Does a multiethnic church have to be intentional?

Question>> I’m about to launch an intentionally diverse church, and sometimes I get asked whether we should be intentionally diverse or just start and see whom God brings. Well, I have an answer as to why we want to seek being diverse and exemplify diversity on our leadership team. However, there are many churches that start off as Asian-American churches and seek to be diverse, yet only attract Asian-Americans. So, I was curious if you had any insight you’d like to share on this question to help me with a different perspective?

djchuang’s reply ::

As for becoming a multi-ethnic church, there are a couple of books that most clearly lays out the ingredients for such a church: David Anderson’s book Multicultural Ministry and Mark DeYmaz’ Building a Healthy Multi-Ethnic Church. And my web page at djchuang.com/multi has a lot of resources and articles and books that inform my thoughts about developing an intentionally diverse church.

So, in short, my answer is “yes” — it does take intentionality to become ethnically and racially diverse. It doesn’t happen by accident. If it just “naturally” happens (i.e. without intentionality), we’d see a lot more diversified church, wouldn’t we.

According to one study, more than 92% of all churches in the U.S. are segregated, with more than 80% of their membership representing a single race or ethnic group. I think that 92% is including Catholic and Protestant churches; less than 5% of evangelical churches are diverse, less than 2.5% of mainline Protestants. And, it’d be too overly simplistic to say that prayer and Bible study will diversify a church — most evangelical churches do that, and most are not diversified.

Now, what that intentionality looks like may be different from church to church, and depends on the cultural context of where the church is located.

Those are my top-of-mind thoughts. What would you add?

[update] also see (somewhat) related comment thread “Why are Asian American church leaders so obsessed with multi-ethnic church?” [@ randplaty.com] and “Is diversity a taboo subject within the church?” [@ daveingland.com]

August 20, 2008 | Filed Under dialogue 

Comments

Viewing 13 Comments

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    I've seen a few Chinese churches in the northeast say that they are "open" to becoming multi-cultural/ethnic. They might do simple things like take "Chinese" out of their church name or make their website English-based with a small link to translate it to Chinese. Or they might go as far as rewrite their purpose from reaching immigrant Chinese to reaching all people, or officially declare from their elder board that they "welcome people of all races."

    But when it comes to being intentional or proactive about trying to bring non-Chinese through the door, being "open to it" is not enough. For example, to spend the money to raise the quality of the sound system or bathrooms to the average non-Chinese church, to purposely bringing non-Chinese into leadership, or to tear down the majority of Chinese posters and signs in the lobby takes intentionality that isn't common in what I've seen.
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    I agree emphatically that it has to be intentional. We're trying to go down the multi-ethnicity route in my ministry context and it requires a lot of foresight and proactive leadership to steer the community to choose to live intentionally and cross-culturally. Left to our own, at best we would be a diverse group of people with shallow relationships, and at worst we would become a mono-cultural community.
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    When I was pastoring in Hawaii, a multi-ethnic church was the norm. We didn't intentionally try to be multi-ethnic, we just reflected the community we were in.

    I think that's a reasonable goal, to reflect the ethnic makeup of the community you are in. Or at least visit it as a way of a health indicator.

    at the same time, i don't see a mandate for being intentional about being a multi-ethnic church in scripture.
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    that can be a noble direction, but often our own cultural surrounds can colour what we see being the makeup of the surrounding community. that's why we can't just assume that what we create will be an accurate reflection. We can't view if from a distance to see if we are indeed painting a faithful picture of the community. Just not possible to be that objective. That's why intentionality is needed. Efforts need to be made, not to be more objective, but to be more open to what might be uncomfortable or "other" to ourselves.

    and the mandate is found in our call to be disciples of our god who is "bringing the kingdom." a healing and restoring of the whole world kingdom that includes the healing and restoring of racial divisions, not in a bland, melting pot style, but in a bright, artful, mosaic style.

    thanks so much for this post, DJ. It's an inspiration to me and the direction we are moving in and around toronto
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    basically agreeing with dj except with a slight spin. what is a church for? one useful contrast might be to ask yourself where you fall on this spectrum.

    is it a refuge, a retreat, a place to get away from the brokenness of the world and be with god?

    is it a command post in the front line of the struggle to live justly, walk humbly and love god.

    if we like the retreat model of church, then someplace where we don't have to fight for our status as full humans, where we can just be humans and be with god, sounds like a great idea.

    if it is a command post, the questions aren't, "is it safe, is it comfortable", but "is it effective in helping us struggle".
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    Good topic DJ, because it applies to all ethnicities not just Asians.

    Let men encourage your friend to contact Asian pastors who have walked the path he is about to undetake. Pastors Gibbon and Fong started out ministering to the second generation Asians. They later became multi-ethnic congregations. Pastor Lee planted a multi-ethnic church. Their insights should be very helpful.

    David Gibbons, NewSong Church, Irvine, CA (newsong.net)
    Ken Fong, Evergreen Baptist church of Los Angeles (EBCLA.org)
    Ed Lee, Mosaic Community Covenant Church, Sugarland, TX (mosaicpeople.org)

    The beauty of a church plant is that you don't have to worry about changing any old traditions, just starting new ones.
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    Thanks all for your comments so far. I hope this isn't striking a nerve, but neither do I want to rehash an old topic that's already been in conversations for years.

