Welcome Home

You will often see and hear the words “Welcome Home” within the BVC community. To us, welcome home embodies our desire to bring those who are looking for somewhere to belong into a community that will love them, protect them and help them grow. Jesus radically welcomed everyone, no matter circumstance or life stage, into a heart and soul changing relationship. We like His model.
The Billings Vineyard community is inspired by two passages in the Bible. God revealed these scriptures to us as our mission and reason for existing in Billings, Montana.

Our Mission

Teach people about Jesus and help them teach others • Matthew 28:18-20

Our Reason

Comfort the broken and make a clear path to the healing Jesus has for us all • Isaiah 40:1-31

Love God. Love People.

We are a Christian church. This means we hold to the orthodox beliefs of Christianity, though as missionaries, we want to communicate those beliefs in a way people can understand them. There is nothing new here. We are trying to be faithful to the work and call of Jesus’ for His church which has been in existence for 2000 years. The truth is true, no matter how old it is!

There are certain beliefs that are non-negotiable:

• The Bible is our authority.

• Jesus, God’s only son, died so that we could be forgiven and live in a loving relationship with God, the Father.

• Jesus was resurrected from the dead, vindicating Him as God incarnate.

• He will return on the day of resurrection, raising those in Him from the dead to be His bride.

• The Holy Spirit is His down payment for our salvation and the One who gives us power to be His witnesses.

• The church is Jesus’ hands and feet in this world. We have been given important work to do. Work that is not only worth dying for, but more over, worth living for. That work is to spread the love of God to anyone who wants it. So we are called to love other people, shown through serving them and our community.

There are perhaps other items of importance, and certainly other items which we could argue about (negotiables), though arguing never has been an effective way to convince anyone of anything. Some things the Bible leaves to us to figure out—“on the job training.”

Allen and Jennie Hodges moved to Billings in 2005 to plant the Billings Vineyard Church.

Allen has been pastoring since 1983, and has been part of the Vineyard movement since 1986. Allen has a B.A. from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon and a M.Div. from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. In addition to pastoring, he was a writer for Jet Propulsion Lab’s Magellan Mission (mapping the surface of Venus) and was an Assistant Professor at the University of Nebraska where he taught, among other things, critical thinking and entrepreneurship. He also started an Economic Development Corporation for the Medicine Valley in Nebraska.

Allen served the Vineyard as an Area Pastoral Care Leader for the Northern plains for several years before moving to Billings. He now serves as the Regional Overseer for Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas and Idaho.

Jennie is involved with the church outreach programs.

Though Allen has wanted to live in Montana his entire life, he never thought he could pursue living here simply because God kept calling him elswhere. In May of 2004, his Regional Overseer (Tri Robinson of the Boise Vineyard) suggested he and Jennie plant a Vineyard in Billings. After a summer praying about it, they both sensed God saying to “Go.” When God says that He gives us the desires of our hearts, it means less that He gives us what we want and more that He puts into us the desire to do what He is saying. In short, Allen wasn’t born in Montana, but he got here as soon as he could!

At the end of the first summer here (2005) they gathered a group of people to help plant the church and taught them the Vineyard core values. October 9, 2005 was the church’s first open meeting in the Hodges’ home. By the spring of 2006, the church began to grow steadily and has continued to grow ever since. Each season of growth has led to different locations, from warehouses, to parks, school buildings and store fronts (our current location is in the North Pointe shopping center at the far north end of town). In June 2011, we purchased land on Hwy. 87N where we intend to build a permanent home in the near future.

As a church, we long to be a safe place where people come to grow, heal and become more like Jesus. We hope to be organic, meaning we do the things that God calls us to do (not what we "should" be doing). Some reaccuring programs have been Financial Peace Univeristy, watercolor classes, open mic nights/coffee house events, dinner groups and various bible studies.

We have been working at learning to serve the poor and were the first group in Montana to offer "Getting Ahead in a Just Gettin by World" a part of Bridges out of Poverty. We are committed to the Ecuador Partnership and are helping to plant Vineyard Churches there. We have kid’s ministry, called the Great Adventure, with a goal of fully integrating our kids into the work of the Kingdom and the life of the church.

The Billings Vineyard Church is part of:
 

The Montana Vineyard Area

Montana currently has five Vineyard churches: Billings, Bozeman, Belgrade, Dillon and Great Falls.
The Montana Area is led by Zane & Cathleen Springer from Dillon, Montana.

which is part of…
 

The Big Sky Region

The Big Sky Region contains the Vineyard churches is Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas.
The Big Sky Regional Leader is Allen Hodges (hey…I know him!).
www.VineyardBigSkyRegion.org

which is part of…
 

The Association of Vineyard Churches, USA (AVCUSA)

The Big Sky Region is one of sixteen regions within the VineyardUSA. Over 600 Vineyard churches are active today in the United States.
Our National Director is Phil Strout from Lewiston, Maine.
www.VineyardUSA.org

which is part of…
 

The Vineyard International Consortium (VIC)

The Vineyard Movement is a global family of 2400+ churches in 90+ countries around the world. Over 3000K people call a Vineyard church their home worldwide.
www.Vineyard.org