Sammie Oh - Church #1

Sammie Oh - Church Visit #1

Wheaton Chinese Alliance Church

1748 South Blanchard Street

26 February 2014

Different Ethnic Category(Chinese-American)

Describe the worship service you attended. How was it similar to or different from your regular context?

 Walking into the building was an interesting experience. The light green wall did not feel cohesive with the general set-up of the place. It seemed it was in the midst of getting revamped with its modern looking ceiling light fixtures but missing toilet tank lids and interesting color combinations in the basement. An usher opened the door for us as we walked into the building and we found seats in the dome-shaped chapel. The serviced start at 10:07am and people slowly trickled in during the worship. I recognized a handful of them from school. 10 minute lateness is a cultural norm though some people come early to have fellowship. This is true in most of the churches I’ve worshipped with. Having attended many Korean-American Churches, that occasionally held combined English and Korean services, I was used to hearing a message and worshiping in multiple languages. 

What did you find most interesting or appealing about the worship service?

 I appreciated that the purpose of that particular service was to build unity within the different language-speaking congregations. They do not do it every week but allow each member to attend to the service they can best understand. To have an occasional joint service encourages relationships to form between the different congregations by way of hearing the same message together and getting to fellowship before and afterward. They had a moment set aside to welcome new members or visitors (aka me and two others), and we were greeted by everyone as if they were one congregation. I wonder if I had stayed longer after to socialize, how many new people I would have met and got to know simply by saying hello and if people would initiate conversations with me if I just stood there in the midst of the talking crowd.

What did you find most disorienting or challenging about the worship service?

I found worshiping in different languages at the same time difficult mostly because I could not hear the English worship leader. During the more hymn-like songs it was difficult to know the melody and rhythm and I found myself unable to sing but or completely miss notes. However, they had all the songs in both Chinese and English so I could understand all the meaning being the songs. There were also some a little more contemporary worship songs that I knew. The male worship leader was the only one singing in English and it was hard to hear him and his guitar. His voice was drowned out by the two Chinese sopranos singing very high and loud. Even though it is not the first time I have worshiped in this manner, I still found it distracting at times and wishing there was another way.

What aspects of Scripture or theology did the worship service illuminate for you that you had not perceived as clearly in your regular context?

I do not think the different context itself illuminated any aspects of Scripture or theology that I could not or would not have perceived as clearly in any previous church. The message of forgiveness, however, was very applicable to me and regardless of the culture I am in, when the truth of God’s Word is preached, it does not fail to make a difference. As different as Chinese and Korean culture is, there are probably many similarities between the two when compared to the greater American culture that we live in. Especially where there are many differences involved and potential misunderstandings, there needs to be a lot of grace and forgiveness. In America, many minority cultures have known the oppression of their culture by either the greater (as in majority) American cultures or other cultures in the States.