Now retired Friendship Baptist Church pastor David Klass and his wife Cathy, both Montana City residents, recently traveled to South Africa, where they visited a Baptist mission near Cape Town that David founded over 35 years ago. The Klasses helped to establish an orphanage that now serves over 800 children across the Southern Cape. The orphanage houses children in a collection of bungalows, with each assigned a “granny,” a native adult mentor responsible for the supervision of six to eight children at a time. Children are given specific chores and domestic responsibilities, while also attending local schools.
“The solutions we applied there can be done anywhere,” said David. “And that’s what we’re trying to do: not just here (Montana), but everywhere. What we came away with is that no matter where you are in the world, people have similar problems.” While visiting, David gave several sermons to children under the orphanage’s care, provided community service, and traveled throughout South Africa.
The Klasses explained that they were first “called” to service in South Africa in the late 1990s, in wake of damage sustained to tribal and urban population centers by the AIDS epidemic and social difficulties in restructuring a post-apartheid society. David and Kathy, in addition to aiding the orphanage, have been most recently focused on serving South African communities impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“No nation evangelizes another nation,” said Friendship Baptist missionary committee member Jon Polly. “We work to establish and empower local pastors in these locations, so that they can speak to their people. The missionaries are actually trying to work themselves out of the job, so a local minister can take over.” The Friendship Baptist Church has sponsored and chartered missions across the U.S. and in more than 20 other countries. Friendship Baptist is unique in that its missionary work does not fall under guidance from any external organization, which, according to Polly, gives the church the freedom and independence to choose which locations to support.
“There are a lot of difficulties in keeping missions going, especially the costs,” said Polly. “We are learning how to help the missionaries develop national pastors in new ways, and by providing encouragement.”
