wfn.org | Director named

[BethAH@mbm.org]

January 3, 2001
Beth Hawn
Communications Coordinator
Mennonite Board of Missions
phone (219) 294-7523
fax (219) 294-8669
<www.MBM.org>

January 3, 2001

MBM, Western District name first joint urban ministry director

ELKHART, Ind. (MBM) – For newly appointed urban ministry director
Marco Güete, the task of planting new churches, and training
local leadership for yet more church plants, is a familiar one.
Far newer and more significant is the fact that Mennonite Board
of Missions has appointed its first leader from the General
Conference Mennonite Church to assume the role.

“Nationwide and in Canada, I think I am the only Hispanic serving
as conference minister [in the General Conference Mennonite
Church],” said Güete, who since late September has served as
Dallas-Fort Worth urban ministry director as part of an agreement
between MBM and the GCMC’s Western District conference.  “What
this says to me is that the new Mennonite Church that is emerging
is open to working with people of color, and to integrating them
into the mission of the church more openly.”

This is significant both within the region he serves and from a
national perspective, he said.  After African-Americans,
Hispanics are the second-largest minority group in Texas.
According to some projections, in less than 10 years, Hispanics
will be the largest minority group, not just in Texas but in the
entire United States.

In his new position as urban ministry director, Güete is helping
in two key areas with church plants that are designed to meet the
needs of this burgeoning Hispanic population.  He will be the
identified leader who will carry the vision for leadership and
church development strategies, and he will identify and equip
leaders for ministries that lead to new church plants.

“Our main challenge will be to organize some of the Hispanic
churches that are just coming out of the church-planting
process,” he said.  “Those churches will be either Hispanic or
English, or whatever is the predominant minority group.”

In January, a new multicultural church will officially get off
the ground, and will employ a team of three pastors, one for each
of the three main ethnic groups the church will serve.  An
English-speaking pastor and a Hispanic pastor (who is a woman)
have already been hired.  An African-American pastor has not yet
been hired.  Although the process for planting this church was
well underway when Güete arrived, he provided important
assistance in finalizing the plans.

Before accepting his current assignment, Güete served for four
years as a Commission on Overseas Mission (GCMC) worker in
Bogotá, Colombia, serving as the director of the Mennonite
Biblical Seminary there.  He also was director of the Latin
America Anabaptist Resource Center (CLARA) in Colombia.  From
1982 to 1988, he helped establish and served as pastor of
Comunidad de Fe (Community of Faith), a Mennonite church in
Chicago.  For 10 years, he was involved in church-planting
efforts while working director of Hispanic resource ministries
for the General Conference.

“While we were still in Colombia, we were praying that God would
guide us in our new assignment,” Güete said.  “We think the call
to come to Dallas was a response to our prayers.  We like to live
in big cities because the diversity of the population there
offers more opportunities for evangelism.”

In addition to his role as an urban ministry director, Güete
serves as an associate conference minister with the Western
District conference.  He and his wife, Sandra, live in Grand
Prairie, a city near Fort Worth.  Their three grown children all
live in Newton, Kan.

Güete is the newest urban ministry director to be supported by
MBM’s Evangelism and Church Development department, in
partnership with Mennonite Church regional conferences.  Urban
ministry directors are appointed to carry the vision for
leadership and prayerful growth in urban settings.

MBM extends the whole gospel to a broken world by building
holistic communities of faith in 46 countries.  MBM ministry
occurs in five Canadian provinces and 36 U.S. states.
* * *

MBM staff        PHOTO AVAILABLE