James Kolb Stauffer, 94, who with his wife Arlene initiated the Vietnam Mennonite Mission ministry in 1957, died on Nov. 13 in Harrisonburg, Va.

Stauffer graduated from Eastern Mennonite College in 1953 and accepted an invitation to pastor Sonnenberg Mennonite Church in Kidron, Ohio. He married Arlene Krupp in 1954.

Responding to an invitation from Eastern Mennonite Missions to begin an evangelistic ministry in Vietnam, the couple arrived in Saigon in 1957. They traveled widely during their years of language study, establishing friendships with pastors of the Evangelical Church of Vietnam and preaching.

“James’ collaborative relationships with the Evangelical Church of Vietnam helped foster warm acceptance of Mennonites in Vietnam that are felt to the present day,” said Gerry Keener, former EMM president and current nonresident missionary to Vietnam.

The Stauffers began their evangelistic work primarily among young people, teaching the gospel in English and Vietnamese. As EMM increased its personnel in Vietnam, Stauffer served as chair of the mission, encouraging them with joy and humor in a war-plagued country.

The couple led a community center, established in 1964, which included a daycare center, library and English language classes, and later a large primary school to serve children unable to attend school. As a church developed, Stauffer served as pastor until Tran Xuan Quang was ordained in 1969. The Stauffer family spent eight months in Hong Kong in 1965 to help develop the mission program there.

Vietnam was at war during Stauffer’s entire tenure in Vietnam. When the war intensified in the mid-1960s, the entire mission team publicly called on the United States to change its policies. After the war ended in 1975, the Stauffers served in the Philippines from 1976 to 1978. He and Arlene then served as co-pastors of Weaver’s Mennonite Church in Harrisonburg.

Arlene died of cancer in 1985. In 1987 James married Ruth LaVerne Yoder, who had served in Vietnam as a nurse. They supported the development of the Vietnamese church in Honolulu, Hawaii, from 1989 to 1995.

He is survived by his wife, Ruth; three children, John (Mary Beth), Rose (Leslie Kille) and Carl (Carolyn) Stauffer; five grandchildren, and one great-grandchild.