Becoming St. Timothy (2001) - St Timothy Presbyterian Church

(To view Korean subtitles on the video, click the “CC” button and select “한국어”.) This video is part of our 25th Anniversary: Community of the Word series. For more on the Community of the Word, please click here.

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The Search for a New Building

At Victoria Royce, which is in the downtown west side core, it was very difficult for people to come, so we were thinking of moving. Also, as I mentioned before, that took different presbyteries so we were not sure whether we would take over this building and also a huge building, the cost of maintenance was quite a bit too, so we’re kind of looking. But at that time, Young Mi, my wife, was a part of the West Toronto presbytery, and she found out that this church would come out for sale.

Before this church, there was actually another church, Bonar-Parkdale, that was right in Parkdale. I was very interested in that because my idea at that time for mission was city mission rather than overseas mission. I wanted to really bless the city and deal with situations that are going on in the city. And Parkdale was a very good area. So I contacted the session of Parkdale and they were very interested in giving their church or amalgamating or working together. There was a congregation so we got very close to getting that church. But, I don’t think our church was ready, it’s a very dangerous area and all that. There were a lot of concerns, so we gave up that idea, and then this church came out.

Moving to Etobicoke

At that time we put in a bid for 900,000 dollars. That $900,000 10 years ago, probably equals to $3 million or something today, but we got it for $900,000. The Christian Church in Canada, they gave us a $300,000 grant and a $100,000 10-year interest-free loan. And we also got 50,000 or 100,000 dollars from the Presbytery of West Toronto. So altogether, we paid only 400,000 or something like that.

I do remember, before the purchase of this building, coming to see the building. We had to make a decision whether it was good for our congregation and that was very exciting. I remember entering the sanctuary and being very wow-ed with the high ceilings and the way it looked. It was a new beginning with a new name and a new body of people.

We came to this church and, boy, people got so excited. The basement, all these different rooms, we built them. All our congregation members came out and built it. Even this floor, I built it, along with some other people – I was part of putting the floor down. So everybody was so excited about taking care of a new building, our own building that we owned. So they got so excited. A lot of people worked hard to build it.

But also, even though Bonar-Parkdale church was gone, I was very interested in city missions. So I contacted Evangel hall and we started a food bank. We did food bank every Thursday and had monthly hot meal service for the people. We are very interested in those kinds of city missions.

We also got a place in different areas like Teesdale and downtown, so we did inner city missions in different places.

What led the church to change its name to ‘St. Timothy’?

I mean, we still had the name north of Livingstone there, but people started calling in and they couldn’t find our church. We weren’t in North York, we were in the west end now. So, we realized it’s time to change our name. So we decided to hold a contest. People put in names, anonymously, and we chose. Actually, I put in the name St. Timothy. I don’t know how my name got chosen, but somehow my name got chosen. They might have known that I put it in!

I liked the name, Livingstone, but Timothy was a second generation. His mother was a Jew, his father was Greek – a coexistence model. I liked the name Timothy and also the meaning behind it, so I can put that name into the contest. I thought it kind of sounds like a Catholic or Anglican church name, but somehow they chose that name for our church. I still like the name.

Community of the Word: 25 Years of St. Timothy Presbyterian Church

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