Mission Victoria 1.9

Chris and Kellee Synesael started Mission Victoria in February of 2011. At the time they were serving at Saanich Baptist Church, overseeing the youth and young adult ministry but began to notice how many people in the city were not being reached with the Good News about Jesus. Chris, Kellee, and their three children took up this challenge and began to gather support and people around them and planted West Village Church in the West Shore area with the intention of reaching people who would never walk into a church building. They met in a movie theatre for their services but what was truly unique was that their main form of organization was around smaller house church communities called Community Groups (CGs). Each of these groups served as a missionary base for people to learn to reach out to unchurched co-workers, neighbours, and friends.

In 2014, West Village had grown to a church of over 200 people, a large portion of who had not been part of any church previously, and Mission Victoria added Robin and Leanne Martens as well as their 5 children. Robin had previously served at Campbell River Baptist Church but also felt God’s clear calling on his family to become Missionaries to Victoria. Robin and Leanne have spent the last year and a half training with West Village to learn how best to reach out to those who would never think to step foot in a church building.

As of winter 2016, West Village is seeing about 300 people regularly attend their Sunday Gatherings and they have over 12 Community Groups citywide. They have seen over 60 baptisms to date and are working hard with Robin and Leanne to develop a core group of people, all geographically situated in the West Saanich area, into a new church-planting core team with the goal to launch by 2017.