, mics, speakers, woofers and spots by the score and no end of leaks.
But most importantly between then and now it has and it continues to forge strong links not only with its immediate neighbours but with no end of local churches, community groups and mission partners, some as far away as Bangladesh, Kenya and Romania. It has, in common with all other Baptist churches been a loyal supporter of both BU Home Mission and BMS World Mission; indeed MBC has often been the home church of medics, teachers, engineers and the like who have served in both the home and the foreign mission field. It has had literally hundreds of deacons. It has been the birthplace of several church plants and of course right from the word go it has played a lead role in many important welfare projects for example the Leeds and Moortown Furniture Store, the Fairtrade Organisation and Citizens.
To ask anyone to chronicle MBC’s entire history here and now would be far too daunting a task; particularly for someone like me, a relative newbie who only came on the scene in 1965. But looking back through Roger Robson’s two excellent publications* I guess it’s up to God and God alone to decide if the words addressed to the founding forty nine at South Parade way back in 1955 have been honoured. They were: “You are Christ’s Church; you belong to Him, you are not just a voluntary association, responsible to yourselves alone… What kind of Church Moortown is in the future generations depends on what you are now; how you worship, work and live.”
Today, MBC, a place once described to me as a local church with world wide vision has a notice board in its car park on which it says this: “Moortown Baptist Church; Loving God, Following Christ and Living Generously.” Although some may disagree I believe that in April 2020 and without being in any way self-congratulatory we’re certainly doing the best we can.
JS
*Moortown Baptist Church, The First 25 years 1955 – 1980
Moortown Baptist Church, The First 50 Years 1955 – 2005
Below is a gallery containing a few more pictures taken over the last 65 year. We hope they bring back some happy memories. And remember if you have a story or a picture you would like to share with us on our Past – Present – Future page email it to mbcnewspics@gmail.com
