"IEMELIF REFORM MOVEMENT HISTORY"

The history of the IEMELIF church dates back to the turbulent 1900’s, a time when the Philippines was still under colonial rule. During the previous century, the Spaniards controlled not only the government, but every sector of society as well, including church affairs.

A time came when Filipinos asked, and later fought for the right of Filipino priests to run Filipino churches. The Spaniards rejected this petition and even executed its three main proponents, the famous GomBurZa – Father Jose Burgos, Father Mariano Gomez and Father Jacinto Zamora.

When the Americans came, many things changed, but the situation in churches remained the same. Filipino Christians had little to do with the way the churches were run, even though they compromised majority of its members.

In time, discontentment and resentment at foreign leadership became widespread. Filipinos upheld the belief that they were capable of leading and governing a church on their own. Coupled with a sense o nationalism, a group of Christians declared their independence from American influence, led by the first ordained Filipino Protestant pastor, Pastor Nicolas Jacinto Zamora.

On February 28, 1909, the group established the first all-Filipino church, which became known as IEMELIF. This stands for Iglesia Evangelica Methodista en las Islas Filipinas (Evangelical Methodist Church in the Philippine Islands). It was the first indigenous Protestant church in the Philippines, and Pastor Zamora became its first bishop and general superintendent.

The church grew mostly in Luzon throughout the years. In 1992, some events led to the establishment of a faction within IEMELIF – the IRM or the IEMELIF REFORM MOVEMENT. The church started out with 105 congregations, daughter churches and mission points. IRM is also known as I AM Redeemer and Master Christian Fellowship. Rev. Reynaldo C. Domingo became its first Chairman. He was consecrated Bishop on March 10, 2001, and continues to be the head of the IRM Church.

2002 is a monumental year for IRM Church not only because it celebrated its 10th year as a group, but more significantly, IRM experienced a missions breakthrough when the IRM Foreign Missions Dept. was formed. A new challenge was given to us – that is to expand our boundaries and make His name shine brighter, reaching all possible territory for God’s glory.

The latest available data for 2003 shows that the number of IRM churches and mission points has ballooned to 368, marking a 250% increase in the number of IRM churches. Through its aggressive evangelistic and church planting efforts, IRM is now in 33 cities and 33 provinces of the Philippines.

The numbers of workers – pastors, deaconesses, volunteer workers, missionaries and missionary trainees – has also grown from 124 in 1992 to 444 today, an increase of 258%.

And today, January 11, 2004, we have reached another milestone in our vision and calling as a church. We are here to witness the launching of IRM Global Harvesters Foundation Inc.

Now is the perfect time to claim what is His, by spreading His light to all possible corners, and sharing His love to as many unreached souls we can reach.

Now is the moment to go beyond our limits, to cross over boundaries, and be bold enough to testify, that God is still alive and He is at work up to this day.

In this day and age, when life seems to get harder and harder each day and when hope seems to be the hardest thing to claim, we Christians should overcome barriers and cross boundaries and make God known, make God’s presence felt, and make God’s love alive to all nations.

BREAKING THROUGH BARRIERS AND BOUNDARIES FOR GLOBAL HARVEST. This is the challenge. This is the commandment. This is our commission.


@PASTOR ROLAND C. ROBLES