Columbia Bible Institute: a shared school at Clearbrook

Columbia Bible Institute emerged in 1970 when British Columbia’s Mennonite Brethren and Conference of Mennonites combined their respective Bible schools. The Mennonite Brethren stream began with evening instruction at South Abbotsford Mennonite Brethren Church in 1936. It developed into a daytime school, briefly used the name Bethel Bible School, and later became Mennonite Brethren Bible Institute. Its merger partner was the separate Bethel Bible Institute associated with the Conference of Mennonites.

The new Columbia institution continued to develop its educational programs at Clearbrook, in the Abbotsford area. After strains in the original working agreement, the two conferences established full joint ownership and management in 1982. Provincial legislation passed on June 26, 1987, conferred college status, marking the transition to Columbia Bible College. The chart’s 1970 annotation records a concrete act of cooperation between church bodies, while the earlier schools explain the different communities that brought their teaching resources to that partnership.