    Vince is right that many (most?) churches in Hawaii are already multi-ethnic, and from my one-time exposure to Hawaiian culture, that seems to be the default in Hawaii.

    My vote for intentionality being required for a diversifying multiethnic church is particularly required in continental 48 U.S. states, where people shop and work and go to school in diversified settings, but the majority of churches are segregated.

    Astute readers will notice that I did not address the Asian American aspect of the question.

    For that, I'd refer you to this randplaty.com blog post and comment thread titled Why are Asian American church leaders so obsessed with multi-ethnic church?
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    The church I attend now, Citylife Presbyterian Church in downtown Boston (in the Redeemer network -- geared towards young professionals) is an interesting example of a primarily Asian-American church that has become multiethnic. The senior pastor is Korean-American and the church started six years ago primarily with Asian-Americans (and mostly Korean-Americans). But our pastor wanted to move towards a multiethnic church, so he hired Caucasian Pastoral staff (today, in addition to him, there are 3 Caucasian and 1 Chinese-American full-time staff members). In addition, the church intentionally tries to reflect diversity in all leadership positions (ministry directors, community group leaders, etc.) Today, the church, with about 500 attenders, is 50% Asian-American (a good mix of Korean and Chinese), 45% Caucasian, and 5% other. Unlike some churches I've heard of, ethnicity is not talked about a lot in sermons, worship services, etc. It is not avoided (the church has had workshops on diversity and race), but multiethnicity is not intentionally pushed through the pulpit.
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    I would have to say both - intentionality and see who God brings. I think Jim Cymbala argues for whoever God brings, while others argue for intentionality. We at Connection Community Church have practiced both. I think being Asian and having an African-American wife and diverse leadership team have been beneficial to us, but overall, we just tryin to make disciples of whoever.

    Overall, I think people are looking for true community and love. They are looking for a community where God is changing lives.
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    Homo proponit, sed Deus disponit. Or in other words, "Man proposes, and God disposes." We can prepare for a multi-ethnic church and pray that God grants us that desire (Prov. 16:9), but ultimately, God will direct the focus and character of that church. I started in a multi-ethnic evangelical church, moved to a single-ethnic evangelical church, attended a single-ethnic semi-evangelical church that had hopes of becoming multi-ethnic, and now I'm back at a multi-ethnic evangelical church.

    IMHO, the successful multi-ethnic churches never focused on ethnic "outreach." They focused on Christ over culture, and thereby attracted a multi-ethnic following simply because of the quality of their teaching. The first single-ethnic church I mentioned succeeded in its evangeli because it rcal role because it recognized that 1st Gen As-Ams needed to develop their spiritual identity concomitant with maintaining their ethnic one (it also didn't hurt to be located among a significant number of As-Ams). The second didn't succeed in its efforts because many 1st Gens didn't sign on to the new multi-ethnic "vision" which bore the risk of expanding their comfort zone.

    So consider yourselves blessed to be able to start afresh! :-)
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    Here at Village Baptist Church (mentioned in Mark De Ymaz's book), intentionality is certainly a keyword for us in transforming a 50-year old middle class Caucasian church into a multicultural church that consists of a vibrant mix of American, Korean, Hispanic, Chinese, and Indian groups of Christians (along with a few more ethnic groups) worshipping and fellowshiping together.
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    To the best of my understanding, according to scripture, being multi-ethnic is an incidental reality that happens to reflect the demographic makeup of the surrounding community (cf. church in Antioch). Intentionality, rather, lies in the fact that through the gospel we should no longer recognize anyone according to their physical or external attributes (cf. 2 Cor 5).

    The fact that more churches are not multi-ethnic, especially in this day and age, has more to do with 1) the marginalization of gospel proclamation--both in word and in deed--of the local churches; and 2) the difficulties of integrating cultures and overcoming traditions... It also doesn't help that many churches disguise their missional ineffectiveness by drawing commuters through their wealth of "programs".

    On the other hand, if we truly take the gospel and its gracious blessings to our neighborhoods, God will draw and redeem our neighbors to Himself from all walks of life. Granted, not all of them will join our spiritual community, but many will simply as result of our investment in their spiritual pilgrimage.

    Therefore, it is my earnest expectation, that should God so graciously compel and empower us in our Christ-formation and Christ-proclamation, many faithful churches will become multi-ethnic because their neighborhoods are multi-ethnic.

    Grace to you,
    Raymond C.

    p.s. A quick word about me. I am a pastor at Sunset Church in San Francisco. While Sunset Church still identifies closer to a traditional ethnic (Chinese) church, she brought me on board a year ago in order to facilitate a paradigm shift in our understanding of the gospel and its implications for how Christ lives in and through us for the good of the world. Our yet-to-be official visionary slogan is "Christ in Your Life and in Your World." While the road ahead is daunting, I am thankful that most of my leaders are open to reclaim a gospel-center vision for the church, as well as to the potential alteration to our "ethnic" makeup in the future. Please pray for us when God does bring us to mind, for this is no small challenge within a large, established, bi-lingual church. Thanks.
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    Like attracts like! If you have an Asian American pastor you will likely end up with an Asian American congregation - even down to the percentage of Chinese or Koreans. The visibility is so strong that it may discourage others from joining. Starting off intentionally diverse helps but there are many factors like the location of the church, friends of the group, etc.
 

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