It’s not every church where a bright yellow Piper Cub airplane could casually pull up in the parking lot on a Sunday morning, but at Alzaida Baptist Church in the southeast corner of Montana they’re getting used to it. That just means their director of missions, Mike McKinney, is visiting that morning. He lands on the highway in front of the church.
Welcome to eastern Montana, where wheat and cows are plentiful but people — clustered in small communities like Alzaida — are relatively scarce. The 29 churches and missions McKinney assists in Big Sky and Hi-Line Baptist associations cover a 64,000-square-mile area larger than the entire state of Mississippi. And the single-engine aircraft he pilots is about the only thing that allows him to cover it effectively.
McKinney and his wife, Martha — both North American Mission Board missionaries — are featured during the Week of Prayer for North American Missions, March 5-12.
McKinney said it was during seminary in the mid-1970s he first felt the call to missions in the Northwest, after hearing Alaska Baptist Convention executive Troy Prince speak of the needs.
Circumstances did not allow that call to be fulfilled immediately, but throughout years of ministry in Texas it was never forgotten. McKinney knew piloting skills would be valuable in the Northwest, for instance, so in one of his pastorates a friend taught him to fly and helped him get his license. And in a move to a church’s church-owned parsonage, he used the equity from a former home to buy his first airplane.
And his calling was never a secret in the churches where he served.
“Every time a church called me I always told them that some day I am going to missions work in the Northwest,” McKinney said.
Then in 1991 the opportunity came to serve as pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Missoula in western Montana. Three years later he was asked to serve as director of missions for the two associations that make up most of the state’s eastern half.
“I needed 22 years of experience as a pastor to know how to work with pastors, and to help them with the difficulties and situations in their churches,” he said. The experience also has been helpful in securing volunteers and partnering churches to help with the work.
The delay also provided another asset: the ability to acquire and fly a 1951 Piper Super Cub that is his primary means of transportation.
The two associations he leads comprise some 64,000 square miles, the largest area under any single director of missions in the country. The entire state of Mississippi could easily fit within its borders. Yet there are just 29 churches and missions combined, some nearly 70 miles from their nearest Southern Baptist church neighbors. One is 264 miles away from McKinney’s home.
McKinney regularly acts as a catalyst for churches to reproduce themselves in nearby communities.
“I say to the pastors, ‘You and I are going to develop a plan to start a Bible study, even if it’s just once a month,’” he said. The pastor will then lead the study, which eventually may grow to a weekly study, and if the people see the need a church eventually will take shape. McKinney himself is currently leading a Bible study near Cohagen, a small ranch community about 40 miles north of his home in Forsyth.
First Baptist Church, Jordan — the nearest town to Cohagen — was actually started as a mission First Baptist Church, Circle, some 67 miles away.
James “Budg” Riekeman, the pastor in Circle, “had already seen that need and was starting a Bible study, and then I came along and helped him,” McKinney said. “We eventually helped them constitute into a church and get a building.”
Despite the hardships of working in Montana, McKinney said the list of applicants is surprisingly long. The problem, he said, is that some pastors want to come for the wrong reasons: they need a change in their ministry, or the potential for adventure seems appealing. Then when the winters hit, and the excitement fades, they find themselves wanting to go home. Finding the ones who are truly called is the challenge. He even has written a 14-point list of things for prospective pastors to consider — published on the Montana Baptist Fellowship’s Web site.
In the end, however, those who are truly called stay and thrive. For Martha McKinney as well, that is what makes the difference.
“Just knowing that we’re doing what God has called us to do is of course rewarding,” she said. “Sometimes things don’t go how you hoped they would go … but overall it is a joy to see churches ministering to communities, and knowing that we have had a part in helping them.” (NAMB)
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