1975-1978 | Pastor Harry Jackson
For more than a quarter of a century, Northwest Bible Baptist Church has blazed
a trail over the rocky terrain of opposition and forded the raging rivers of
tribulation. Pastor Harry Jackson and his family came from Rochester, New York,
in 1974 with a burden to start a fundamental, independent, Biblically-separated,
soul-winning Baptist church in Chicago’s barren northern suburbs. With God’s
grace, Pastor Jackson established a small but solid foundation of dedicated
families in the church, grounded them in God’s Word and in soul-winning, and
began a fledgling bus ministry.
1978-1982 | Pastor Larry Waye
When Pastor Jackson later resigned to accept a
call from a church in California, Pastor Larry Waye came from Cleveland in 1978
to lead the young church on for the Lord. Seeing the need for a Bible-based
education for the families’ children, he started a Christian school, added a
second bus route to reach more boys and girls, expanded the church’s missionary
program, and moved the church’s soul-winning emphasis to the northwestern
suburbs.
1982-present | Pastor Keith Gomez
When Pastor Waye left in 1982 to join the staff of the same Rochester
church from which Pastor Jackson came, a young but mature Bible school graduate
accepted God’s call to pastor the Northwest Bible Baptist Church. After hearing
Pastor Keith Gomez’ first message, the church folks knew that a zeal for right
living and a passion for souls would be key themes of his ministry. Red-hot
preaching kept their feet to the fire and their hearts yielded to the Holy
Spirit.
The visionary young preacher rallied the small remaining flock of the
then-struggling church. Withstanding the winds of hell, it grew from thirty-one
members in 1982 to a high day of 1,031 only five years later. And on the
10th-year anniversary of Pastor Gomez’ ministry, God gave the increase with a
record-setting attendance of 2,281 on a Big Day!
Vision Unlimited
During the first decade of
Northwest Bible Baptist Church’s life, it had met in houses and rented schools
in three different suburbs. Finally, in 1985, under the inspiration and
leadership of Dr. Gomez, the people gave sacrificially to a “Vision Unlimited”
building fund program where everyone could give something - not equal gifts, but
equal sacrifice. That Program permitted the congregation to move into its own
real “church building” for the first time. (This “VU” program is now a renowned
tool that Dr. Gomez has used across the country to help many other churches in
building projects in order to facilitate their growing ministries, too.)
By
1995, Northwest Bible Baptist Church had far outgrown that church plant. Unable
to expand on that small site of only three acres, God led Dr. Gomez and his
congregation of then-several-hundred in a miraculous relocation thirty-two miles
west, to the far northwest Elgin area, where a new 45,000 square foot church
campus was constructed (still with “Vision Unlimited” funds paying the way).
Today and the future
In
its present 16-acre location in the beautiful rolling countryside on Nesler Road
in rural Elgin, Illinois, Northwest Bible Baptist Church continues to expand the
ministries started under Dr. Gomez’ leadership and to add new outreaches that
broaden with the horizon of his vision - all with the same right-living zeal and
soulwinning passion that have served as its guiding themes over the years. The
church, a Gospel lighthouse all over Chicago’s northwestern suburbs, now
launches life boats for disadvantaged children with thirteen bus routes; for
nursing home residents in eight locations; for thousands of homes in need of
Christ; for hundreds of young men in two prisons; for Spanish-speaking folks
with a distinct Spanish Department; and for the lost on over seventy home and
foreign mission fields. Church members from ten different soul-winning groups
rescue the perishing every day of the week. Preaching with zeal and fire from
God’s Bible blueprint, Dr. Gomez’ dedicated determination has helped build this
lighthouse that sheds its bright beam from Elgin to Rockford to Aurora to
Chicago and every outlying region within reach.
…A light that also shines over
the church’s Christian School (pre-K-12), Northwest Baptist Academy; over
Providence Baptist College that opened in August, 1998, with a miracle
enrollment, training pastors, evangelists, missionaries, Christian school
educators, and church/school office staff; over a National “God Save America”
and Youth Revival Conference, a Midwest Ladies’ Conference, a Midwest Teen
Leadership Conference, and a Midwest Legal Seminar; over an “Aquila and
Priscilla” Friendship Ministry and a “Mentoring Man” Ministry for boys without
dads in their homes; over King’s Kids, Stepping Stones for young girls, and a
“Food Pantry” and “Clothes Closet” for the needy; over thirty-five graded Sunday
School classes, an instrumental music ministry, four choirs, and five summer
camps for all ages; and over a Christian Book Store, a tape and publication
ministry, an old-fashioned Camp Meeting, and summer Vacation Bible School. Since
1982, in the first 19 years of Pastor Gomez’ ministry, over 21,580 souls have
been rescued because of the Northwest Bible Baptist Church lighthouse, with over
11,250 following the Lord in believer’s baptism. The intense driving force of
this Man of God, preaching the Word of God, leads this church to follow the Will
of God, to reach everyone possible, in the right way, with the Gospel light of
Jesus Christ!